Pornosec

Pornosec is a sub-section of the Fiction Department in the Ministry of Truth of Oceania. Its sole function is to produce the lowest form of pornography, which is sent out in sealed packets and which no Party member other than those who work on it is permitted to look at. The existence of Pornosec exemplifies the Party's strategy of using degraded entertainment to control the proles while maintaining ideological purity among Party members.

Function and Purpose

Pornosec was created to manufacture cheap, sensational pornography for the proles, such as booklets with titles like "Spanking Stories" or "One Night in a Girls' School". These were sold furtively to proletarian youths who believed they were buying something illegal. The department was staffed almost entirely by young women, because the Party's theory held that men, whose sex instincts were less controllable, were in greater danger of being corrupted by handling such material. Being chosen to work in Pornosec was considered a mark of good reputation, an infallible sign of orthodoxy. Julia, for instance, was selected for this work because of her excellent character as a troop-leader in the Spies and a branch secretary in the Youth League. She spent a year in Pornosec, which those who worked there nicknamed "Muck House". The department's operations were hidden from the general Party membership, and the content was produced by mechanical means on versificators and kaleidoscopes, ensuring that it was entirely formulaic and devoid of any potentially subversive quality.

Ideological Significance

Pornosec embodies the Party's doublethink regarding sex and class. The Party officially discourages sexual pleasure and promotes puritanism, yet it secretly manufactures pornography for the proles as a means of pacification. This aligns with the broader principle that the proles are to be kept in a state of degraded ignorance, entertained with "prolefeed" while the Party maintains its own ascetic discipline. The fact that Julia, a member of the Junior Anti-Sex League, worked there without apparent contradiction demonstrates the compartmentalization required of Party members. Pornosec is thus a microcosm of the Party's methods: it controls through both repression and indulgence, depending on the target group.