> I remember when American companies could do domestic business, or not, with whomever they wished without having to worry about being punished by the government for their choices.

No you don't, because that time as never existed.

> If a government orders a pacifist to pick up a gun, is that allowed? If a government orders a pacifist to manufacture a gun, is that allowed? (There's a spectrum of 'complicity'.)

Yes. It's called the draft. It's called wartime manufacturing decrees. These all existed at the time of Orwell, and he never alluded to them being thoughtcrimes. Compelling people to act against their beliefs is common and distinct from throughtcrime. And if you cannot see that, then I don't even know how to talk to you. Government has always controlled your outer life. Orwell introduced thoughtcrime as the next step in totalitarianism, as the erasure of inner life.

edit: I asked Opus to analyze this thread, and I agree with it.

> That said, Orwell would probably also note that the people arguing against you aren't entirely wrong to be alarmed — they're just reaching for the wrong literary reference and overstating the analogy. Government retaliation against companies for political speech is concerning on its own terms without needing to be dressed up as dystopian fiction. The 1984 framing actually weakens the critique by making it easy to dismiss as hyperbolic.

> He'd probably tell everyone in the thread to say what they mean in plain language and stop hiding behind his book.