Big head Quote by George Orwell
““Unpopular ideas can be silenced, and inconvenient facts kept dark, without the need for any official ban. Anyone who has lived long in a foreign country will know of instances of sensational items of news — things which on their own merits would get the big headlines-being kept right out of the British press, not because the Government intervened but because of a general tacit agreement that ‘it wouldn’t do’ to mention that particular fact. So far as the daily newspapers go, this is easy to understand. The British press is extremely centralised, and most of it is owned by wealthy men who have every motive to be dishonest on certain important topics. But the same kind of veiled censorship also operates in books and periodicals, as well as in plays, films and radio. At any given moment there is an orthodoxy, a body of ideas which it is assumed that all right-thinking people will accept without question. It is not exactly forbidden to say this, that or the other, but it is ‘not done’ to say it, just as in mid-Victorian times it was ‘not done’ to mention trousers in the presence of a lady. Anyone who challenges the prevailing orthodoxy finds himself silenced with surprising effectiveness. A genuinely unfashionable opinion is almost never given a fair hearing, either in the popular press or in the highbrow periodicals.””
About This Quote
Source Essay: The Prevention of Literature, 1946
Powerful ideas are often suppressed through informal agreements, not overt bans, especially by dominant media owners.
In simple terms: Ideas can be hidden by consensus, not law.
Seek diverse sources to uncover hidden truths.
Themes
Mood
Type
When to use this quote
- news consumption
- academic research
- activism
- public discourse
Key Concepts
Questions to Reflect On
- How do you verify claims of systemic bias?
- What mechanisms can protect minority viewpoints?
The claim may overgeneralise British media and ignore counter‑examples of free speech.