3 ms·

Yes, this is obviously the reason. Once the cold war kicks in, Animal Farm quickly becomes a Western classic.

• moomin 3y ago
  There was, at the time, something of a doublethink going on. Whilst publicly friendly, the U.K. was privately discussing scenarios up to and including invading the USSR (Operation Unthinkable). However, again, it was wartime. And not one of these wars where your professional army fights far from home against an asymmetrically weaker foe. People tend have fairly negative views of dissenters in that circumstance. Look at what happened in America after 9/11.
  • saalweachter 3y ago
    ... after 9/11, when America's professional army fought an asymmetrically weaker foe far from home?
    • moomin 3y ago
      I mean, that was the consequence. The trigger was, I think, the greatest American loss of life on home soil since the Civil War. Imagine what America would have been like if Al-Qaeda had bombed all major cities on a daily basis for years, and the US had won with the help of Iran. I think pointing out reservations with the current regime there would be quite unpopular.
    • FrustratedMonky 3y ago
      I think maybe this has happened, some. In many of the recent wars. Afghanistan/Iraq, or even others like Ukraine. The US 'group think' is to not criticize the 'people' of the country. The population is separated from the government. Most media is very pro - "The wonderful people of the country whom surely had nothing to do with the evil government we'd like to see defeated". Criticizing the population is not allowed. Even thought they must have had some influence on their government. Hence how it is very much not allowed to criticize Muslims. Even in Ukraine, it is not allowed to criticize the "Russian People", who surely are with us against their evil government.
• jhbadger 3y ago
  It was more than that among the Left. Yes, everybody on all parts of the political spectrum on the Allied side tolerated "Uncle Joe Stalin" during the war, as Germans fighting Soviet troops were Germans not fighting their troops, but this was just "the enemy of my enemy is my friend" reasoning. But until Khrushchev's leaked 1956 "Secret Speech" in which the crimes of Stalin were denounced, a large part of the Western Left really thought the USSR was a workers' paradise and that complaints about it were just right-wing propaganda spread by exiled Russian aristocrats bitter about losing their power and wealth. Trotsky of course had been telling the world about Stalin (until he got murdered in Mexico by one of Stalin's agents), but most people likewise assumed that he was just bitter for losing out in the competition to be Lenin's successor.
  • bnralt 3y ago
    Right, people overlook the fact that Stalin was popular among many on the left (Che Guevara gave him a lot of praise). Trotsky, for his part (as well as Lenin) was authoritarian himself. But all of the revolutionaries, including Stalin, were true believers in Communism, and acted accordingly. Orwell likes to present things as a few bad actors that just happened to betray the revolution, which suits his purpose, but that isn't an accurate portrayal.
• empath-nirvana 3y ago
  A large part of the reason for that is that the CIA promoted it _hard_ in the 1950s, including directly financing a motion picture.