Good And Evil In Lord Of The Flies By William Golding
Throughout history humans have been interlocked in a struggle with good and evil, each side lending new evidence to the age old debate: are humans essentially good, or malevolent?
Upon closer analyzation of recent history and the text Lord of the Flies By William Golding the answer stands out poignant and true: we are essentially bad. Though civilization has tried to correct the natural man into a benevolent character, when left to their own desires chaos reigns.
Exemplified in Lord of the Flies the innermost human is all but humane, murder and savagery play a dominant role to civilized behavior. This is a parallel that can be drawn from this to multiple major powers of the twentieth century. Primarily from Lord of the Flies we are struck …show more content…
One specific circumstance during the Second World War stands out: the siege of Leningrad. Starting on September 8th, 1941, one of the largest cities in Soviet Russia was under complete siege by the Nazi Wehrmacht, what occurred next was shocking. “The blockade was sudden and unexpected, as much as the war itself was unexpected for the country. There were no reserves of fuel, no food... Then one after another catastrophic event started to occur, power supplies were stopped, there was no water, no sewerage system operating, no central heating in place..." Daniil Granin. For a while things remained normal in the city as patriotism was at a high point, soon supplies became short. As winter approached no supplies had reached the city and all attempts to break the siege had failed, water was scarce and food virtually nonexistent. Order broke down and mass cannibalism of the dead reigned as a primary food source. Snow had to be melted in order to drink, survival depended on grit and savagery. As one of the most appalling circumstances a human can endure wore on and on, the true survivalistic nature of homo Sapiens flashed through. When faced with these kind of circumstances what person would be strong enough to not resort to this decrepit state? Emaciated by their …show more content…
George Takei, a veteran of these camps exclaimed “What would be grotesquely abnormal became my normality in the prisoner of war camps. It became routine for me.” . From this it can be surmised that these camps yet again provide what human nature is really like when the chips are down. It has been said that one can tell the true nature of a man by how he acts in these camps, where resources are scarce and survival means everything. When a person's life is dependant on their own instinct and effort rather than anyone else's. It can also be argued that even in in these terrible planes there was stoic civilization, this is true, but not completely. Many people within Prisoner Of War camps showed that we can still be human in the midst of tyranny and to this we are very grateful, but when real human nature reared its ugly head we generally avoid acknowledging it. Many prisoners became aggressive and would fight for food, water or other things the need. Crime, organized or not became rampant. The Soviet gulags offered one of the most horrific scenes especially as inmates begin to see almost no hope of survival. Men would arm themselves to go so far as to kill another for his meager rations of bread. Nazi stalags bred specifically into their Soviet and Italian prisoners such hate that in many cases prisoners would murder their captors at any chance they got, even at the expense of their own life. At the time of their
Upon closer analyzation of recent history and the text Lord of the Flies By William Golding the answer stands out poignant and true: we are essentially bad. Though civilization has tried to correct the natural man into a benevolent character, when left to their own desires chaos reigns.
Exemplified in Lord of the Flies the innermost human is all but humane, murder and savagery play a dominant role to civilized behavior. This is a parallel that can be drawn from this to multiple major powers of the twentieth century. Primarily from Lord of the Flies we are struck …show more content…
One specific circumstance during the Second World War stands out: the siege of Leningrad. Starting on September 8th, 1941, one of the largest cities in Soviet Russia was under complete siege by the Nazi Wehrmacht, what occurred next was shocking. “The blockade was sudden and unexpected, as much as the war itself was unexpected for the country. There were no reserves of fuel, no food... Then one after another catastrophic event started to occur, power supplies were stopped, there was no water, no sewerage system operating, no central heating in place..." Daniil Granin. For a while things remained normal in the city as patriotism was at a high point, soon supplies became short. As winter approached no supplies had reached the city and all attempts to break the siege had failed, water was scarce and food virtually nonexistent. Order broke down and mass cannibalism of the dead reigned as a primary food source. Snow had to be melted in order to drink, survival depended on grit and savagery. As one of the most appalling circumstances a human can endure wore on and on, the true survivalistic nature of homo Sapiens flashed through. When faced with these kind of circumstances what person would be strong enough to not resort to this decrepit state? Emaciated by their …show more content…
George Takei, a veteran of these camps exclaimed “What would be grotesquely abnormal became my normality in the prisoner of war camps. It became routine for me.” . From this it can be surmised that these camps yet again provide what human nature is really like when the chips are down. It has been said that one can tell the true nature of a man by how he acts in these camps, where resources are scarce and survival means everything. When a person's life is dependant on their own instinct and effort rather than anyone else's. It can also be argued that even in in these terrible planes there was stoic civilization, this is true, but not completely. Many people within Prisoner Of War camps showed that we can still be human in the midst of tyranny and to this we are very grateful, but when real human nature reared its ugly head we generally avoid acknowledging it. Many prisoners became aggressive and would fight for food, water or other things the need. Crime, organized or not became rampant. The Soviet gulags offered one of the most horrific scenes especially as inmates begin to see almost no hope of survival. Men would arm themselves to go so far as to kill another for his meager rations of bread. Nazi stalags bred specifically into their Soviet and Italian prisoners such hate that in many cases prisoners would murder their captors at any chance they got, even at the expense of their own life. At the time of their