Transcript V for Vendetta

Terms re-cap
and
a little bit of history
Terms: BIG BROTHER
Big Brother
• Do you drive a car? Do you watch
television? Do you use a cell phone? Do
you use loyalty cards? Do you use the
internet? If you do any of those things,
information about you is being recorded and
tracked.
• Satellites – Google Earth does more than
take photos!
• Cameras and listening devices on streets, in
shops etc
• Lack of privacy
Terms – POLICE STATE
A Police State
• People restricted in their mobility, and in their
freedom to express or communicate political
or other views
• People subjected to police monitoring or
enforcement.
• Political control may be exerted by means of
a secret police force which operates outside
the boundaries of a normal society.
• The Soviet Union and East Germany
– extensive and repressive police and intelligence services (KGB)
– approximately 2.5% of the East German adult population served
as informants for the Stasi (600 in GC = 15 unknown
informants!)
• Nazi Germany: a dictatorship brought in
gradually
– repressive control over its people in the lead-up to World War II.
– Used the SS and the Gestapo to assert control over the
population from the 1930s until the end of the war.
• Apartheid: the South African government
–
–
–
–
banning people and organizations
arresting political prisoners
maintaining segregated living communities
restricting movement and access
Terms – TOTALITARIANISM
State
controls
Church
family
economy
school
media
Totalitarianism
Totalitarian regime strategies include:
• Having a dictatorship
• Employing only one ruling party
• Rule through fear
• Censorship of media
• Propaganda in media, government speeches and through
education
• Criticism of the state is prohibited
• Mandatory military sign up
• Secret police forces
• Controlling reproduction of the population (either in hopes to
increase or to decrease)
• Targeting of specific religious or political populations
Totalitarianism
• Joseph Stalin – The Soviet Union. He took over the country
and began executing any people who were not in alignment
with the goals of the state.
• Benito Mussolini –Italy in 1922 became the leader of the
nation and immediately began to rule in a totalitarian
manner.
• Adolf Hitler employed totalitarianism as a means to attempt
to achieve an obedient nation that was his personal vision
for the country.
• North Korea – North Korea has been ruled by the same
family since 1948. The family has been running the country
based on the concept of self-reliance.
• Mao Zedong – From 1949, when he established the
People's Republic of China, until his death in 1976.
Why would a state/government want to control the following?
Church
family
economy
school
media
For each heading come up with at least two
benefits for state and two dangers for people
when the state controls each of these areas:
eg. Benefit for state: If the state controls the church
they can tell you that their god/gods put them in power
so they must be obeyed = control through divine right
GUY FAWKES
REMEMBER, REMEMBER,
THE FIFTH OF NOVEMEBER,
GUNPOWDER, TREASON AND PLOT.
I KNOW OF NO REASON
WHY THE GUNPOWDER TREASON
SHOULD EVER BE FORGOT.
GUY FAWKES
The facts:
• 5th November – 1605
• Gang of Catholics planned to blow up Parliament while King
James I was in the building
• King James and
Parliament would not
let them practise their
religion
• Cellar under the House of Lords came
up for rent! Hooray!
Throne
House of Lords
Cellar
Cross-section of the House of Lords, by
Sir John Soane, 1794. Parliamentary
Archives
hung
drawn
The prisoner was hung but cut loose just before they lost
consciousness.
Their stomach was then sliced open and their guts pulled
out.
The heart would be pulled out last, and shown to the dying
person.
quartered
Finally, the head would be cut off and the body cut into four
quarters.