I am writing the next class lesson and planned to post a class assignment to get you to think about the role of outrage on social media. I was going to wait until tomorrow morning, but then realized that the dynamics involved in the clip I am posting are the same ones that we saw four years ago today, during the insurrection on January 6, 2021. So I thought tonight might be a good time to remember and reflect on that (and be thankful we did not witness anything like it today).
The clip depicts “Two Minutes Hate” from the movie version of George Orwell’s 1984. If you haven’t read the novel, Two Minutes Hate is a regular ritual in which the people of the totalitarian state of Oceania — who are watched at all times by the omnipresent and omniscient Big Brother — participate. The speech and visuals target an ostensible traitor named “Goldstein” to generate outrage among the participants. Watch the clip and then answer the questions that follow. (Sorry, it’s creepy, I know.)
Discussion questions:
What role does “Goldstein” play in terms of how members of the crowd relate with each other?
What is the purpose of bringing everyone together in the same physical space to do Two Minutes Hate? (In other words, why not just force each person to watch this video alone, at home?) What does being able to see others’ reactions change about the experience?
Based on this scene (and the context), what are the costs and benefits of refusing to participate in this activity? We see for example, Winston (the skinny guy) not reacting, until he notices he is being watched. What do you believe is his motivation to join in?
Do you think this kind of dynamic can play out in the digital sphere? For instance, what would a “Two Minutes Hate” look like on social media (like X/Twitter)?
I’ll draw on some of your responses in my post, so I am eager to hear your thoughts!
a scapegoat is necessary for unity.
we need unity to feel righteous.
an outsider of that unity threatens sense of righteousness and becomes scapegoat.
we need affirmation of our participation in group unity. once the frenzy starts, it is self-sustaining and seeing others hardly matters, until we feel alone or abandoned or left behind.
thinking for ourselves is dangerous to that unity, again threatening sense of righteousness.
when i was on twitter, the 'ganging up' on 'the other' was so ugly and unnerving, i couldn't stay on the platform.
this little clip was highly unnerving to watch, and all too real feeling :(
I was in the sixth grade at Parkview Jr. High when I read “1984.“ I had a subscription to “Analog”, a science fiction magazine, and “1984” came up a lot in the various articles. It was in the school library. I vividly remember that library as being quite advanced for our age group. I could check out “Brave New World” there, but at the town library it would have required my parent’s permission because of “adult content.” I was assigned to library study at 3PM, the last hour of the day, so I read, or used the turntables to listen to the libraries collection of classical music or plays.
I actually remember getting to the ”hate” ritual. I thought it was a silly and childish thing for adults to be doing. Then at 4pm the bell rang, but we weren’t dismissed because there was a mandatory “pep rally” in the gym. There was a basketball game against hated rival St. Francisville that night and we had to get everyone whipped up for it. I remember sitting in the gym as we were led in cheers and I realized we were doing what I had just read about. I think that was the first time in my life that I started looking at it all as an outsider and determined I may well be a player in it all, but I would never be played.
I didn’t fully understand ritual then, or how it functions as social glue. But life was all ritual, all the time. The Pledge of Allegiance first thing in the morning. The oath we recited in Boy Scouts. The confessions we repeated in church that no one but the minister remotely understood. The national anthem we sang before Little League baseball games. In school we watched films about the Nazis, all filled with ritual. The anti-communist propaganda films we were frequently shown depicted the commies doing the same sorts of things. It was all about social glue, conformity, group think, and though we were all told only communists demanded everyone think and do the same, we were constantly demanded to think alike and do alike by everyone and everything. Looking back, it’s laughable, but not funny.
As an adult with a sociology and theological education I understand ritual quite thoroughly now, both in how it can promote good behavior, how it promotes really bad behavior. Whether it’s a Billy Graham altar call, or the Trump rally before the January 6th attack on the capitol. It’s all about controlling the crowd and manipulating their emotions. Done it myself many times as a teacher, a public speaker, most especially as a former pastor, invoking symbolism, rules, leading a congregation through the unvarying and mindless performative sequences of a Sunday service, or even worse, a revival meeting whose aim is provoking an emotional breakdown followed by a profession of sin, a plea for forgiveness and a pledge of obeisance.
Ritual shapes literally everyone’s experience. It’s to a very large degree how we perpetuate knowledge, truth and falsehood. And it is 100% about social control. It creates a shared notion of the sacred and profane, the acceptable and the contemptible. I’ve studied it in archeology, anthropology, sociology, psychology, theology, and the more I know, the more I distrust everything about it.
We are all living in "Oceania." All of us. Wherever we live in the world.