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Big Brother – TranscriptionErica – Lindsay

Erica: I read this really interesting article the other day about Facebook and social media and how the government and other companies can observe our profiles and information we put on the internet and it got me thinking that maybe we’re not really as private as we think we are! The article mentioned something called ‘Big Brother’. Maybe you could explain that to me?

Lindsay: Well, the idea of ‘Big Brother’ came from a book called 1984. Erica: Oh, 1984! Who wrote that?Lindsay: It was written by George Orwell who also wrote Animal Farm. He’s quite a famous English author.Erica: All right! And when did he write this book?Lindsay: He wrote it in 1948 so quite a while ago but he was talking about what he thought society would be like

in the future in the 80s.Erica: Ok! Was he optimistic about the time?Lindsay: Not particularly, no. He thought that people would be quite unhappy in society. There’d be a lot of control

over what they’d do and what they’d say. He didn’t think people would have much freedom any more.Erica: All right! And who’s this Big Brother?Lindsay: Well it’s kind of like the government. They were watching what everybody would do and they have

cameras everywhere, they’d listen to what you say, even the things that you think wouldn’t be private any more.

Erica: It’s terrible! So what actually happens in this book?Lindsay: Well, the main character is a man named Winston. And he’s a very intelligent man so he understands

all the oppression in society but there isn’t really much that he can do and he actually falls in love with a woman named Julia so he tries to find ways that they can have some freedom and some privacy where they won’t be seen by Big Brother.

Erica: Does it at least have a happy ending? Does he go happily ever after with her?Lindsay: Not particularly because Big Brother would never approve of their relationship. So eventually when they

get caught, he’s subjected to torture, a lot of bad things happen to him to try and make him realize he’s wrong and to make him change.

Erica: What an awful prediction of the future! Do you agree with that? Do you think Orwell was correct, or did his predictions come true?

Lindsay: I don’t think it’s as extreme as Orwell thought that it was going to be. Everybody knows a lot of information about us and everybody sees our Facebook profiles and nothing that bad has ever happened to me.

Erica: Alright so I shouldn’t go deleting my Facebook account? Lindsay: I don’t think you need to, no. I’ve been using Facebook for ages and nothing bad has happened so...Erica: So I’ll just be more careful about what I send to people and the pictures I post.Lindsay: Exactly.Erica: All right, cool! Then I’ll keep my account.

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