In Animal Farm, George Orwell demonstrates the danger of unquestioning acceptance of ideas and actions that are "supposed to represent" a better way of life. Throughout the book there are many examples of hatred and evil undermining what sounds like a great utopia when introduced, but not when they are lived. The ideas are very familiar because they are based on those that drove the Russian Revolution, and what went wrong with it. The difference between a nice Utopian idea and what goes wrong in real life has to do with human nature. Greed is real, in that it drives people to do things. There is greed for power, greed for food, and greed for whatever a greedy person might want. While not everyone is greedy, some people are very much so. The very greedy people make life difficult for the rest of us. This is not such a big problem in democracies, which are constructed to balance any action with the ideas of many groups and rights. In a dictatorship, like the Soviet Union, a person like Stalin can determine every key aspect of most individuals' lives. The more violent a Stalin is, the more power a Stalin has; and the farther from Utopia are the lives of the common people.

The animals of the farm firmly believed Napoleon was a great ruler regardless of the suffering they endured due to their unquestioning acceptance of ideas. For example, no one noticed when Snowball's idea was changed from, "All animals are equal," (43) to "All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others," (133). Whenever the rules were changed, the animals seemed not to notice -- even though the change meant that each time their lives were worsened. No free press was allowed to point out the evil of the system. By accepting to be excluded, to have lower status, and to accept that they could be ruled over with cruelty, the animals of Animal Farm actually encouraged Napoleon's worsening or shortening their lives. In the Russian Revolution, Lenin made it clear that everyone of the people in Russia were Soviets and that they were all equal. Once Lenin died, Stalin took supreme control of Russia. He made supporters of his favored government officials, and then inexplicably forced them to confess to untrue stories. One of the leading theories as to why the government officials confessed is that so many trusted that Stalin was always correct, no matter what. It wasn't worth saying otherwise. By surrendering to Stalin and not fighting back, the citizens of Russia helped him grow more dangerous. In his greed for power, cruelty made him powerful. The more power he got, the more he wanted, and the more cruel he became. Another example that states this is in the beginning, when all animals worked hard to get enough food, or to get the windmill finished for themselves. "All that year the animals worked like slaves...everything that they did was for the benefit of themselves..." (73). In the end, after Snowball had been sent out of the farm, the animals worked furiously, with bad health conditions, and did so for Napoleon's pleasures only. With the change of who they were working for and what they were getting out of it, Napoleon knew they would follow him because the power he gained through cruelty made them afraid not to follow him. They would do anything, even if it meant death. Their being weaker meant he was more powerful, which must have been most important to him. The weaker he made them, the more powerful he

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Approximate Word count = 1520
Approximate Pages = 6 (250 words per page double spaced)