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unselect5917yesterday at 7:52 PM1 replyview on HN

The parallels between Emmanuel Goldstein and Trump Derangement Syndrome are impossible to ignore for anyone who's actually read 1984.

To borrow from Baum (The Wizard of Oz): today there's not only a curtain with men behind it, but a man in front of the curtain that everyone is pointing to (a la Goldstein). And if he stops being useful they'll replace him. This has happened several times already while the men behind the curtain and long standing policies he people hate remain unchanged.


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Terr_yesterday at 11:57 PM

Donald Trump: Billionaire in one of the top government roles of one the most powerful countries in the world; puts enormous banners of his own face over buildings; runs a personal distribution network to announce what he hates every day to his followers; regularly "jokes" about being a dictator; triggers perpetual wars with other countries; etc.

Emmanuel Goldstein: An exiled academic in hiding with a death-sentence over his head for criticizing the despotic government.

You: "People like myself who actually read 1984 know that Trump is basically Goldstein! Not any other character. The parallels are impossible to ignore."

If you really read the book, then that's tragic, because all you learned was how to embody doublethink.

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