Struggle Against Tyranny

Everything that any human has ever known, felt, seen and done has been connected in some obvious or unseen way; The ancient Chinese Taoist culture created and believed in the meaning symbolized by the yin yang. Yin was to symbolize dark, feminine etc. and yang was to symbolize light, masculine etc. but the two could not exist separately, embodying the metaphor of seemingly different things and ideas being two sides to the same coin.
Animal Farm, is a political satire of soviet totalitarianism, most notably the Marxists. It is a riveting novel, personifying animals as specific characters from the communist era such as Stalin, Karl Marx and many others, written by George Orwell in 1945. The Matrix, on the other hand, is a science fiction movie based on the fear that humankind may not be able to control its creations, specifically computers and Artificial Intelligence. It was written and directed by the Wachowski brothers at the turn of the 21 century with the emergence of true-life artificial intelligence already well set upon the horizon. Both are extremely unique texts that, upon first examination, have little to do with one another but, upon further examination, some very profound similarities arise.
One can assume that the authors had a common thought in mind during the creation of their texts. This thought might have been, the realization that any limitations left unchecked in the hands of mere human or humanlike creatures only have the potential to work if all play fair.
Since the utopian idea of fair is nonexistent in any world evident on this earth, limitations are bound to be tested. If no one is up to the challenge of keeping up with and enforcing the limitations, than the limitations serve no purpose. Both texts seem to invite the thought and provoke the will for, any individual or group’s determination and dedication to the enforcement of their preset limitations (Orwell 7). In addition to this, the authors seem to stress the necessity of the fight against tyranny as well as against political or social ignorance.
The most obvious of the evident similarities being the use of the manipulated speaks candor to the above statement. The intellectual pigs of Animal Farm play the same role as the first artificially intelligent machine, already in power at the commencement of the Matrix; Both manipulate lesser intelligence, portrayed by humans or the non-pig animals in order to establish their power within their establishment, be it a computer or a society. The machines are now using the hatched humans as batteries (Wachowski 41:58). One may perceive that the non-pig animals and the humans who were not connected to the matrix, are fighting the same struggle against oppression.
The two tales tell that both the oppressed begin as, or established themselves as, the governing and are eventually found to be the governed. Towards the end of both texts, the situation of the used becomes almost unbearable. The animals are starving and the humans have little tolerance left for their mechanical keepers.
Animals led an oppression triggered revolt against the farmer, doing so in order to obtain the ability to govern themselves. After their struggle, the animals are very simply manipulated into being governed by and ultimately more oppressed than before by the pigs (Orwell 62-3).
Problems arise when one character or element perceives that it can “predict [others] interests…make [others] decisions for [them]”(Orwell 47-8). These words, spoken by the tyrannical Napoleon are comparable to the first machine deciding that it knew what was best for the humans. The humans created and controlled, for a time, artificial intelligence, the same intelligence that created the matrix, which now controls all human thought and action. The animals invented and established laws (Orwell 21) that would have made their society very prosperous, had they been followed. Since the rules were not followed, the animals allowed themselves to fall victim to oppression yet again.
Both texts point to humans as the source of all discontent as well as posses characters that were ’programmed’ to enact the oppressors’ will and enforce the oppressors’ oppression. Animal Farm paints the dogs as such characters in the fact of their being controlled or, more accurately, brainwashed by the personification of Joseph Stalin in the devious head pig, Napoleon. Comparatively, the agents of the Matrix are controlled by and made to do the bidding of the master computer. Napoleon and the main computer both employ tractable ‘muscle’, if you will, to enforce their protocol because the two posses little, and no significant, power of their own actions in order to otherwise establish control.
With the knowledge of their oppressors’ misdeeds, the groups decide to educate themselves in the ways of their despot. The animals, upon their overthrow of the farmer, educate themselves in the ways of tending the fields; The pigs go so far as to educate themselves in reading, writing, arithmetic and sophisticated living such as sleeping in beds, using electricity, bartering, etc. As the struggle against the Matrix’s control over humankind is waged, the protagonists are well aware that their every action and sometimes every thought has the potential to be known by the network of machines. With this in mind, they proceed to determine how the network operates in order to find loopholes within the system.
Overall, both tales tell a captivating story of revolt against tyranny. It seems that if both the humans and beasts had merely been aware that there was significant potential within their delineated plexus for manipulation then, perhaps, the manipulation would have had no opportunity to take place (Orwell 7).

Orwell, George. Animal Farm; A Fairy Story. Secker and Warburg. London, United Kingdom.1945
The Matrix. Dir.Wachowski, Larry and Andy.Per. Keanu Reeves, Laurence Fishburne, Carrie-Anne Moss. 1999.DVD.Warner Brothers.2003