Autoimmune Reaction

       Autoimmune Reaction

          Once upon a time, the Equalest of the Anti-Sex League bellowed to the crowd, “Double-plus-ungood oldthink!” She pointed to a four-word graffito spray-painted onto the wall of Miniluv headquarters. “That doublethink is UnIngsoc!” The crowd roared.

She raged, “It says ‘Big Brother is Goldstein’? It says ‘Big Brother is Goldstein’?! Who dares utter such duckspeak? It unbellyfeels Big Brother!” The crowd cheered. “It goodspeaks the Hated One!” The crowd booed. “And plus-ungood yet, these words are sexcrime! For ‘Big Brother’ is prole-speak for…” she paused, took a huge breath, and sang out, “the stand-upping man-part!” The crowd gasped. “Yes!” she wailed. “And ‘Goldstein’ is prole-speak for that same man-part gone soft!” Men howled, women fainted.

          With crimson face and heaving breasts, the Equalest of the Anti-Sex League ranted, “Destroy that crimethink! Make it never was! Memory-hole it! Speedwise blot the words, smash the words, smash the wall!”

          The rioters tore down that wall and set the Ministry of Love ablaze. The next day, that same graffito, copied by a dozen different hands,  appeared on Minitrue, Minipax and every other Party headquarters in town. The day after that, all those buildings lay in ruins.

          Moral:  Big Brother is Goldstein.

          Commentary: An autoimmune reaction is when an antigen provokes the immune system to attack its own body. Even the tiniest trace of antigen can be fatal. Here it took only four words of smutty proletarian slang.