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About The North Coast times-eagle. (Wheeler, Oregon) 1971-2007 | View Entire Issue (Jan. 1, 1994)
u m is E R C II lo Pi n s i R IH VOL15NO5 5OCENTS JAN&FEB In a dark tin t t\u eyt by ins tosa. 1994 - Tfu&lrrt Rjxrhk/ 1994 BY MICHAEL PAUL McCUSKER "The capacity of the human mind for swallowing nonsense and spewing it forth in violent and repressive action has never yet been plumbed." — ROBERT A. HEINLEIN "If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping a human face - forever." -GEORGE ORWELL GOD IS WATCHING YOU! The apparation appeared suddenly in front of Winston Smith at his com puter in the Ministry of Truth. As often as he had been confronted with the specter, he cringed inwardly as the brief flash of light disappeared. Holographic bursts appeared everyw here in the city like dust devils at any time day or night, inside or outside, office or home. Each time a sudden swirl of bright silver and gold lights from which boomed a sepulchral voice w arning of eternal celestial surveillance. Everyone in Evangelica, which was shorthand for the Holy Evangelical Empire, was watched all of the time, or at least thought they were, which was much the same thing. Every personal com puter was hooked to a empirical net which was capable of monitoring everyone without human observation. Television was the main spy, however. More to the point, the masses who were terrified of the Grand Inquisitor's thought police were pacified by media control. The om nipresent screen looked back at its viewers who maintained perpetually pious expressions lest they be suspected of mental im purity. Winston Smith lived in a world of the ever recurring present. The past was evil; the future belonged to God. Life was immediately now, everlasting, occupied in service to God's Holy O rder, the high priests who ruled Evangelica. There were contradictions of course, corporeal aging for one, but only a very few were close enough to the heart of the Order's adm inistration to realize it, and at that point doublethink was a necessary reflex, the mental agility to make oneself believe that the most blatant lie was not only truth but had always been true. Doublethink prevented heresy and subsequent liquidation. Winston was an auxilary member of the priestly Order that ruled, a lay functionary equivalent to a Catholic altar boy. The Ministry of Truth in which he held a minor post controlled every bit of information dissem inated within Evangelica and was responsible for external propaganda as well. (The use of the word ministry was itself recaptured from its former bureaucratic misuse and reapplied for the same purpose.) There were millions like Winston, antlike creatures who carried out the will of the Order, not allowed to think or feel for themselves, subjects of an iron theocracy that tolerated no question of its authority or power. If Winston had a w indow in his airless cubicle in the Ministry of Truth he would have seen the large city massed below, delapidated hovels that surrounded for miles each of the four huge ministries as were cathedrals in medieval times. (The other three ministries were Peace, Love and Joy, successively headquarters for the armed forces, thought police and social adm inistration.) The streets swarmed, with police particularly evident, though as usual priestly limos carried im portant clerics about their sacred duties. Buried deeply within the giant cathedral of the Ministry of Truth, Winston was shielded from the incessant shrieking of sirens as the Grand Inquisitor's thought police swept down upon heretics, blasphem ers and traitors, raided homes and suspected meeting places of outlawed sects. His thoughts were interrupted by a loud fanfare of trum pets followed by an excited voice shouting from video screens positioned on every wall of the huge room. The hosts of God had smitten the forces of evil a mighty blow. Video visions of gleaming missiles shot from shining white jet bombers filled the screens. The evil strongholds appeared to be nondescript shanties from which erupted fleeing darkskinned persons, many of whom fell or were vaporized in explosions. Following that announcem ent the voice said that the wine ration at daily compulsory worship services, the only alcohol consumption allowed, w as cut by a third. A trem endous hosannah of trum pets and voices ended the newsflash. Winston knew that by tomorrow the media would proclaim that wine rationing had been increased instead of decreased. Winston might himself be given the assignment to revise the numbers. W inston's job at the Ministry of Truth was to slightly alter selected portions of holy scripture, in particular to ensure past prophecies be brought into line with contemporary reality, itself subject to perception and change. His job was reality control. At all times the O rder was to be perceived as the rock of absolute truth and clearly the absolute could never be different from the present. The concept of divinely inspired gospel had been altered to fit evangolitical needs, which made it critical to present each scriptural revision as if it were truth everm ore until replaced by another tem porarily operable truth. The unchanging truth adhered to as gospel by the reigning theocrats was that whoever controls the past controls the future, and who controls the present controls the past. Knowledge of history was confined to what appears in the Bible, though it had been so tam pered with Winston was unaw are both of its original gospels and that they had been altered, though he m ade small changes everyday. Winston knew that in the 5th century BC the citizens of Athens deposed a tyrant and set up what was considered the world's first democracy. A few years later the deposed tyrant returned with a large arm y of mercenaries. The tyrant was wlecomed back by m any of the same citizens who deposed him and they cheered as he executed members of the democratic government. Winston was not supposed to know this. He was not certain why he knew it. History was portrayed as perpetual CONTINUED ON PAGE 12