Told using animals, Animal Farm by George Orwell tells us a story about a destroyed society. Orwell uses his political insight to compare this novel to what our world looks like today. The beginning of the novel educates the reader on the animal’s rebellion and how they will satisfy it. During the rebellion, though, the pigs consolidate full power after getting rid of Mr. Jones. After the rebellion, the pigs are corrupted by this power, which leads them to be exactly what they told everyone to be afraid of. Don't you just love hypocrites? All the animals on the farm are set on defeating the humans, but the pigs abuse their power and end up turning a successful rebellion into a legit failure. The blind animals -- not literally, of course -- are used to symbolize people in our world while the pigs represent our government. This helps in highlighting important themes hidden in the novel, and most importantly, Orwell’s big message. Animal Farm is a book I would recommend to read in school because it initiates thought to provoke discussions that relate to current day ideas.

Orwell’s book prompts discussions responding to the corruption of power, which can relate to our own lives. Throughout the novel, we read about the animals success during the rebellion against the humans. The pigs manage to turn the success into extreme chaos by taking away rights of the animals. Also, they create a list of seven commandments which everyone on the farm must follow, including the pigs themselves. If one of the pigs broke one of the commandments, they would quickly send another pig to change what it says in the commandment before anyone noticed. Why make the rules if you're not gonna follow them? Who knows. After the pigs completely corrupt the farm, Orwell shares at the end of the novel, “No question, now, what had happened to the faces of the pigs. The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from man to pig again; but already it was impossible to say which was which.” This made me so mad I wanted to scream like a newborn baby. Anyway, this proves that the incongruity brought on by the pigs, resulted in forgetting the purpose of the rebellion; to rid man from Animal Farm. In the end, not all the animals are equal, traditions are gone, the farm is called Manor Farm, and the animals are working with the humans. This is the opposite of what the entire farm wanted. Nice going...am I right? Nothing changed except for the pigs who became equal to humans. The corruption of power brought on by the pigs starts a deep and meaningful class discussion, which relates to the government we follow today. The government holds power over the people, and in a way can control what we do and don’t do because of set rules, just like the pigs did in Animal Farm with their own set of rules. Also, school administrations use propaganda to shut students up in a way so that they don’t unexpectedly act out against the school. Some schools force students to keep quiet about their opinions, which shows how they hold power over their students, preventing them from being who they are. Not good. Just not good.

Another example of a solid discussion that connects to today is the lack of critical thinking and blind conformity. While Napoleon, the clandestine pig, is in charge of Animal Farm, all the other animals casually go along with what they are told. One could say that the failed rebellion was due to the animals lacking intelligence, however the corruption of the pigs leads to blind conformity within the farm, and also some brain washing. The power of Napoleon, and the other intelligent pigs, leads the rest of the animals to blindly conform to Napoleon's beliefs and ideas. Once the animals were convinced that Snowball was a traitor and was sabotaging his original farm, they just went along with whatever Napoleon's plan was to restore the farm and get revenge on Snowball. During Boxer’s, a slow horse, failed moment of critical thinking about the whole situation, he says, “If Comrade Napoleon says it, it must be right". The rest of the animals on Animal Farm are mindlessly going by the leadership of Napoleon. The animals can't form their own opinions, and cannot act out on whatever the issue or arising problem may be. Relating to real life, this illustrates the people versus our government. People in society are blind to certain ideas that could potentially be bad due to what authoritative leaders make them believe is normal. Therefore, people believe their powerful leaders truly want the best for them, but in the end, they are only helping themselves. In a school situation, this could relate to bullying. In most friend groups there is usually a lead person. If the leader of the group is making fun, or bullying, another student, then the rest of the people in that group will go along and bully as well. The people in the friend group blindly conform to what the leader was doing without knowing the aftermath of the situation. Moral of this whole thing...speak up, use your brain, and do your best to not conform by just being your own person.

The big themes of corruption of power and blind conformity intend to create Orwell’s big message. Orwell writes in a letter to a friend, "I meant the moral [of my fable] to be that revolutions only effect [sic] a radical improvement when the masses are alert and know how to chuck out their leaders as soon as the latter have done their job.” Now, I suggest you go and read this book, but I guess you don't have to because that would be conforming.