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   From: unPerson@IngSoc.gov.CCCP   
      
   Atheist Ministry of Truth- Rewriting History and Making Facts Disappear   
      
   Making the Historical truth Disappear:   
      
      
   Unperson   
      
      
   An unperson is a person who has been "vaporized"; who has been not only   
   killed by the state, but effectively erased from existence. Such a   
   person would be written out of existing books, photographs, and articles   
   so that no trace of their existence could be found in the historical   
   record. The idea is that such a person would, according to the   
   principles of doublethink, be forgotten completely (for it would be   
   impossible to provide evidence of their existence), even by close   
   friends and family members. Mentioning his or her name, or even speaking   
   of their past existence, is thoughtcrime; the concept that the person   
   may have existed at one time and has disappeared cannot be expressed in   
   Newspeak. Compare to the Stalinist practice of erasing people from   
   photographs after their assassination (see photos, below).   
      
   The Stalin-era Soviet Union also provided real-world examples of   
   unpersons in its treatment of Leon Trotsky and other members of the   
   Communist party who became politically inconvenient. In his 1960   
   magazine article "Pravda means 'Truth'", reprinted in Expanded Universe,   
   Robert A. Heinlein argued that John Paul Jones and a mysterious May 15,   
   1960 cosmonaut had also received this treatment.   
      
      
   A Soviet "nonperson" vanishes: commissar Nikolai Yezhov retouched after   
   falling from favor and being executed in 1940.   
      
   Before   
      
   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Voroshilov,_Molotov,_Stalin,_w   
   th_Nikolai_Yezhov.jpg   
      
      
   After   
      
   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:The_Commissar_Vanishes_2.jpg   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)