Both George Orwell’s 1984 and Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World are dystopias with much

in common, including diverse views of the dangers of social control. Brave New World
highlights that hedonism is a possible interpretation and individualism is a delusion, and
Orwell’s account shows that authoritarian regimes should be feared and reality can be
manipulated.

This is seen in the Thought Police pursuing people, especially anywhere they go, and the
omnipresent telescreens in "1984", where surveillance becomes the most formidable tool in
human mind control. Through the suppression of information, the government is rewriting
history archives, reigning terror, and erasing all opposition to maintain its reign in place. The
party relies on terror, physical abuse, and violence to make sure conformity and obedience by
the party members are ensured.

Contrarily, this novel shows a society where materialism and pleasure remedy distress or
rebellion. This sensation so closely resembles Freud’s notion of the pleasure principle. A
person need only make the decision to let go of their independence almost instinctively
toward the smooth satisfaction of their desires that society has already bred them to receive
from birth in the direction of the hedonistic ends set by society at large. It even tries
psychological manipulation and conditioning tactics, and for the world state, peace and
stability in society are the ultimate goals over all the individual's liberty. The novel deals with
capitalism as a value, implying that everything, including relationships and leisure, turns into
commodities. It tries to generate a kind of dispassionate consent by having individuals adopt
these concepts as their own beliefs. These people have nothing but the pursuit of
commodities in their minds and no desire for anything else.

The subject in both novels is reality as a tool for community governance and suppression, as
well as the mental restraint of those who challenge it and perceive it as a danger to their
development and identity. In "Nineteen Eighty-Four," the Party distorts the truth, enabling
the Party to hold totalitarian hegemony and diminishing individual freedom. The heart of the
Ministry of Truth is to alter the official records to reflect the party's own narratives, and the
Thought Police, whose rugs sweep every corner, punishes the violators of opposing views. In
this setting, the party's censorship is omnipresent, helping it to work. Across the grudging
news flow, popular acquiescence and obedience are maintained. In “Brave New World,”
hedonism and superficial culture distort our view of reality; in fact, they even throw it away.
An individual's submissiveness to unethical and totalitarian rules results from conditioning
and brainwashing to manipulate information. Whether they realize it or not, from the moment
of birth, citizens are brought up to embrace these norms, beliefs, and values. Hypnopaedia
explores the dystopian nature of the world's vision. Yet the latter is concealed, for it sanctions
the operation of mental control by imposition rather than by the totalitarian action of
forbidding. Diverse viewpoints stated on knowledge and reality in the books compare diverse
social regulation and management methods. They show the problems that can arise when
controlling information. On the other hand, they range from various viewpoints, thus
enabling them to better understand insightful interpretations that illustrate a complicated
relationship between governance and authority in society.
The party in “Nineteen Eighty-Four” destroys individuality through uncompromising
commitment to conformity of thought. The ability for individuals to express their opinions
and emotions is restricted but also the least digression from Party directives could entail dire
consequences as Thought Police are always there. Dissidents can be found within the party’s
grip and therefore, they are closely monitored and punished. Conversely, Huxley presents a
society where control by society and brainwashing eliminate personal autonomy. Human
beings have been conditioned since birth to play pre-assigned social roles which makes them
not independent agents or autonomous entities. Allowing a person in a world state to deviate
from average results into mute such people; these people who do not obey can thus be viewed
as being made non-existent within its territories. However, both novels show societies that
lack individuals’ sense of self but still respect collective conformity. This betrays an absence
of personal liberty due to the lack of barriers depicting how extreme this shows it goes when
power becomes absolute.

Orwell’s novel demonstrates this theme through the totalitarian rule exerted by the Party
amidst a dystopian environment leading to oppression versus freedom. The total eradication
of individual identity and freedom is emphasized by the fact that in Oceania, even the act of
independent thought is punishable by death. The fight against fascism, in which privacy is
violated to the point of regulating ideas itself, is profoundly reflected in Winston Smith's
struggle against this repressive dictatorship. Winston's intellectual opposition contrasts with
Julia's disobedience, which is motivated by a desire for pleasure and personal liberty.
However, O’Brien, who seemingly shared sympathy for Winston’s cause, ultimately betrays
him by becoming a loyal Party member (Marks, 2015). In contrast, Aldous Huxley reveals a
society where people voluntarily give up their freedom and dignity in exchange for instant
gratification and superficial happiness. Consequently, in the World State, people are molded
and brainwashed at birth to accept and live according to society's standards and seek pleasure
in consumerism's simplicity. Freedom of choice allows for stability and uniformity in a
society where people enjoy the security of their allocated roles. The prevalent use of soma as
a mood-changing drug becomes the most reliable means to escape from harsh realities that
only serve to accentuate the suppression of individual autonomy in exchange for superficial
happiness. However, John's rejection of soma manifests his anti-hedonist personality. In
Greek mythology, Dionysus represents pleasure, indulgence, and being free from social
restraints. At the same time, soma embodies hedonism and conformity in the World State that
lets them escape from reality and brings them false happiness (Izzo & Kirkpatrick, 2008).

In "Nineteen Eighty-Four," the Party's repression is imposed externally, giving the citizens no
choice to resist or be submissive to its control. In contrast, "Brave New World" represents a
society where people hand over their freedom to feel happiness and stability. Contrary to
their ways of working, both novels highlight the indispensable role of individual autonomy in
upholding human dignity and freedom. Whether through an outside force or from within, the
loss of autonomy poses a terrifying threat to fundamental human nature, reviving the
timelessness of these themes in modern discussions.
Like the case in Aldous Huxley's "Brave New World," the society order is firmly constructed
upon intelligence and appearance. The most affluent class, known as "Alphas," is highly
intelligent and holds occupations that require sophisticated talents. Lower-class inhabitants,
such as "Deltas" and "Epsilons," are designed to undertake menial duties with less
intelligence but greater physical stamina. Mass production techniques such as the
"Bokanovsky process" reinforce the division of labor, which allows several children to be
born from a single fertilized egg. The strict caste system reflects the hierarchical nature of
capitalism, where a few people hold all the money and power, causing widespread alienation
and unhappiness among the general population. Despite society's claim to individuality,
citizens have no actual distinctive personalities and live largely as agents of their societal
strata. This lack of individuality serves societal stability by molding humans into preset roles
that let the dystopian society work (Booker, 1994. p. 49).

The Orwell and Huxley warnings resemble elements of 21st-century complexities that warn
us against allowing tyranny to control our freedoms. Analyzing the applicability of Orwell's
warnings about surveillance, propaganda, and dictatorship to the twenty-first century reveals
that his dystopian perspective in "Nineteen Eighty-Four" remains strikingly accurate. The
growth of social networks and digital devices provides endless opportunities to communicate
through online surveillance, in which governments and companies collect huge amounts of
personal data without people’s informed consent. Moreover, spreading false information and
fake news has become more popular. The danger of propaganda is real in democratic
conversations and people’s trust in the institutions, promoted by social media algorithms and
echo chambers. Orwell’s warning about totalitarianism and playing with facts is a great clue
to our problems with protecting individual Freedoms and democracy in digital age.

This point is also made in Huxley’s Brave New World, where he personifies today’s
complaints of shallowness. Consumerism and instant satisfaction are the main drivers behind
individual behaviour and societal norms. The rise of social media platforms and digital
technology has continued the spread of hedonism as well as consumer culture that forces
individuals to seek validation or fun through likes, shares or online connections.

Moreover, when personal data reasonability was put into question, so did security and
privacy issues; this was also found out when living within an interconnected society that
values one’s data as currency marketed for profit. Huxley's accusation of a society where
people whose responsibility it is to keep humanity happy are not wholeheartedly doing their
tasks that control just for transient satisfaction echoes contemporary discourses about the
impact of conformity.

The presence of technology results in the changing of relations between people, mental
conditions, and social beliefs. From the data in his writing and speeches, it can be clearly
seen that Huxley's personal perspectives on eugenics have changed over time. In the first
place, Huxley was on the side of eugenics, believing in the projection of the anticipated
future and how to avoid it, resulting in a decrease in populations in Western Europe.
However, Huxley appears to have believed that the abuses of the Nazis—the Holocaust and
eugenics—were disastrous, so he sought to alert the public to the dangers of such extreme
technological dominance in society. It was one of the dangers emitted by untampered
innovation. Fear is expressed that these developments could pave the way for the Big
Brother-like government surveillance that was already depicted by Orwell’s Big Brother
(Diken, 2011).

Orwell raised the concern that individuals who could be constantly watched and the
government could eventually become suffocating. Huxley tells us that we tend to focus more
on buying things, pleasures, and physical necessities than on the more important things in
life. As much as they do, they leave us with insightful examples for today. We dwell in the
era of digital technology, and we become so busy defining its colliding effects on society and
whether they alter our values.

“Nineteen Eighty-Four” shows how the authority manipulates information and keeps people
ignorant to have better control over society. They ruthlessly implement their own views of
the world in society through dissent, suppression of any kind, and complacency of the people
below the earth’s surface that have been given out for dead, and that is without intellectual
issues. Although the themes of the two novels might differ for each one, there is no doubt that
both books are about the truth of the matter. He sets out to safeguard the individual's
autonomy and to struggle against a government that suppresses personal liberties.

Finally, both novels are known to have strong voices that remind us of the risks of
totalitarianism and social engineering. Despite the fact that the delivery of both books is
different, their underlying theme, which is that the outspoken truth would liberate any human
and subdue any authoritarian rules, is the same. Through his picture of a power-grabbing
society in which there is tight control over information and dissent is brutally suppressed,
Orwell’s description of the world was terrifyingly appropriate for today’s digital espionage
and manipulation era. Similarly, Huxley’s depiction of a pleasure-driven society where truth
gets lost in diversions and entertainment is as unsettling as modern-day issues surrounding
consumerism and the erosion of critical faculties. Also, the authors’ personal views on
eugenics and technological suppression offer insight into the moral dilemmas raised by
scientific progress and social transformation.

References
Booker, M. Keith. (1994). The dystopian impulse in modern literature (pp. 49). Greenwood
Press. http://books.google.ie/books?
id=lwrDEAAAQBAJ&dq=The+Dystopian+Impulse+in+Modern+Literature&hl=&cd=2&so
urce=gbs_api

Diken, B. (2011). Huxley’sBrave New World— and Ours. Journal for Cultural Research,
15(2). (pp. 153–172). https://doi.org/10.1080/14797585.2011.574056

Izzo, D. G., & Kirkpatrick, K. (2008, May 23). Huxley’s Brave New World: Essays.
McFarland. (pp. 106 –115). http://books.google.ie/books?id=YZCqGf-D-
qYC&pg=PA145&dq=Huxley%27s+Brave+New+World:
+Essays&hl=&cd=1&source=gbs_api

Marks, P. W. (2015). Imagining Surveillance. (pp. 86)

https://doi.org/10.3366/edinburgh/9781474400190.001.0001