1984 Question
“‘Do it to Julia! Do it to Julia! Not me! Julia! I don’t care what you do to her. Tear her face off, strip her to the bones. Not me! Julia! Not me!’” (Orwell, 236)
Did Winston make this decision, to push Julia
under the bus so to speak, rationally? Was he in any condition to respond
rationally? Do you think that was how Winston felt from the beginning, or do you believe that he had been forced to lie?
(NO GRADE). Winston did not make his decision to betray Julia rationally. Winston was peer pressured into breaking, which caused him to turn on Julia. His fear of rats caused him to do whatever it took to get the rats away from him. Winston was not in a position to respond rationally because of the torture he was experiencing in Room 101. Winston was both forced and not forced to lie. He was put into a position that his mental self could not overcome which is what caused him to betray Julia, but Winston chose to break because of he couldn’t control his fear of rats.
ReplyDeleteI agree the idea that he didn't make the decision to betray Julia entirely rationally. However, I don't think he was completely forced because of the rats; while I'm sure he liked Julia, I'm not entirely sure he was in love with her. It seemed more like he was in love with the idea of her; in love with the idea of rebellion and the idea of sex, and she was the only one available. (reading Megan's response now, and yeah, she basically said what I was writing out here, so refer to hers for a smarter response)
DeleteI dont think WInston's decision was very rational because he was being very selfish by wanting to save himself. I also don't believe WInston felt that way since the beginning, I feel like this event just made him realize Julia and him aren't truly fit for eachother. It was all kind of in the moment.
ReplyDelete(no grade)
I agree with that so hard! "I feel like this event just made him realize Julia and him aren't truly fit for each other." That's exactly what I was trying to convey with this question; I think situations like these, life or death situations in which people have to make split second decisions, that's where one truly uncovers who they are inside. Does that make sense? Like, you can only really know for sure if there's a threat or something bad about to happen. I think it's untrue when people say that in those moments you become somebody else to fight off the pain; I think it just reveals who you truly are. It's why the two ultimately drifted apart in the end, because they knew they weren't who they had originally painted each other to be. That those tortured versions of themselves were really them when all the lies are removed. I'm not good with words.
DeleteI think that he wasn't quite in a completely mental state of mind so he wouldn't have made as caring a decision as he would've in normal conditions. He wasn't in a condition to respond rationally because he was being horribly tormented by his worst fears. Being faced with your worst fears will push you into survival mode, where rational thoughts become almost obsolete and your only focus is on keeping yourself alive, most of the time. He was scared for his life - he's not concerned about Julia's needs right now. Their relationship wasn't built on a strong foundation in my opinion. They just seemed to revel in the fact they both were rebellious, committed rebellious acts, and were very lustful (for each other). They were also both raised in an uncaring environment where you weren’t talk to care for one another and be concerned for others’ needs. Although the first concern here wasn’t for your own needs and rather “the party’s” needs, the intrinsic survival instinct will still take over and your worry will be put on yourself. I don’t believe that’s how Winston felt from the beginning. Although what he felt for Julia seemed to be a lot of lust and superficial and he seemed more in love with the acts they performed, I believe he still cared for Julia to an extent. At least purely for the reason that she seemed to be in the same fight with them, like it was them against the world. In short, at the time to survive, it was rational to him. He was doing what he could to survive. However if he had been given that choice and he wasn’t in danger he most likely would’ve tried to save her.
ReplyDeleteUnder the horrible circumstances Winston was under, his actions seemed appropriate (in a dystopian society at least). Firstly, Winston had never known true freedom and had only heard of, remembered, or read about freedom from past ages. It’s important to know that long before ever meeting Julia or starting his diary, Winston was subjected to indoctrination for years and years under the reign of The Big Brother. Winston comes to the conclusion that “how could you tell how much of it was lies? It MIGHT be true that the average human being was better off now than he had been before the Revolution. The only evidence to the contrary was the mute protest in your own bones, the instinctive feeling that the conditions you lived in were intolerable and that at some other time they must have been different.” (Orwell). But from the start Winston had been just another Party Member, just another worker who follows their order to the letter without question. It was because of Julia that Winston produces real emotions towards another human being for the first time. But a return to an emotionless state may not have been as hard as you think since before Julia came into his life, he was “just another party member”. I think that Winston was actually telling the truth when he said that he no longer cared about Julia. In the end, the government always triumphs over the meager citizens.
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