I just got done reading Orwell's Ninenteen Eighty-Four, and I thought it a fascinating and thought provoking book, but I had to disagree with Orwell's opinion that human nature and the drive for freedom and individuality can be trampled down completely. I personally think that no matter what humans will always strive for individuality, though to an extent they will always settle into the system of the High, Middle and Low that Orwell laid out.
Orwell seems to believe that if enough pain and fear is imposed upon a person, they will eventually succumb to whatever doctrine their torturers are attempting to impose on them. I disagree. I personally think human nature is a very real thing that can never be destroyed.

Discuss.

There's a great book called The Survivor's Club, which discusses a statistically common and rather interesting analysis of people in crisis. The general overview is:

Suppose you're in a sudden crisis. Let's say there's a bomb threat on an airplane. The breakdown shows that of all people on the plane, 80% will become, in essence, "Sheeple" who will go wherever the strongest force leads. 10% will become catatonic and self-destructive, choosing an extreme pessimistic outcome. the remaining 10% will attempt to find a solution to the crisis, and will attempt to survive. In our plane hijacking scenario, the breakdown would look like this:

10% say "We're gonna die!" and do nothing.
80% do nothing.
10% say, "Let's figure out how to survive this."

The book itself concerns survival strategies, and personally I found the statistics and stories to be more interesting than the tactics and tips. However, given the discussion topic, it is worth noting that most people, upon noticing their freedom becoming drastically limited, have a tendency to bow to the greater power. Whether or not the greater power is the 10% who want to fight to live, or it is the oppressive, anonymous freedom-quashing regime, is of critical importance. Certainly, people would be angry, but given a great force of oppression willing to harm or kill for individual freedom-seeking, I'm not so sure human nature would prevail. If there were a rebellion force equally as powerful, with equal or greater drive for freedom, perhaps such a force would prevail. More likely, as history shows, the very forces attempting to liberate the people can become dangerous to the people they're trying to protect. While human nature may be based in individualism, there's also another part of human nature that wants to one-up the other guy. Individual freedom creates a power vacuum where bad things happen unchecked. Crime is held by some to be an individual freedom, and most people would agree that crime is bad. There has to be SOME force ensuring that individual freedom does not become anarchy. Human nature will never fully permit individual freedom. Full individual freedom would be as equally damning to human nature as would oppression and big brother.

Thus, human nature is to rule and to be ruled. The two rarely coexist peacefully. And while human nature will never fully be destroyed because of this, it will certainly cause conflict and strife, no matter how we govern ourselves and each other.

An interesting argument that Orwell proposes is that the constant war mentality, epitomized by "hate week", actually aids the regime in the book. In reality, it seems much more likely that, so long as people have basic needs secured, they are perfectly, or largely, complacent with totalitarian governments. Some examples could include the fall of the Tsarist state, and later the Soviet union, due to intense suffering on the part of the Russian people. It's also worth noting that China, which today does a relatively good job in securing the basic needs of most of its people, has contented its citizens, even though it is famed for human rights abuses. Finally, I would disagree with the concept that the desire for freedom, or individuality, is somehow intrinsic to human nature. If anything, based on pure instinct, humans would desire stability more than freedom. That's not to say freedom and stability can't coexist, nor that large groups of people wouldn't opt for freedom/individuality as opposed to the alternative, merely that stability seems to be more fundamental to human nature than freedom or individuality. Indeed, I would argue that, to some extent, it is human nature to suppress such things. Not totally, but to a degree.

Yes, but in Nineteen Eighty-Four not all human needs are met. Namely, the Party members are forbidden from having sex (besides for the sole purpose of procreation).

That's a human need if I've ever seen one