we have always been at war with Eastasia

phrase

Used to highlight a situation in which circumstances have changed, yet this change has gone unacknowledged or is being denied.

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Meanings

phrase

alternative we have always been at war with East Asia · alternative we have always been at war with Eurasia · alternative we've always been at war with Eastasia · alternative we've always been at war with East Asia · alternative we've always been at war with Eurasia

  1. humorousUsed to highlight a situation in which circumstances have changed, yet this change has gone unacknowledged or is being denied.

    Now it truly is as if it never existed in this repository! And we've always been at war with Eastasia.

    2012, Jon Loeliger, Matthew McCullough, Version Control with Git: Powerful Tools and Techniques for Collaborative Software Development, page 344
    2 more examples

    The more conversational, many-to-many nature of the medium also acts as a counterweight to older-style broadcast politics, where rulers could more easily get away with assurances that, "We've always been at war with Eastasia".

    2016, George Megalogenis, Balancing Act: Australia Between Recession and Renewal

    "The President never downplayed the virus," according to press secretary Kayleigh McEnany. We have always been at war with Eastasia.

    2021, Charles Finch, What Just Happened: Notes on a Long Year, page 184

Origin

From the novel Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949) by George Orwell, in which the world is divided into the superpowers of Eastasia, Eurasia and Oceania. Oceania is in a state of perpetual war with one of the other powers but its alliance keeps shifting, and the government never acknowledges that its current adversary is its former ally and vice versa.

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Cite this entry
APA

we have always been at war with Eastasia. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 5, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/we%20have%20always%20been%20at%20war%20with%20Eastasia

MLA

“we have always been at war with Eastasia.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/we%20have%20always%20been%20at%20war%20with%20Eastasia. Accessed November 5, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “we have always been at war with Eastasia,” accessed November 5, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/we%20have%20always%20been%20at%20war%20with%20Eastasia.

Source: we have always been at war with Eastasia on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.