Maneuvering Human Relationships

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Changing history has profound effects on humans and the choices that they make, in 1984 by George Orwell Big Brother has the ability to manipulate the past, present, and future because he is the supreme leader of Oceania. The supreme leader of Oceania is Big Brother, none of the citizens in the country know if Big Brother is a group or a single individual. Big Brother stepped into power after the rebellion and has maintained absolute power over his citizens. In order to gain absolute power, Big Brother had to destroy human relationships. Relationships are a problem for Big Brother because they allow citizens to form bonds with one and other. Big Brother has ruined humanity and the relationships that they have in order to gain absolute power. By controlling the essential parts of relationships, physical contact, sex, and breaking the bond between parents and children, Big Brother successfully turns society into individuals in order to gain absolute power which will ensure that he will never lose power. The lack of physical contact that people in Oceania have allows the bond between man and woman to be broken and it allows Big Brother to gain more support and power. By limiting physical contact between Party members, Big Brother is able to separate society into individual people. Big Brother does this by watching the Outer Party members 24/7 through telescreens and listening to them through microphones. Although physical contact is not illegal, it is frowned upon and many people do not enjoy being touched. Katherine, Winston’s Missing wife, and Winston cannot touch each other without some sort of reaction; “As soon as he touched her she seemed to wince and stiffen” (Orwell 66). Katherine is a devoted party member who does not value ... ... middle of paper ... ...ns absolute power over the citizens of Oceania, because he needs to remain in power. Absolute power ensures that Big Brother will not lose control of its citizens and risk being taken over by Eastasia or Eurasia. By eliminating sex and physical contact Big Brother is able to demolish the bonds that partners form. To further his power Big Brother uses child spies to control parents and to further destroy the family bonds. With these bonds destroyed Big Brother is able to fully control his citizens because they are only loyal to him and are more wiling to support him. In the end Big Brother only cares about gaining absolute power and will do anything to achieve his goal. In a totalitarian world, human relationships can easily be manipulated and the same can happen in any other world as long as humans do not know they are being taken advantage of or being manipulated.

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