Peach

Many people in today’s society aim to become powerful in various aspects of their lives. Although power can be used in a positive fashion, what has frequently been witnessed is the misuse of power in terms of abuse, manipulation and force. This is due to many leaders becoming greedy of their level of authority and instead of using power in the right manner it is often used in a form that benefits the leader for selfish reasons. In the prescribed text ‘Animal Farm’ by George Orwell as well as the feature article ‘Purgatory’ and the movie ‘The power of one’, all three misuses of power are explored. At the core of these power issues is the theme of relationships. Good morning Mrs Sayadi and fellow classmates. Today I will use the feature article of ‘Purgatory’ and the movie ‘The power of one’ as well as the novel ‘Animal Farm’. These texts will examine how relationships both positive and negative influence leaders in determining how they will use the power they posses. “Absolute power corrupts absolutely”. This quote by Lord Acton has truth as absolute power will always corrupt as it is generally gained through the exploitation of relationships and manipulation of people. In ‘Animal Farm’, Orwell uses certain characters to form distinct relationships in the text to communicate his ideas of how relationships can influence people or in this case animals, in a negative form to gain power and use it for their own advantage. Orwell presents this idea with the use of anthropomorphism; this involves giving human qualities to animals. Orwell bestows the power of education and knowledge upon all the pigs on Animal Farm. A relationship in the novel that Orwell constructs negatively is the relationship between the young boar Napoleon and the other farm animals. Napoleon uses the power of education and knowledge against the other animals that are illiterate and dim-witted to empower himself to a higher level of authority and eventually to control the other animals. This is incontestable throughout the middle to the end of the novel as Napoleon gradually gains more power through manipulating the other animals and playing on their fears. An example of how Napoleon manipulated the animals is with the use of Squealer. Since Napoleon is not a very good speaker he uses Squealer as his orator to support his image as a great leader. Napoleon uses Squealer many times throughout the novel. This can be seen on page 75, when Napoleon uses Squealer to conceal the truth about the food situation. Squealer appears very optimistic towards the animals with the news of the food situation. He informs the animals that they were not in fact short of food no matter how it may seem to appear, although it was necessary to make a ‘readjustment’. Squealer always spoke of a ‘readjustment’ and never a ‘reduction’.