Staff / TruthdigFeb 12, 2012
As George Orwell pointed out more than half a century ago, the storehouse of the English language occasionally needs a good sweep. In the hands of excited, careless or tired writers, words and phrases that once were new or uniquely descriptive become so overused that they seem to threaten the integrity of the language itself. With a broom (or rather, cartwheel) in hand, CounterPunch editor Alexander Cockburn attempts a cleaning. Dig deeper ( 1 Min. Read )
Chris Hedges / TruthdigDec 27, 2010
The two greatest visions of a future dystopia were George Orwell’s "1984" and Aldous Huxley’s "Brave New World." It turns out they were both right. Dig deeper ( 9 Min. Read )
Staff / TruthdigJan 8, 2010
American school officials' attitudes about the relationship between kids and their school lunches have swung from shades of strict social Darwinism to reflections of the free-market mentality over the last century, as Michael O'Donnell explains in his Washington Monthly book review. Thus, the ideal of character-building deprivation gave way to the age of the tater tot. Dig deeper ( 2 Min. Read )
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Staff / TruthdigDec 14, 2009
What have you been doing all weekend? If the answer isn't reading about Fox's goofy polls, the man who hid 44 lizards in his pants and great moments in Orwellandia, hop on past the jump for the weekend list and catch up. Dig deeper ( 4 Min. Read )
Staff / TruthdigAug 5, 2009
With millions of cameras watching its citizens' every move, Britain is already one of the world's leading surveillance states. Now the government wants to go even further, putting cameras in 20,000 private homes "to make sure children attend school, go to bed on time and eat proper meals," reports the Telegraph. Update Dig deeper ( 2 Min. Read )
Staff / TruthdigAug 4, 2009
Amazon's Kindle reader might still be a great device in the estimation of some literary aficionados, but the honeymoon is over for Michigan high school student (and potential member of Future Lawyers of America) Justin D. Gawronski, who's getting litigious with the online superseller after his copy of George Orwell's "1984" was yanked from his Kindle in July. Dig deeper ( 1 Min. Read )
Staff / TruthdigMar 7, 2009
A Canadian filmmaker is combining his love of science fiction with his alarm over the ramped-up surveillance in his native Toronto by putting a specially fitted Web cam into his prosthetic eye -- he lost his own in a childhood accident -- and filming everything he sees. Dig deeper ( 1 Min. Read )
Chris Hedges / TruthdigSep 8, 2008
St. Paul is a window into our future. It is a future where constitutional rights mean nothing and where lawful dissent is branded a form of terrorism. Dig deeper ( 4 Min. Read )
Kasia Anderson / TruthdigJun 3, 2008
It's usually a reliable sign that a once-original idea has been utterly stripped of its impact by the time it becomes the premise for a reality television show. Not so for "Big Brother." Several seasons of that particular televised train wreck have come and gone, and besides, Apple Computer also cashed in on the whole surveillance paranoia theme ages ago. Big Brother is watching. We get it. Dig deeper ( 8 Min. Read )
Staff / TruthdigSep 4, 2007
It turns out that George Orwell, famed author of "1984" and originator of the term "Big Brother," was spied on by his government for more than 10 years. Members of Britain's MI5 suspected the writer of being a communist, until they bothered to read him, and were apparently baffled by his "bohemian" clothes. Dig deeper ( 1 Min. Read )
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