Brainwashing as An Ideological Technique of Prisoners' Treatment (Research Paper Sample)

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Brainwashing as An Ideological Technique of Prisoners' Treatment
Brainwashing, also referred to as thought control or coercive persuasion, is the concept through which a human mind can be controlled and or altered using a set of psychological techniques. Brainwashing targets to reduce the ability of a particular subject to think independently and critically. In this regard, subjects are exposed to new ideas and unwanted thoughts, subsequently forcing them to change their beliefs, learned values as well as attitudes. Manipulation of human actions and thoughts against their desire, will, and knowledge occur through the use of various techniques. The key to brainwashing is achieving two objectives. The first objective is to compel innocent people to admit with all subjective sincerity that they have committed serious crimes against the state and the people. The second objective entails coercive persuasion to individuals in reshaping political views and alienations and cause people to abandon previous beliefs and advocate for new political ideologies and alienations. The coercion methods, albeit different, manipulate individuals to accept and agree to their previously rejected opinions. From a broader perspective, brainwashing appears in socialization, political education, and propaganda. Brainwashing, as an ideological technique of prisoner treatment, served the past regimes in the past. The methods and effects of brainwashing rose markedly in the 1950s (Orwell 166). During the cold war, experienced in the 1950s, America and Korea participants of the war executed brainwashing techniques on the captured prisoners who would later provide them with secrets. The prisoners would somehow be indoctrinated and coerced to confess to imagined crimes. The features of the widespread 1950s brainwashing ideological technique parallel with 1984 brainwashing techniques presented by George Orwell. Most of the brainwashing coercion methods are based on torture and physical deprivation; the methods only produce short term results and not long term manipulation of subjects' intrinsic believes and attitudes. This study analyzes brainwashing as an ideological technique utilized in the 1950s and the technique's features that appear in 1984 by George Orwell.
Brainwashing in the 1950s
Brainwashing and mind control was prevalent/widespread in the 1950's cold war between Americans and communists. Various techniques were used on American prisoners of war in Korea and intended to break the will of the prisoners manipulated to leak secrets and even change sides and achieve profound allegiance. Chinese also captured prisoners and set out to re-educate them on the true nature of war. According to Orwell (59), the re-education process was relentless and systematic and incorporated long hours of interrogation, multidisciplinary group discussions, and lecturing. Chinese manipulations made American prisoners collaborate with the Chinese, informing on each other and frustrating escape attempts.
The regimes used brainwashing techniques to convert captured enemy soldiers into mindless automatons who obeyed communism. The processes aimed at radically changing the mind of the rebelling soldiers converting them to puppets. According to Orwell (103), he spread of communism through brainwashed agents proposed the removal of liberals and socialists from entertainment, libraries, and learning institutions. The Koreans and Chinese, most American soldiers and agents, signed confessions and petitions seeking an end to end the war. Standard interrogation techniques such as isolation, torture, physical deprivation were applied to elicit these performances of coercive propaganda.
1984 by Goerge Orwell
The setting of 1984 is in Oceania, one of the three perpetually warring totalitarian states governed by the then all-controlling party. The party had brainwashed people to avoid questioning their leader, Big Brother. The all-controlling party has developed a propagandist language referred to as Newspeak intended to limit free thought by people, ultimately promoting party doctrines. Orwell 75), suggests Newspeak a doublethink belief for contradictory ideas concurrently, which portrays the party's three slogans highlighted as 'Ignorance is strength' 'War is peace' and 'War is peace'. With continual surveillance and enforcement of police thought, the party manages to maintain control. Winston Smith, a functionary of outer party rebels against the government's thinking and grows his interests in the Brotherhood group of dissenters.
Winston is captured and presented to the ministry of love with the intention of violent reeducation/brainwashing. The consequential imprisonment, torture, and reeducation projected to Winston are not targeted at breaking him physically or making him submit but rather to root out his independence, subsequently destroying his humanity and dignity. Winston is taken to room 101, where prisoners are exposed to their worst nightmares and involuntarily forced to submission (Orwell 153). A cage of rats is attached at his head, and this sends him to panic and yells to his tormentors to execute the action to subject the same to Julie, whom they shared common belief attesting he does not care what happens to her. Winston later encounters Julia, and due to the betrayal, the duo loose interest in each other, and interestingly Winston has instead loved the Big brother.
Nineteen eighty-four by Orwell depicts a state where daring to think differently is rewarded with torture and where people are monitored throughout all the time. Party propaganda suppresses free speech, and thought is a sobering reminder of the evils of unaccountable governments (Orwell 35). Winston acts as a symbol of values and virtues of civilized life and his defeat by the government serves as a poignant reminder of the vulnerability of such values while in the midst of all powerful nations and states.
In the cold War, Korea made captured American soldiers to think that if they did not call off the war, they would be executed using brutal means. In some of the concentration camps, if the prisoners did anything wrong or failed to adhere to instructions presented, they were burnt in giant furnaces or even gassed out (Orwell 88). In 1984, the Oceania citizens were taught that if they disobey the laws, they will become an unperson interpreted to mean they will be executed, and any information about them will be deleted permanently from history.
In the 1950's brainwashing, some ideas and or phrases are used to stick to people's brains. Once people are exposed to the brainwashed message more regularly and denied from alternatives, they accept what they are told without thinking. The indoctrination is evident in 1984, where Oceania people are taught to say, 'ignorance is strength' 'war is peace' and 'freedom is slavery'. People are taught to say this and never think differently throughout their lives (Orwell 139). In the 1950's war, American prisoners were regularly exposed to communist propaganda. In particular, American prisoners captured by the Chinese were asked to make anti- American statements such as 'The United States is not perfect' or 'In a communist country, unemployment is not a problem'. Once the prisoners regularly altered such statements, they found themselves pushed to submit to related albeit more substantive requests. As a result, the prisoners found themselves signing petitions calling for the war to come to an end, urged their families to initiate peace negotiations, and even admitted to dropping biological weapons to their enemies. Some prisoners were brainwashed to the extent of remaining with their captors at the end of the war swearing allegiance to communism.
For the American soldiers captured in the Korean prisons, brainwashing meant solitary confinement, deprivation of sleep and food, forced standing. In 1984 the brainwashing acts subjected to Winston is extremely traumatizing. Winston is subjected to brutal physical torture and relentless blows, reducing him to a trembling individual (Orwell 103). From the torture, Winston is inclined to confess to everything and anything. He goes to the extent of implicating Julia provided the pain will stop. Other subtler forms of suffering ar