Ask HN: Why aren’t there any automobiles in Nineteen Eighty-4?
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some sort of quasi-fascist screed by a Futurist artist or writer from the 30s about a marvelous “race-automobile” or something
Yep that sounds exactly like the Futurist movement[0]. It basically was Fascist (or at least, intentionally intended to be highly compatible with Fascism). Fillipo Marinetti wrote both the Manifesto of Futurism and the Fadcist Manifesto and wanted Futurism to be the official art style of Mussolini’s Fascist Italy (though Mussolini really didn’t care much for art in general and Fascist Germany was far more interested in “traditional” German and “classical” art than Futurism). The Futurist Manifesto states: “We affirm that the beauty of the world has been enriched by a new form of beauty: the beauty of speed. A racing car . . . is more beautiful than the Victory of Samothrace.” [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Futurism |
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Right, everything in the book is shoddy and second-rate. Access to high-quality luxuries like good tobacco and coffee is reserved for the Inner Party and is a major perk of membership.
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It’s been a few years since I read the book but weren’t there shortages of things as commonplace as boots? How are they going to have cars? (And they’ll need rubber for the wheels, at least)
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Cars are means and symbols of individual independence and freedom. As such, they wouldn’t be allowed in a 1984 world. Beware those trying to eliminate cars.
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If Orwell correctly predicted that communists would want to eradicate the personal freedom that comes from car ownership, you think he wouldn’t have beat us over the head with it?
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How many privately owned cars were there in the Soviet Union? Seems like automobiles are tools of the bourgeoisie, so it seems perfectly inline that a socialist paradise would tightly control them.
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17 million privately owned cars in 1991, about 1/5 per capita than Europe at the time.
Unless you are talking about 1948, when the country was a burnt-out desert recovering from 30 million war dead. |