Humans like to be in control, so they tell people what to do. In the
Animal Farm
, by
George Orwell, he uses an animal revolution to represent what was happening in the Russian
Revolution, The pigs were the guys in charge, but they became corrupted by their power, and life became even worse for the working class than before. In a New York Times article by
David Brooks, “The Nudge Debate”, he talks about how the government “nudging” us to do things, like how they want to make bad decisions harder for U.S. citizens. “Government doesn’t tell you what to do, but it gently biases the context so that you find it easier to do things you think are in your own self interest” (Brooks 4). This means that our government is nudging us to do things, and makes it seem like we came up with it. “If government starts manipulating decisionmaking processes, then individuals won’t learn to think for themselves”
(Brooks 7). I think that Orwell believes that the government “nudging” us is bad. In his book, he creates the pigs to go mad with power, change laws, and tell the other animals what to do.
Governments should be set up with many different kinds of people to ensure the best situation for its citizens, and not in a monarchy, or dictatorship.
From the change in power on Animal Farm, previously called Manor Farm, from the book
Animal Farm
, by George Orwell, the animals felt happier than ever as the summer passed. They had gotten rid of their cruel master, and cut themselves off from humans all together. The animals no longer had to comply with what the humans want, but were ‘free’
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from all the burden. They still had to work hard, but they reaped more benefits from it, such as increased food rations in the early days of rebuilding their lives after the revolution. As
Orwell said in
Animal Farm about why they were all happy, “Every mouthful was an acute pleasure, now that it was truly their own food, produced by themselves and for themselves, not doled out by a grudging master. With the worthless parasitical human beings gone, there was more food for everyone to eat” (Orwell 28). They even thought the food tasted better, because they all worked together, and all of it went to the animals and none to the humans.
They also found out what free time meant. “There was more leisure time too, inexperienced though the animals were” (Orwell 28). Before, all they did was work. Now they had specific hours they had to work, then they could relax, which is something they could have never done before getting rid of Jones. The animals were happy and free, and life was fair. They had a form of democracy, that wasn’t quite democratic. The animals all got to vote on laws and ideas, and they all though life was good. This is how a government should work, with a variation that includes other animals in the position of the pigs.
Later on in
Animal Farm
, Napoleon has chased off Snowball and placed himself supreme over all. When Napoleon told the hens that they must surrender their eggs for the benefit of the farm, they were murderous. They now had to lay four hundred eggs a week and still get their clutches ready for the spring sitting, so they could replenish their numbers. They couldn’t bear the extra strain. “Led by four Black Minorea pullets, the hens made a determined effort to thwart Napoleon’s wishes. Their method was to fly up to the rafters and there lay their eggs, which smashed to pieces on the floor” (Orwell 76). However, Napoleon was ruthless and quick with punishment. He ordered the hen’s rations to be stopped, and any animal found helping them to be put to death. Napoleon kept all the animals in line with a cruel dictatorship.
This is not how a government should be run. George Orwell, the author of
Animal Farm
,
