1984

I found this comic online. It has abit of Objectivist themes to it. It's called "No-where Girl". I found it at www.nowheregirl.com, it's about a young lady who suffers from depression and isolation, but later learns to rediscover her self worth and boost her self-esteem and persue her own goals in life.

Speaking of "We" by Yevgeny Zamyatin, does anyway know where I can get a free online copy of it? I managed to get an online copy "Anthem", "1984" "Brave New World", "Manifesto of Communism", "Mein Kampf" and the "Dune" novels. "We" was actually the first dystopian novel and inspired Orwell to write "1984" and Huxley to write "Brave New World". These three are the most famous dystopian novels in the world. "We" also inspired Ayn Rand to write "Anthem".

Since I was a kid I never really liked overweight people. As a kid I used to read my "Beano" comics which is from the UK and basically short stories about mischefis children. Anyway there was this one character called fatty and basically his role was the fat guy. He would eat a mountain of food and never excerise. In most other comics and cartoons, fat characters were similarly protrayed the same way. To me obesity was always seen as a symbol of greed and laziness, even a symbol of opression like the fat emporer who has more than enough food while his nation's people are starving. As a kid I've also been raised to feel grateful for what you have, I was always reminded about the state of third and second world nations and felt like I should stop making complaints and make the most of myself. This is also one of the main reasons why I dislike overweight people. When I was 16 I was at a halloween party and my friend came up to me and told me that this girl wanted to go out with me. At the time I honestly thought he joking because she was really fat and ugly and therefore to me really unattractive. I rejected but then he suggested that I should go out with her anyway because at that time I had never gone with a girl. I still rejected and called her a rude name behind her back. For afew months my other friends at the time kept bugging me to go out with her. Then I eventually I did and I didn't enjoy it at all, frankly it grossed me out. I also tought that maybe if I got to know her, maybe she actually had a good personality and was really cool to hang out with. Sadly no, as it turned out she was really annoying. So I didn't go out with her again. I get alot of abuse at time, people saying I'm shollow,"oh you're dumping her cus she's fat"."would you like her if she wasn't fat". I didn't see what the big deal was, everyone tought it was ok for her to look at me and say she's really attracted to me and really want to go out with me dispite the fact that she knows absolutly nothing about me, but it's not ok for me to look at her and say she's unattractive I don't want to go out with her? I used to ask the same people "yeah well why shouldn't she lose the weight then?" they couldn't give an answer "why do you want her to stay fat then?". I couldn't see a reason why she shouldn't lose the weight so I couldn't see a reason why I should accept her for it. I didn't feel sympathetic for her becuase I felt like it was her own fault she was fat so why should I be the one who put up with it. I know wemen are pressurised into looking attractive, but I think men can be pressured too. To be honest I don't see anything wrong with the media, I actually think its a good thing. Say for example the old diet coke ad with the 11.30 break where all the office wemen are looking the muscular window cleaner. I think ads like that are really good because it give the message that the man with six pack who's really fit, really strong and healthy is the guy all the ladies want. It tells young boys "hey lets go out and get really fit like that guy so that we can score some chicks", is that really a bad thing. I think the only people who do critise the media are really those who are unattractive and who therefore lose out by it. Most of them are hypocrites anyway, They make everyone feel bad for not going out with them because they're unattractive yet thet themselves only want to go out with people they find attractive. Most importantly though, obesity is really bad for your health and likely to cause premature death and other major health problems. I was introduced to objectivism and Ayn Rand by the brother about a year and a half ago, since then I've explored her philosophy and positives of capitialism, and I feel like people should be free to live their own lives the way they wish and people should take reponsibilties for their know actions. Like if someone smokes, smoking can be enjoyable but it's their fault and problem if they get cancer, not the tabacco company. Likewise if a person chooses to eat an unproper diet and not excercie enough, it's their problem if they're unfit and unattractive. I do try to tolerat overweight people and try not to judge them for apperance to much, but I immediatly see a person who is greedy and lazy. Is this expectable are is it another form of dicrimmination like racism?

Is this modern material world, there is a constant obsession to have new and nice things. The more intelligent humans become , the more they get bored and therefore have a greater demand to have more new things. But eventually we can get bored with those things aswell, and many of them becomes obsolete eventually which in turn cause us to continously go out and buy more things. Most of dream of fortune, to be able to go out and buy major purchases, such as big screen TV, sports car, etc. But eventually we would get bored with that aswell. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for Capitialism and Gobalisation and greater development in technology but can those "things" ever really fill the void in our lives?

Is emotion simply a form of primative instinct formed by chemical impules or is it something deeper. There have been form of religions and practises that try to control our emotions. Will we ever fully control our emotions? Does feeling let us know that we're still human and not just machines?

"1984" isn't technologically advanced. I've only read half of it so far, but the main character "Winston" describes the houses as being old and decaying and were built in the 19th and early 20th century and most of those have broken windows and and are boarded it. The novel may also be pro-Capitialism. "Winston" is aged 39 in the time of the novel and the Socialist party "Insoc"(English Socialism) was established when he 12 years old, so he tries to think back to a time before the revolution and wonders if life is really better than it is now. The party tries to brainwash people with Marxist anti-Capitalist proganda, describing a history before the revolution the Capitalist Bourgeoise controled most of the wealth and lived in luxury while the vast majority of people lived in poverty and had berely enough to make ends meet. In a cafe "Winston" meets an elderly gentleman who has lived half his life in the Capilist era and the other in the era of Insoc. Wiston uses the oppurtunity to question whether he believed live was better now than it is back then. However the elderly man seems to be so brainwashed that he doesn't understand Winston's question, and thinks he is simply asking whether it is better to be young or old.

I first saw the movie of "1984" afew years ago and I have just recently got a copy of the book and have started reading it. For those of unfamiliar with it, it was written in 1948 by George Orwell who was also the author of "Animal Farm". "1984" is basically a dystopian vision of the future where the world has been divided in to 3 superpower nations all of which ar totalitarian regimes and are at constanly at war with one another. The story is set in London which is the center of goverment of Airstrip One(what we now know as Britain) which is part of the vast nation of Oceania which controls Britain,Ireland,North and South America, Australia and southern Africa. The other two nations are "Eurasia"(Europe and Russia) and East Asia(China, Japan and south east asia). In this novel Orwell envisioned a world where our lives at constanly monitored by the regime. There is a devise called a "telescreen" which works as both a television and camera. There is one on very room, every corridor, every street constanly monitoring every person. It is a law that they must be left on all the time and there is only one channel which only broadcasts public announments and propaganda from across the regime. If nothing is being bradcast then they simply show a portarit of the dictator's face, who is know as "Big Brother". In most dictatorships, they use posters or paintings but here they use the telescreens, which he is at the top of this hierarchay of monitoring so it is like he is literally looking back at you. Hence the slogans "Big Brother is watching you". The novel describes the citizens as living a clockwork, mechinical-like existence full of conformity where everyone only wears uniforms and address each other as "comrade", and only living off the bare essentials of what is needed to survive. The novel basically tries the descibe the horrors of a totalitarian and statism regime, where there is no freedom whatsoever. However many argue that Orwell novel is really pro-communism but only anti-Stalinism. However his vision of Oceania stilll carries the same charateristics of a Totalarian society. A society which controls our lives, uses proganda to manipulate our minds, a dictator who tell us what to think and a statism attidude to believe that their nation, their party is superior and the everything which opposes them is unmoral. What do you people think?

When I was younger I used to be a Socialist, but when I was introduced to the works of Ayn Rand I became to value her ideals. Since the I have learned to value Capitalism, freedom, democracy and individual rights. I am also I big fan of George Orwell's work especially his novel "1984". In her work, Ayn Rand tries to decribe the serious dangers of altriuism and totalitarianism. However I believe that Orwell's vision of 1984 was much better of describing these dangers. I world where there is no freedom and truly a fate worse than death. I have recently also joined a "Newspeak" forum deciated to the vision of 1984. Although I have been praised by some pro-Capitalists, I have been mocked by Marxists and Communists and other Socialists. I was wondering if anyone could give me advice or opinions of how I could illustate to them how Capitalism can be better than Socialism. Also, I will look forward to discussion and debating on this forum and will be happy to discuss any topic or opinion you may have about me or my beliefs.