Try to bring sources, and don’t try to go too hard. For example, in the critical reading of animal farm, the author writes about how above all it reveals Orwell’s aristocratic disdain for the working class. If you want to defend and contextualize the USSR without provoking ire, it’s best to highlight Orwell’s miserable history as a homophobic, anti-semetic fed, sexual assaulter, and tie that directly to his work. You can also tie in how the Soviet Union at the time was coming out of a chaotic civil war and trying desperately to build up a modern country while heavily sanctioned.