How to think fearlessly and write with courage

When George Orwell released “Animal Farm,” as he recounts, his book was seen as inconvenient. England was involved in a minor conflict known as World War II, and the Allies were still fighting to defeat a certain Hitler and the Axis.

The Soviet Union was part of the group of countries trying to stop the advance of fascism, as is well known. And, if you haven’t read “Animal Farm,” it tells the story of a rebellion on a farm, a thinly veiled (but not too much) critique of the direction the 1917 revolution took in Russia, especially under the command of Stalin.

Orwell recounts that the book had been rejected by four publishers before its publication. The reason, according to him, was that the story could upset the Russians, such essential allies in that cruel war waged across Europe. Defenders of Moscow in England would be potentially offended by the content of the book.

The writer says that one had to tread so carefully regarding the Russians that it was easier to criticize Churchill than Stalin at that time.

Orwell recounts a similar dilemma when he published his accounts of the Spanish Civil War. Those who witnessed the conflict, as Orwell did, saw a second war, beyond the bloody clash between the Republic and the Nationalists, led by Francisco Franco. Yes, there was a dispute within the left.

The group linked to the Soviet Union wanted primacy in leading the republicans, which led to fights. More than that, there was even armed conflict between the two factions. A war within the war. However, reporting this fact was frowned upon, once it could create the impression (true) that the left was divided, weakening the republican cause in Spain.
More Information, Less Religion

Both examples are illustrative of the dead-end that journalists, analysts, and thinkers can find themselves in at any moment. The political conveniences of the time can dictate that it is better not to address certain subjects at certain moments, under the penalty of compromising some greater objective.

Information or religion

“This is not the time to discuss this,” some will say. “It’s not convenient to talk about that,” others will defend. Telling the truth becomes secondary, and promoting a specific view or narrative becomes the priority. Have you seen this scenario before?

Those who try to break this “agreement” are accused of opportunism, having bad intentions, or being alienated. To me, this is the worst accusation because it places the person in a position of non-commitment; you become an “idiot” in the original sense of the term, an ignorant person who cannot look around and understand the world.

None of this can be said of George Orwell, who not only was in Spain to fight against the fascists — taking up arms, mind you — but also took a bullet in the neck that nearly killed him. Far from being “neutral.” It was there, in fact, that he witnessed the entire fight of the lefts present in the republican ranks.

"To write in plain, vigorous language one has to think fearlessly, and if one thinks fearlessly one cannot be politically orthodox."

George Orwell

But none of that mattered. Orwell was criticized in both situations (when he wrote “Animal Farm” and when he reported what he saw in Catalonia) for daring to stray from the tone, for not playing the same music the band was playing. And I think it can be said without fear of being wrong that the Soviet Union deserved Orwell’s criticism in his fictional book. And that reporting the facts that occurred in Spain was necessary and helped to understand some of the tragic outcomes of that war.

Orwell was not the first to go through this, nor will he be the last. In times of high political voltage, the facts, criticisms, and well-founded reports are not of interest. The important thing is to find what fits into the grand narrative of the time; anything outside this puzzle is considered a threat.

In several of his texts, Orwell talks about “intellectual honesty.” It is a principle perhaps a bit diffuse, but that fits perfectly here. It’s about not bending to political conveniences at the expense of facts. This is the role of the journalist, which Orwell was, but also of anyone who engages in intellectual activities in a public way: writers, poets, debaters, analysts, commentators, etc.

To be afraid is to refrain from saying something not to stir up the spirits of colleagues. To be afraid is to condition the facts to political objectives and pretend that this is not a problem. Journalism is particularly affected by this dilemma, of course. When it abandons its mission, it has been co-opted. If it’s afraid of upsetting, it’s no longer journalism, but just a pawn in the political game of day-to-day life.

Orwell wanted to escape this fate, and his writing reflected that. He believed in the mission of reporting the truth and thinking honestly, even if he failed. To me, this is noble and increasingly necessary. If everything becomes a matter of narrative, then we no longer have information but religion.

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To learn more, read Orwell on Truth, a book with selected excerpts from the writer’s texts on the idea of truth.