Modern life in North Korea as mirrored in the events of 1984 (Essay Sample)

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Modern life in North Korea as mirrored in the events of ‘1984’
Do any aspects of modern life in the North Korea mirror the events of 1984? Write an essay that exposes the ways modern governments employ similar tactics to those used by Big Brother.
George Orwell wrote the novel ‘1084’ in 1948. The novel is set in Oceania which has omnipresent government monitoring, perpetual war, public mind control, and great government control of everything (Orwell p. 4). The society is divided into three distinct social classes which include the Inner Party, who enjoy the good life, allowed freedom, and wealthy, but still monitored and controlled, they make about 2% of the population. The other social class is Outer Party, which is made of the middle class, who work for the party and are highly monitored and controlled.The last social group is the Proles, who make up the 85% of the population and are uneducated and very poor (Orwell p.6). Big Brother is the quasi-divine Party leader, who optimizes the tyranny and dictatorship. Big Brother is a leader who enjoys a cult like worship and nothing about him can be questioned. The Party and the Big Brother based their justification, of the rule, on the good of society. The Party exercise totalitarian rule and authority and anybody who do anything against the state or the Party will is eliminated. Orwellian is adjective that is used to describe secret surveillance, manipulation by authoritarian state and official deception in the novel ‘1984’.It was hard to imagine then that Orwell’s was writing in a prophetical manner to what some states have turned into, in the modern civilization, like the North Korea (Lankov P. 12). There are many things that are happening in North Korea totalitarian state, which compares with the events in ‘1984’. North Korea government and state are controlled by the Supreme Leader, who enjoys a supernatural-being worship across the country. This is in comparison with the Big Brother, in the Orwell’s novel (Orwell p. 10).The Big Brother and the Party keep constant control and surveillance to the people through ‘telescreens’ (Orwell p. 43). This ensures that, no one is plotting some evil against the Party or the Big Brother. In North Korea, every move is monitored and recorded through the use of community policing and intelligence information. No one is supposed to turn off the surveillance. This is depicted in the documentary ‘Inside the North Korea’ (Lankov P. 17).The other similarity is in the level of censoring and mind control. ‘1984’ movies and books are censored, and the only one, which is distributed, is the one from the Big Brother. This is similar to the North Korea where there are no other materials, allowed in the country, except the one of the Supreme Leader (Kwon & Chung p.27). The materials in both cases are used as a method of mind control and brainwashing. In the novel ‘1984’, Winston, who is a member of Outer Party, talks of how the Party censures movies, books and everything that held ideological or political importance. What the Party distributes to the Proles is propaganda and brainwashing materials from the Big Brother (Orwell p.95). On the other hand, in North Korea, the supreme leader, Kim Jong 2, makes sure that all the literature and news are Korean. The population understands nothing about the outside world. There is no telephone or internet and visitors are controlled.The other similarity between the events in ‘1984’ and North Korea is in the total control of everything by one leader. The leader is the centre of everything and centre of reference for all activities in the state. The Big Brother in the Orwell novel is the centre of reference of all matters and Supreme Leader in North Korea control everything (Lankov P. 35). In the Orwell novel, Winston notices a banner that describes the only Oceania’s leader, the Big Brother. The poster clearly states that ‘Big Brother is Watching You’. There are no other leader to be loved and only other leader Oceania knew was Goldstein, who was hated and loathed. The other leaders had to be hated and forgotten. In North Korea, Supreme leader pictures, posters and statues are spread all over the country. Kim Jong is associated with supernatural birth, and the propaganda is spread that, he descended from heaven, and he is to be worship and respected (Kwon & Chung p.43). The other leaders from the western countries are to be hated and avoided. The citizens only understand the Kim Jong is a good leader due to the great fear that is inflicted on them, and the rest of the leaders in the world are untrustworthy.The other similarity of the events of the ‘1984’ and the North Korea is the value in war. In the ‘1984’ novel, the government thinks war is a good thing, and it should be happening all times, and this is the same case with the North Korea (Lankov P. 69). Though, in North Korea, the country is not in constant war as the case of the ‘1984’, it continues to retain significant army and develops nuclear warheads, in preparation for war. The society had been brainwashed, and their only goal is to fight any advance from the western countries, particularly, United States.The other similarity between the events of the ‘1984’ and North Korea government is the propaganda tools and inflicting of fear through execution of those who start any resistance. The Party and Big Brother had the community police who executed those who seemed to start a resistance (Orwell p. 74). In the North Korea, anyone who betrays the government, or try to escape the boundaries of the country, is executed (Kwon & Chung p.58). There are concentration camps, where even the entire families to a person who defect, are wiped out. There are propaganda machines in every section of the state, which ensure people get what the supreme leader, want them to hear.The majority of the North Korean lives in extreme poverty, diseases and is uneducated. This group is highly protected from the foreign headlines (Lankov P. 75). The other group is the middle class who work for the government. They e...