Double thinking

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Doublethink (Engl. Doublethink ; in older translations: doublethink ) is a newspeak -term from the dystopian novel 1984 by George Orwell and describes a kind of contradictory thinking , which is said that to his understanding doublethink itself forms the prerequisite. Through this propagated thinking in which two contradictingor to maintain mutually exclusive beliefs and accept both, the ruling caste overrides the laws of logic. As a result, the thinking of the party members becomes vague and ambiguous, which means that rapid changes of course by the regime can be accepted immediately in a peculiar way, even if it is the exact opposite of the previously “valid truth”, for example in the case of abrupt changes in enemy images or of political slogans.

This includes: deliberately telling lies and sincerely believing in them; to forget any fact that has become inconvenient, and then, if necessary, to bring it back from oblivion; to deny the existence of an objective reality for as long as necessary while accepting the reality that one is denying.

State reality control

As Orwell explains in 1984 , the party could not maintain its relentless control of power without psychologically damaging its people and subjecting them to constant propaganda . And yet the recognition of this inhumanity and deception, even within the party, could lead to an implosion of the state structure as a result of the general outrage. For this reason, Orwell's imagined perfected form of government uses a complex system of reality control . Although the novel is best known for its total surveillance of everyday life, it was primarily this cognitive reality check that kept people in check. Reality control meant the ability to control and manipulate the population by changing everyday speech and thinking. Newspeak was the method of controlling thinking through language. Double thinking was the method of directly manipulating thinking.

Double thinking was a kind of conditioned , deliberate negation of internal contradictions in the prevailing state ideology. In the case of Winston Smith, Orwell's protagonist , this meant working at the Department of Truth , erasing potentially subversive data in the state archives, and then really being able to believe in the new version he wrote himself.

Self-deception through a shift in reality

As a result of the double-mindedness, the party was not only able to militarily terrorize its own people and convince its citizens that the attacks were caused by the enemy, but also all party members, even those who had ordered the attacks, were in the Able to believe that the terrorist attacks were controlled from outside. In addition, the dual thinking allowed the party to maintain great goals and realistic expectations in equal measure:

"If one wants to rule, one must be able to shift one's relation to reality , because the secret of rulership is to believe in one's own infallibility and to combine this with the ability to learn from mistakes."

In this way, any party member could be a credible pawn without ever being lacking relevant knowledge. The party is both fanatical and well informed, so it would hardly stagnate or effeminate and collapse. The "killing the messenger " , the command and control structure disturb conventional totalitarian power apparatus, but would have no effect in such a system. The double-thinking functioned as a key tool of party discipline , for state propaganda and as a complement to the police apparatus. Together, these tools have been able to hide state malice not only from the population but also from the government itself, but without the confusion and disinformation associated with more primitive totalitarian regimes . Double thinking was essential to the ability of party members to discern the party's real intentions without guiltily shying away from those intentions.

Psychotherapy and cognitive dissonance

Over the years, since the publication in 1984 , the concept of double thinking has become a synonym for psychological relief, which is achieved by simply ignoring the contradiction of two points of view ( see also: cognitive dissonance ). Some schools of psychotherapy, such as cognitive behavioral therapy , encourage patients to modify their thinking in order to treat various mental disorders that are sustained by ignoring contradictions ( see also: cognitive bias ).

See also

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Hans-Christoph Schröder : George Orwell. An intellectual biography. Beck, Munich 1988. p. 264.
  2. ↑ Renate Hutterer-Krisch: Outline of psychotherapy ethics: relevance to practice, treatment errors and effectiveness . Ed .: Renate Hutterer-Krisch. Springer Vienna, 2007, ISBN 978-3-211-30671-0 , pp. 228 ff . ( limited preview in Google Book Search [accessed January 29, 2017]).