If the boot requires a face, and the face is humanity's -- it is really only outer party members who feel its full force.
The inner party is at one with the system. They know how it operates, its actual purpose. They are insane but do not live in tension with the external environment. It suits them.
The proles experience deprivation -- but their wretched state belies the way their collective actions prop the system up entirely. Their massive unconsciousness and focus on mundane day-to-day concerns destroys any possibility of change, as the will energy of the majority gets siphoned away. Their breeding furnishes the necessary workers and foot soldiers, and they are left alone to think and do whatever their limited awareness allows.
The outer party is where you go to suffer, basically. Meticulously controlling everything you say and do, bearing the agony of permanent surveillance and the threat of disappearance. Constantly monitoring the propaganda, its facts and logic, never being able to stand against it or display even momentary doubt or lack of conviction.
If George Orwell makes this point, either directly in the text or by implication -- was he simply recreating a situation he had witnessed during his own life?
Cheerio mates..
Yes. This relates to the idea Orwell outlines as Goldstein in “The Theory and Practice of Oligarchical Collectivism”. All the revolutions of history are, in the opinion of Ingsoc, the middle class recruiting the lower class to remove the current upper class. Therefore, it is logical for the Inner party to view the outer party as their biggest domestic threat.
This is a really good question. Orwell may have been commenting on revolutionary theory. Marxism put(s) its faith in worker revolts; the proletariat will overthrow the bourgeoisie and achieve utopia. Winston has a similar revelation: “If there is any hope, it lies in the proles.” With the inner party’s immiserating the proles, rendering them incapable of abstract thought, the party has vanquished any threat of working-class rebellion. The inner party has pacified the proles such that it doesn’t have to intensively monitor them. The Marxist dream is dead. According to Orwell, then, any hope is lost. Such is his underlying theme.
I suppose the worst case might be -- a proletariat gets in on it, or is so affected by immiseration (excellent word choice) that it becomes functionally inseparable from the elites.
Lumpenproletariat
So I do understand where the idea that immiseration equals pacification comes from, but I don't think it's anywhere near as straightforward as Orwell seems to think. If that was universally true, then you would expect to find much less social unrest in the third world compared to the first world. But empirically speaking, the exact opposite seems to be the case.
This is the fundamental tension. A comfortable working class is an empowered working class; they can strike without fear of homelessness, they can get the day off to vote, they have extra time to engage politically, and they are better informed of national and global events. However, a miserable poor is angrier; they are motivated to action. Which case is likelier to spark political progression?
This is an interesting view point but why are the Inner Party ‘insane’? They know 2+2 = 5 or 4 as the party requires. This is cognitive dissonance - it is used extensively in advertising to existing customers.
It is a psychological tension from holding contradictory beliefs or values, like buying a family car brand that this very expensive because it is ’sporty’ rather than cheapest for getting around in. People resolve this conflict by changing beliefs, justifying actions, or minimizing importance and focusing on the status or ‘sporty’ qualities of the family run around they bought. Cognitive dissonance is seen as a sign of high intelligence or maturity, allowing for embracing ambiguity.
The inner party use their Cognitive Dissonance to actively maintain their personal position, they are manipulated by their role to maintain the status quo because they know they can be pushed out of the inner party. Worse, if they stop they could be given a show trial and executed like the Soviets under Stalin or Hitlers Nazis. Orwell was very familiar with both formats but also in miniature form when he was in Spain and he was affected by the purging of the POUM in Barcelona - it is all covered in Homage to Catalonia.
My belief with the 'insanity' aspect is I suppose -- if you awaken from sleep each morning as a tiny point of consciousness, then go about your day full of a desire to enslave, punish, humiliate the beings that appear around you -- you are not well, ie in a natural state unaffected by various traumas etc 🤷♂️ and nobody without such a desire could participate so actively in a system that creates this.
Of course the elite wake up each day full of desire to enslave, punish and humiliate the beings around them; what do you think drives DJ Trump? There is nothing wrong with him according to lots of doctors and he’s taken 3 cognitive tests and ‘aced them’ all. What about the other members of the Inner Party, the leaders of ICE, the military and cabinet? They are clear eyed working their way through the list and are not insane. They are shoring up their places, making money hand over fist and abusing their power as much as they can before they’re chucked out again and they are indicted by the new administration.
Because they're deliberately cultivating mental illnesses in themselves. Specifically (at least) the Dark Triad.
It is just cognitive dissonance - we all have it - we all live full lives with it. For them it is life or death. For us it is the silly fripperies we delude our selves as we throw out a perfectly functional 42 inch TV for a 80 inch Megalotron with 16k reality enhanced colour and instant replay.
...No, the Dark Triad is not "cognitive dissonance". Your mistake is that you seem to think I'm talking about Doublethink. I'm not. (Although Doublethink also isn't quite the same thing as cognitive dissonance.)
Oddly specific, but also funnily off the mark. I don't know what owning a TV has to do with the Dark Triad.
I don’t recall. Orwell ever using the phrase “dark triad” nor being aware of the concept in 1948, it being a further 20 years away from 1984, being a theory of this century. The tv is, I think, an apt example because of the consumer society of today we live in - unlike the ordered world of 1984. The cost of a telescreen is mentioned by Mr Charrington. This is the book 1984 about social order not psychiatry.
Pretty unlikely, given that the term was coined in 2002 (although the terms psychopathy, narcissism and Macchiavellianism have been around for longer). And? That doesn't stop contemporary readers from applying our current understanding of psychiatry and medical psychology to the text and coming to the conclusion that the Inner Party deliberately cultivates these mental illnesses in its members. This isn't even Death of the Author, this is just bog-standard reading of a text against the background of one's own scientific understanding.
You know it is a work of fiction from the mid 20th Century written in the immediate aftermath of the Second World War in 25 years? You’re completely missing that the television Orwell had seen at the BBC in the 1940s did not have a transistor. Not invented for nearly 20 years. The application of modern science on a work of fiction may be a personally enhanced experience for you. Some of us who enjoy fiction - prefer to recognize the reality of where we are and acknowledge the limitations of its source material and period.
What does any of that even mean?! The question was whether the Inner Party cultivates insanity / mental illness in its members. The answer to that is still Yes and nothing you're saying is even a contribution to that conversation.
I thought I was clear. The inner party is not insane. It is a rational operator applying the levers of power on a controlled society.
You are inappropriately bludgeoning a very modern concept - that you like - into an old work of fiction where doesn’t apply. Further, you are arguing with a fan who enjoys the book for what it is - a mid 20th Century work of fiction.
For what purpose?
The absence of Love is the Boot.
There's always the chance an Outer Party member can be promoted if they show drive, ambition and loyalty to Big Brother.
Imagine how amazing it would be to be promoted to the Inner Party in this society.