You may recognize IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH as one of the three slogans propagated by the secret Inner Party in Orwell’s novel 1984. The others were WAR IS PEACE and FREEDOM IS SLAVERY.

Nobody believed them: they made no sense. But they could not be seen to be utter nonsense, because their words —common, familiar words— had been given new meanings. The Inner Party controlled the definitions of the words.

The altered meanings did not make the propositions sensible nor reasonable, but made them impossible to refute. Arguments against propositions true by definition cannot gain traction. The Inner Party —the government’s absolute power— asserted that only it could properly understand their profound meanings, and it controlled the society though laws —edicts— derived from them.

Orwell understood how language can be —has been and will be— used for deception and political control. A power that can assert nonsense by changing the meanings of words can subdue and control a democratic society.

Your IGNORANCE IS our STRENGTH is not about the nonsensical propaganda of a fictional dystopia. It is concerned with the actual government of the United States, revealed by contemporary citizens trying to come to terms with the assertion —propagated by the government’s absolute power— A CORPORATION IS A PERSON.

Their inquiries, in reasoned if sometimes heated dialog, relentlessly seek the justification for this pronouncement. They examine it from various perspectives: logical, syntactical, semantical, pragmatical, poetical and mystical. And, finding A CORPORATION IS A PERSON to be just as nonsensical as anything Orwell imagined, they demand a demonstration of its legal legitimacy— how did it come to be the highest law of the land?

This should not be a great mystery. Its source is the Supreme Court, which publishes its opinions. Yet the search for the actual reasoning leads only to the logical Fallacy of Composition, a naked edict, and the Orwellian tactic of altering definitions to befog minds and provide legal status for nonsense.

If you don’t understand how A CORPORATION IS A PERSON, you should read this book. If you do understand it, you must read this book. If it’s of no importance to you, read 1984. Then read this book.