The Importance of Martyrs for Political and Religious Movements

Part Three, chapters 1-2 of 1984 details Winston's imprisonment at the Ministry of Love, and his subsequent torture. During one of these torture sessions with O'Brien, Winston wonders why the party would go through all of this trouble to torture him into a confession- when they are just gonna kill him anyways. O'Brien answers that this is because they are trying to get rid of martyrs- a flaw that he claims many extermination groups of the past, such as the nazis and conquistadors, failed to take into account. Instead, O'Brien explained, he wanted to change all of them into "perfect" versions, aka ones that believed in Big Brother and the party, before they killed them. Ideally, this then leaves no hope for anyone. 

But what actually is a martyr?

According to Wikipedia, martyrs are "people who suffer persecution and death for advocating, renouncing, refusing to renounce, or refusing to advocate a religious belief or cause as demanded by an external party".  For instance, Trayvon Martin, Michael Brown, George Floyd, and Breonna Taylor are just some of the many martyrs from the BLM movement. Mahatma Gandhi, Malcolm X, and Che Guevera are just some of the many other political martyrs in history. (Martyrs are also very heavily correlated with religion throughout history- with Jesus being the original martyr.)


So- why are martyrs so important to movements?

Well,  the existence of martyrs gives them a physical manifestation of what they are fighting against. It is essentially, proof of their mistreatment. Without this 'proof', it seems it may be harder for groups to rally around ideas. 

I unfortunately totally understand O'Brien's messed up logic- as it actually seems to make sense. While many argue that MLK's assassination drew a close to the civil rights movement of the mid-1900s, others argue that this created an untarnished legacy that has prevailed through history. 

What do you think? Are there other ways to rally besides over martyrs, or physical manifestations of abuse? Was O'Brien right?


Comments

  1. L. MoffittMarch 2, 2021 at 7:23 AM

    This is a great set of questions. The concept of martyrdom troubles me, because it can be manipulated by both sides of an issue. Why does someone have to sacrifice everything for a movement to progress? Why do we need such extreme proof?

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  2. Mayahuel MalikMarch 2, 2021 at 7:25 AM

    i think for a lot of people ideology is harder to dissect or see the flaw in opposed to physical manifestations of it. what O'Brien is right about, which is scary, is the importance of these physical manifestations. martyrs give people "proof" as you said which leads more people into rallying for a cause, without these martyrs its much more difficult to "prove" to the im-not-sure-yet population why something is an issue

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