The Duty to Stand Aside by Eric Laursen

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Laursen explores the relationship between George Orwell, famed for 1984, and Alex Comfort, famed for the Joy of Sex – an odd couple at first sight.

Yet before the Joy of Sex Comfort was a politic writer, and during the Second World War him and Orwell found themselves on opposite sides of an argument.

Given his experiences during the Spanish Civil War and his post-war writing, in particular 1984 it is easy to forget that during much of the Second World War Orwell worked for the BBC in a role that was essentially a propagandist for the British State.

Meanwhile Comfort held the view that there was a “Duty to Stand Aside” - coming from the anarcho-pacifist position one could not collaborate with a State one believed needed fundamental transformation – even in the face of the evil that was the Nazi regime. For Comfort the ends could not justify the means, two wrongs would not make a right. This was particular true for him as many of the action of the British State during the war moved towards authoritarian responses.

This conflict between Orwell and Comfort is used to explore how complex Orwell is – it is very hard to pin down his beliefs, in part because they evolved over times by twists and turns. Most will know Orwell only for 1984, or perhaps also Animal Farm, but taking his total body of work there are few writers who reveal the development of their thought in the way Orwell does.

Some read 1984 as a critique of the Soviet and other obviously totalitarian regimes – but Laursen suggests it is a critique much closer to home – it is the subtle control of so-called “liberal democracies” that we probably need to watch most closely.

Laursen also links the dilemma that Orwell and Comfort wrestled with to the contemporary – point to the challenge that some of the action taken under the banner of “war on terror” to defend our freedoms simultaneously stripped us of those freedoms.

While not all the point convinced me, Laursen was a fruitful dialogue partner, when I was unconvinced he challenge me to unpack why exactly that was the case, to think more deeply.