Big Brother's Watching You!

Posted by Smokey Stover on February 19, 2004

In Reply to: Big Brother's Watching You! posted by R. Berg on February 19, 2004

: : I just want to know the definition of the phrase: big brother's watching.

: There's no definition. Big Brother was a character, sort of, in George Orwell's novel "1984." By "sort of," I mean that even in the novel he wasn't a real person. A totalitarian British government of the future, as Orwell imagined it, made up a figure called Big Brother and used him to intimidate the citizens. "Big Brother is watching" was a line of propaganda, the idea being that you have to do what the government wants because, if you don't, it will KNOW. Everybody is being spied on.

And that's why the phrase has such currency today, thanks to Bush and Ashcroft. (God, that was so obvious, it's really too easy.)

• Big Brother's Watching You! Brian from Shawnee 19/February/04