I genuinely think it's time to cancel Orwell

Not because he was personally problematic or had problematic politics (though there's an argument for both)

But because his Internet fanbase are the most insufferable human beings known to modern science

"Freedom is the freedom to say two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows"

What a fundamentally obnoxious quote

I mean shit

Would you let someone talk to you like that in real life

If your friend said it to you in your dorm room you'd punch him

It's like just barely acceptable because it's a *character* thinking this in a *novel*

And Winston is supposed to be this headass insufferable flawed hero you only really kind of like

But now there's all these Facebook uncles saying it in *real life*

Chanting it, even

You get that this is the exact same thing as the Ayn Rand quote about "A = A" right

She said it a lot worse because she's a worse writer but the basic idea is the same

There's a lot of overlap between their current fanbases

Like, here, I'll translate Orwell and Rand without the fake math and the writerly flourishes:

"I think I'm obviously right, but all these other people think I'm obviously wrong

They must be lying, in order to oppress me"

See, it's not a universal truth, it's highly contingent

SOMETIMES they ARE lying in order to oppress you

And sometimes you're just a dumbass

Who then becomes an asshole about being a dumbass

As Douglas Adams put it, "The universe had not yet taught Tricia the most vital lesson, determining which of these two circumstances applies"

Cf. Douglas Adams being the first one to tell that viral email forward story about Arthur Dent being absolutely furious about the random guy stealing his biscuits right from in front of him as this alpha male dominance flex only to find his own biscuits were under his newspaper

This Captain America "planting yourself like a tree by the river of truth" shit

Absolutely intolerable horseshit

Maybe plant yourself like a tree and don't talk

Plant yourself in that comments section and don't follow me to my own page

Every Internet Man thinks they're Winston Smith and it's even worse than thinking they were Galileo or Socrates

Jesus Christ

Orwell was lucky he died before he could see it, and it's unlucky for us he died after the book was published

I've totally changed my mind from when I was a kid

I would not get a time machine and bring back nicotine patches to the 1920s to get Orwell to quit smoking

I would try to hook him on menthols

You know the difference between you and Winston Smith? Winston had a girlfriend

You think Julia would've fucked him if he said all that 2+2=freedom bullshit to her out loud instead of moodily thinking it to himself after sex

He knew better