In 1984, does the Party use brainwashing and torture to control the Proles? How does the Party ensure that the Proles do not improve their status?

In
, the Party does not use brainwashing and torture to control the Proles
like it does to control Party members. In fact, what is interesting about the Party's
relationship with the Proles is that, generally speaking, it leaves them completely free to live
their own lives. The Proles are not monitored by telescreens, for example, and are not required
to take part in Party activities, like the Two Minutes Hate or Physical Jerks.

Aspoints out, the Proles make up 85% of the population of Oceania. Considering their
large numbers, the Party only deploys a few agents from the Thought Police to keep the Proles in
check. These agents "spread false rumors" and remove the few individuals who are
deemed dangerous, as Winston explains in Part One, Chapter Seven. Beyond that, the Proles are
left to manage their own affairs and their lives tend the follow the same pattern:

They were born, they grew up in the gutters, they went to work at
twelve, they passed through a brief blossoming-period of beauty and sexual desire, they married
at twenty, they were middle-aged at thirty, they died, for the most part, at sixty. Heavy
physical work, the care of home and children, petty quarrels with neighbours, films, football,
beer, and above all, gambling, filled up the horizon of their minds. 

It is this simple life which prevents the Proles from ever rising
up and becoming a threat to the Party. As pointed out in Part Two, Chapter Nine, they are
ignorant to the notion that they are strong enough to ever pose a real threat to the
Party:

From the proletarians nothing is to be feared. Left
to themselves, they will continue from generation to generation and from century to century,
working, breeding, and dying, not only without any impulse to rebel, but without the power of
grasping that the world could be other than it is.

The
Proles are, therefore, happy and content as they are. They have no interest in ever improving
their social status because the Party leaves them to live as they choose. The Party also allows
them to have as much entertainment as they wish: music, gambling, alcohol, and pornography flood
the Prole districts, ensuring that the Proles are kept permanently amused.

So, is it the Proles' ignorance which keeps them under control and which also prevents
them from ever feeling the need to improve their station. In Winston's mind, access to education
is the only thing which might give them the necessary awareness to rise up and rebel. But the
Party has no intention of ever giving them that privilege.