Orwell the Essayist

Orwell on Gandhi

Orwell essay on Gandhi was an interesting reflection upon the Indian founder as much as Orwell own views on the nature of man and pacifism. "Saints should always be judged guilty until they are proved innocent," begins Orwell discussion of Gandhi. For Gandhi, pacifism was a form of warfare as Orwell notes, "way of defeating the enemy without hurting him and without feeling or arousing hatred." Gandhi's goal was to win India's independence but he also understood that there were ways to do so without engineering centuries of hatred. A nation that is born in violence and begin in revolution may sometimes find itself in perpetual violence and revolution. The French Revolution went from the overthrow of the monarchy to the establishment of Napoleon with intervals of violence spasm that featured the guillotine.

For many pacifists, to even take sides was a violation of pacifism and Gandhi took sides. While he was a practicing pacifist, he still was a stretcher-bearer during the Boar War and as Orwell notes that Gandhi "was honest enough to see that in war it is usually necessary to take side... He did not take the sterile and dishonest line of pretending that in every war both sides are exactly the same and it makes no difference who wins. "

Many pacifists often view life through a lie and fail to see the logic of their own position. Gandhi did see the logic of what he was proposing and the consequences of his action. In 1938, Gandhi told a reporter that the Jews should commit collective suicide in the face of Nazi persecution. Such an action would have aroused the world to the horror of Hitler. And when he urged a non-violent resistance to a Japanese invasion of India, he admitted that such an action would result in the death of millions of Indians.

As for the Jews, Gandhi felt vindicated in his original opinion when the full cost of the holocaust was revealed after World War II. In Gandhi mind, the Jews died anyway so why not do it in a spectacular fashion? Cold? Yes, but it was also what Gandhi asked of his followers, to volunteer their life and that of their neighbors for the cause of peace. For most pacifists, such an admission is inconceivable for many pacifists view their action through the prism of their own experience and rarely see the consequences for the nation as a whole. They don't see the millions who will be sacrifice for their faith nor do they really care. Gandhi did understand what he was asking and yes, he did care about the probable result.

Where Gandhi, like most pacifist, fail to understand was the true nature of 20th century and now 21st century totalitarianism and viewed his struggle through his own experience with the British government. When he called on the Jews to commit collective suicide to arouse the world, it only works as Orwell observed, "If the world gets a chance to hear what you are doing." As Orwell asked in his essay, how could such a strategy work if opponents are taken in the dead of night to be tortured and killed? How can your strategy work in countries where the voices of the media and protest are silenced? As Orwell writes, "The Russian masses could only practice civil disobedience if the same idea happened to occur to them simultaneously, and even then, to judge by the history of the Ukraine famine, it would not make a difference."