instance, were contained in the single word
crimethink, while all words grouping themselves round the concepts of
objectivity and rationalism were contained in the single word oldthink.
Greater precision would have been dangerous. What was required in a
Party member was an outlook similar to that of the ancient Hebrew who
knew, without knowing much else, that all nations other than his own
worshipped ?false gods?. He did not need to know that these gods were
called Baal, Osiris, Moloch, Ashtaroth, and the like: probably the less
he knew about them the better for his orthodoxy. He knew Jehovah and the
commandments of Jehovah: he knew, therefore, that all gods with other
names or other attributes were false gods. In somewhat the same way, the
party member knew what constituted right conduct, and in exceedingly
vague, generalized terms he knew what kinds of departure from it were
possible. His sexual life, for example, was entirely regulated by the
two Newspeak words sexcrime (sexual immorality) and goodsex (chastity).
Sexcrime covered all sexual misdeeds whatever. It covered fornication,
adultery, homosexuality, and other perversions, and, in addition, normal
intercourse practised for its own sake. There was no need to enumerate
them separately, since they were all equally culpable, and, in
principle, all punishable b