Use Of Propaganda In George Orwell's Animal Farm

Animal Farm’s whole story is an allegory in the form of a fairy tale by George Orwell. The entire plot, in a literal sense, is about a group of animals taking over Jones’s farm, but metaphorically, it is meant to reflect on the events of the Russian Revolution, making it easier to understand as long as one is provided with simplistic information on the subject beforehand. The purpose of this book is to address how Orwell felt towards the events surrounding the Revolution, all of which were negative. After the perceived ‘leader’, Old Major, dies, the pigs decide to take control of the farm eventually, making Napoleon the new head of Animal Farm. During the course of the book, Napoleon uses different types of propaganda to persuade the other animals to accept and respect him as their leader through propaganda strategies such as slogan, stereotyping, and card stacking. Slogan is a method of propaganda in which a phrase is used repeatedly to persuade others into doing something or acting a certain way . There were “secret meetings in the barn, and led the singing of Beasts of England, with which the meetings always ended.” (18). This keeps familiarity
amongst the animals, and was considered to be the song of the rebellion, uniting the animals together. Napoleon also used stereotyping to gain respect as the leader with them. The first of the seven commandments says, “whatever goes upon two legs is an enemy” (24). All humans are evil, according to Napoleon, and since evil is all most of the animals have ever known from humans, they go along with Napoleon’s stereotype. The animals most likely follow Napoleon since his stereotyping is conveyed in such a way that sounds professional as though he knows what he is saying, once again. The final piece of propaganda used by Napoleon is card stacking, which is defined as emphasizing one side of an issue and repressing the other with several instances backing up one’s claim.
This is shown when Napoleon says, “[f]For whole days at a time he would lounge in his Windsor chair in the kitchen, reading the newspapers, drinking, and occasionally feeding Moses on crusts of bread soaked in beer…and the animals were underfed.” (18). Napoleon went on to create a verbal list of everything Jones had ever done to wrong the animals of the farm. Everyone agreed that Jones was horrible to them for the most part, due to Napoleon’s facts and figures he threw at them, making him seem to be even more of a leading type. This helped Napoleon maintain the trust of the animals, like how Stalin kept his followers’ as
well. These strategies ultimately allowed Napoleon to gain the acceptance and respect needed to become leader. Though not the entire focus of the novel, a good part is dedicated to Napoleon’s use of propaganda, which was strategically used in the forms of slogan, stereotyping, and card stacking. His persuasion through his words played a big part in the actions of the animals, which were important. Orwell’s purpose in demonstrating this is to show how Stalin was able to manipulate his followers through his language.