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Nov 4·edited Nov 4Liked by Cynthia Chung

Orwell's essay on Burnham isn't scathing in any intellectual way. He's only repulsed by him emotionally. "As I have said earlier, Burnham has probably been more right than wrong about the present and the immediate past," writes Orwell. This explains why he basically incorporates a Burnhamite view into 'Nineteen Eighty Four'

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Nov 4·edited Nov 4Author

Agreed. Orwell was actually working for the British police in Burma and it is there that he learned the torture techniques on the body and the mind. He was both the character O'Brien and Wilson in the book "1984," both the tormentor/programmer as well as the tormented/programmed, since he too had been programmed to be this way by the British Empire. Eton, the famous school for young British boys from promising families is one example of the sort of programming he had gone through (Aldous and Julian Huxley also received this programming at a young age). Eton was notorious. It does seem like Orwell possibly was deeply unhappy being the tool of the British Empire, and the story of 1984 though it was said to be about the Soviet Union, had a disturbingly more familiar overlap with that of the British Empire. Apparently Aldous Huxley during his last days told Timothy Leary that Big Brother was based off of Churchill. I see no reason for Leary to make up such an account, and makes a lot more sense, since Orwell of course had gone through such a system himself. I think the statement you shared above is a fitting quote from Orwell, he hates and despises such visions for the future as Burnham presents (though Burnham is not the originator, neither was Orwell of the ideas they discussed, but rather these were the very ideas being discussed by the British Empire), he hates Big Brother but he does not know how to resist him. And that is the pathetic lesson of the story through the lens of Orwell.

Aldous Huxley had a very similar story, also Eton product, his brother Julian was known to require "electroshock" therapy that was occurring during the London bombings because he was not coping well with his "responsibilities", during one of these sessions they had to rush him out of a building since they were in an area that bombing began. Their middle brother hanged himself on their estate. Aldous had reported that he was happy that he had lost most of his sight as a teenager since it meant less pressure would be on him and that Julian would have it upon his shoulders to continue TH Huxley's legacy. Aldous was permitted to take a more relaxed course as a writer, "philosopher". In Aldous' Brave New World (which is based off of Bertrand Russell's Scientific Outlook) we again see that the three characters that do resist such a system have nothing really to say once they meet the World Controller Mustapha Mond. They all fail in creating an argument for why the system is wrong and are unable to define what would be a better system. In Aldous' earlier writings he made fun of Bertrand Russell, HG Wells (the disciples of TH Huxley) and others and made them ridiculous in his stories that he wrote when he was in his twenties. Again, showing that there was this despise for what these people were working on, but at the end of the day he too found himself powerless to resist. I am not excusing them, I do think it is all disappointing, but it is interesting to note how much it seems the two men who wrote the most influential dystopic books of the 20th century, have a similar programming when young, were products of the British Empire and in service to the British Empire, and both despise the "masters" they have been trained to serve. I think it really showcases that "1984" and "Brave New World" were indeed visionary products of the British Empire. That is at least how I see it presently. Burnham was also a product of the British Empire, and thus it would makes sense that Orwell would respond the way he did, despising but ultimately unable to deny that this must be the course for the future because he does not believe anyone can win again his "masters".

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Pretending to despise some one is the ultimate form of deception, as it gives the outsiders the impression to understand something of which in reality they understand nothing at all.

I think Orwell did came to his senses end tried to warn people,

Perhaps that is why he was poisoned and died young.

The work that Huxley did was of that of seeding as ideas, plans which already put in place.

If you considered the nowadays mobile communication devices, and what they have become for mankind, you can see that they are indeed of the effect of that soma which he describes in his brave new world.

thank you for sharing your very informative research Cynthia.

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Wow, this provides a lot of background that finds the source answers to very many questions. Burnham seems to dismiss Marxism, communism and any form of socialism as not possible and, nor anywhere to be found in practice anyways, and then asserts that capitalism will give way to the managerial society. In that quotation, “ Not only do I believe it meaningless to say that ‘socialism is inevitable’ and false that socialism is ‘the only alternative to capitalism’; I consider that on the basis of the evidence now available to us a new form of exploitive society (which I call ‘managerial society’) is not only possible but is a more probable outcome of the present than socialism. …”, he, on the one hand offers the criticism that asserts that capitalism will give way to the managerial society, which he calls “exploitative”, but in a pragmatic fashion, Burnham accepts that which he names “the Managerial Society” as also to be so inevitable, that the only thing to do is try and find yourself in the best most hoped for favorable position relative the whole of the managerial society. He ambivalently characterizes it as a bleak future but then spends the rest of himself, he life and his time promoting it in a sort of “it’s all wahat you make of it…” kind of optimistic positivism. The foundational principle underlying it all is for the state to always be at war with the common enemy of East Asia (or is it Oceana? I forget…..) .It shows that the active mentality of it is established in practically any place, but more importantly in the minds of just enough people anywhere that it can be more or less permanently exploitative. I must raise my hand and confess as to being a keeper of those ideas in previous times. Such is or was the programming and indoctrination of those who found themselves duped by the false notion that to have or keep any conservative or for that matter Liberal ideals was equivalent to being a Neo-conservative. In any case it is not nearly the arduous confession that Winston Smith was set up to make. Publicly, on television.

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