Determined to stamp out ‘wrongthink’ in all forms, the media establishment has declared a holy war against free speech. Once the bedrock of US society, it faces a redefinition into something more convenient – or oblivion. If everyone is permitted to speak freely, their reasoning goes, people’s lives will be put at risk. Those whose opinions diverge from the mainstream should not be permitted... 

As Europeans prepare to vote in the EU Parliament elections, the European Commission has raised some eyebrows with a tweet extolling the virtues of the union, in true George Orwell style. “The EU is peace. The EU is freedom. The EU is solidarity. The EU is diversity. The EU is human rights. The EU is opportunities,” read the Commission’s tweet, posted on Saturday. The message ended with a simple... 

Exactly 70 years after George Orwell’s 1984 came out, most fancy themselves smart to totalitarian doublespeak. But perverse lies need no torchlight or mass rallies, just a tailored suit, complacent media and a docile populace. We know this, yet hear them so often that they become background noise, and even if they come from the mouths of politicians we do not believe, we let the distortions wash... 

The US Central Intelligence Agency has become increasingly focused on monitoring social media, according to a document obtained by The Intercept; the intelligence agency is pouring money in start-ups mining tweets, Instagram photos and Facebook posts. Every time you post a message on Facebook or share a photo on Instagram, remember this: Big Brother is watching you. No, it’s not a quotation... 

Eight decades after George Orwell was wounded by a fascist bullet while defending a Spanish Republican trench, his son Richard is attempting to save the Civil War-era fortifications. After visiting the trenches in which his socialist father fought fascism, Richard Blair is calling for the Spanish government to rescind policies that have seen them fall into disrepair, and instead preserve them for... 

Proles upset over Seahawks’ bad play calling while ignoring greater evils committed by Obama. Americans are more outraged over Seahawks Coach Pete Carroll’s play calling during the Super Bowl than they are about President Obama, revealing that America is now a nation of “proles” obsessed with football, beer and gambling, just as the novel 1984 predicted. Twitter exploded in debate this... 

US Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor has voiced concerns that, without sufficient protections, the age of unmanned drones and ubiquitous surveillance will usher in an “Orwellian world.” Sotomayor told faculty and students at Oklahoma City University last week that technological capabilities allow devices to monitor “your conversations from miles away and through your walls.” “We... 

A grassroots movement of Fourth Amendment activists is rallying across at least 20 US cities to protest illegal surveillance techniques by the American government. The protests “1984 Day,” named for George Orwell’s classic novel about an ultramodern surveillance state, have taken place across the nations, most notably in New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Washington DC. The rallies have... 

While the world grows increasingly weary of government scams, and police brutality is the only violent statistic seeming to increase, the Scottish government seeks to force ‘state issued guardians’ on young children and parents, to ensure they grow up to be good little wage slaves. Or as they claim, ‘to stop child abuse’ Many governments get away with considering parents who don’t cooperate... 

When Orwell wrote his most famous novel, which happened to be the most emblematic of dramatic past century, he was not writing about Soviet Union and Stalin. He was basically writing a dystopia about Britain, the ruined Britain of Churchill and Lord Beveridge, a desperate country ruled now by conservative nihilism, social security services and the ideology of iron curtain and cold war. Orwell gave... 

Yasir Afifi, a 20-year-old computer salesman and community college student, took his car in for an oil change earlier this month and his mechanic spotted an odd wire hanging from the undercarriage. The wire was attached to a strange magnetic device that puzzled Afifi and the mechanic. They freed it from the car and posted images of it online, asking for help in identifying it. Two days later, FBI...