Life, Liberty, Happiness
not gone yet
Good signage is essential. I look to signs to navigate from here to there. More and more, these guides are not so clear. Saved by GPS, nobody would dare ask for directions as we once did without shame before the internet.
I grew up at a time when liberty was taken for granted. Graduating high school in 1970, I felt fairly free to do as I pleased—say anything. Of course, I did not know much either, had not arrived at the truism about the more you know, the less you know mentioned in my last post. Younger generations have embraced the notion that people born in the 1950s and 60s had some magical clearcut path set out for them to accrue financial and personal success. Likely true for some, but there were also fewer choices/options. Life has always been hard, but I did have a greater sense of safety at that time, something that has been lost.
As I watch the new Ken Burns program about The American Revolutionary War and we approach the 250-year anniversary of the United States, I am also considering another a documentary about George Orwell. Like others, I find myself generally consumed with the drama of our time. Both shed light on all this as another revolution is brewing behind doors and screens. Americans have had it with outlaw governing that has little regard for The People or The Constitution.
If there is one uniting principle, it is liberty. People on the right and the left and in the middle tend to treasure the idea of liberty (freedom & independence) … or so they say. Evidence often counters this with the more realistic view that many unknowingly submit to being told what to think, believe and prefer. Public life has always been a managed arrangement between power and liberty.
As a visual person who maintains thoughts and influences in the world of art, I want to share a related bit of information. The artist Marcel Duchamp (1887-1968) submitted a commercial porcelain urinal to an exhibition of the Society of Independent Artists in 1917 and titled it Fountain. When it was not rejected by the exhibition committee for the show at the Grand Palace, the urinal stood on view and there was a shift in the way we view art. He explained…
If I call it art; or if I hang it in a museum, it’s art.
A basic premise was established. The public can be trained to accept a lot—ways to think, value and accept. Author George Orwell’s writing offers cautionary tales of how totalitarian governments take over. We’ve all heard the metaphor about a frog in a pot of water boiling ever so gradually that it does not even notice.
Tim wrote on this t-shirt for NO KINGS DAY last summer…
Anyone who read George Orwell’s 1949 book titled 1984 will recognize the conundrum of two plus two. According to math, five is incorrect. Orwell insists that a lie told often enough tends to instill belief and acceptance:
‘2 + 2 = 5’ frightens me more than bombs
When untruths are spun into facts, the meaning of life becomes convoluted—small lies are regarded as no different that significant ones.
There are also film versions of the novel (1956 and 1984). The more recent one features John Hurt as the central character, Winston Smith, a civil servant struggling to maintain sanity as a government regime persecutes individual thinking. The Ministry of Truth is the central institution responsible for manipulation of information and history and the embodiment of the party’s control over truth and reality.
Also central to Orwell’s work is his earlier 1945 novella, Animal Farm, a look at what happens when a group of farm animals overthrow their human farmer only to be treated worse by a group of ruling pigs—curious in relation to the recent ‘foot in mouth’ cruelty (Quiet Piggy) spoken by someone who might have behaved more dignified. Film adaptations were released in 1954 and 1999. A new star-studded version is arriving in January 2026.
ORWELL 2 + 2 = 5, the new documentary directed by Raoul Peck looks at the life and work of Eric Arthur Blair (1903-1950…AKA George Orwell) in clips from the two films and narration taken from Orwell’s diary. Layered throughout are clips from conflicts around the globe, and parallels with recent movements—Black Lives Matter, No Kings, Artificial Intelligence, and Surveillance Capitalism.
The film emphasizes Mediacracy (not meritocracy or mediocracy) as the impact of media on culture and the voting public as they (we) receive messaging designed to tell instruct what to think (what to buy). We are all familiar with the repetition of fabricated phrasing over and over (and repetition of tv commercials, as if once was not maddening enough).
Reframe lies to sound truthful. Bend murder, mistreatment and brutality into a shape of respectability—trick us into efficiently accepting all the words without pushback.
…………Legal use of force = police brutality
…………Stimulus package = handouts to the wealthy
…………Tax optimization = legal tax evasion
One of the well-known takeaways from the Orwell book of knowledge is the idea of Big Brother is Watching. Those of us born in the 1950s have been hearing that one for a very long time. Here for real now in the form of algorithms and A.I.
……….War is Peace
……….Freedom is Slavery
……….Ignorance is Strength
As Orwell imagined what was coming from the perspective of the 1940s, a character in his 1984 book said this…
If you want a vision of the future, Winston—imagine a boot stamping on a face forever.
Harsh. True for anyone taken by ICE, forced out of housing or starving. The rest of us may experience Orwell’s words more gently as screens assault our psyches and steal our time.
Looking back a couple centuries before Orwell’s vision of the future to the recent Ken Burns PBS historical look at the time of the American Revolution, we are reminded of the brutality experienced by those who were willing to risk their lives to protect liberty.
John Adams, the first American Vice President and second President, claimed…
The jaws of power are always open to devour, and her arm is always stretched out, if possible, to destroy the freedom of thinking, speaking, writing.
We now have a man in charge who is hateful and uncaring. This moment is fraught. Despite an appearance that power may be overtaking liberty, I still trust that the American people will find a way to disrupt this tragedy.
I will be grateful for many other things on Thanksgiving Day—and ready to carry on.
~~~~~
Tip Jar
.