sweet_bippy

Mostly agree. But it is way too simplistic to say Orwell's novel warned about surveillance. To me, that book warned us more about the determination of those who do the surveillance, and their desire to exorcise every human passion from the soul, only to replace those passions with an unwavering passion for "the party", and an equally rabid hatred for "the enemy". Surveillance is a merely the many rivets that build the mighty structure that is "the party". It does not even matter what "the party" stands for. Nor does it matter who "the enemy" is. It only matters that the people have a pure love for the party in their hearts ... that love having been cultivated by "the party" itself methodically supplanting all human emotions with unquestioned love for "the party" above all else .. even above family, above love, above sex, above kindness, etc.

There is no question there are many competing interests in our world today, many of which would become Orwell's "party", even without overtly attempting to do so, merely because they are gaining the power to do so. We are rapidly coalescing into a small number of highly angry tribes, each tribe hating the others simply because their party leaders ritualistically (e.g., every night at 6pm) tell them they should hate other tribes.