Lord of the Flies and Kid Nation: Kid Wasteland

Everyday in our life, we see youth. Youth is all around us. Youth is the focus. Youth can be positive or negative. It can be playful or subdued. In William Golding’s novel Lord of the Flies (1954), the novel focuses on a group of boys who is stranded on an island after a plane crash during World War II. The boys must work together to survive and maintain their sense of civilization in order to get rescued The reality TV show Kid Nation (2007), a group of children must learn how to live with each other and get along for 40 days. The kids in Kid Nation lives in Bonanza City, New Mexico. The boys crashed on an island somewhere in a ocean. It is extremely important to know the settings since there will be similarities and differences between LOTF and Kid Nation.

Both texts are similar to how they approach the subject of Youth. In LOTF, the conch shell was broken towards the end of the book like how the job board in Kid Nation is burnt down. However, the children of both stories could not care less and continue on to their business.

“Kids will be kids” is the idea that both of these text present.

The LOTF itself said in chapter 1 that the boys will go crazy with no boys around. “These aren’t just kids; they’re schoolboys used to having every party of their life decided for them. No wonder they go a little crazy when all alone with no adults around.” (Chapter 1) The quote here says the boys are destined to go crazy. The boys have to survive on their own with no adults around. Later on in the story, Ralph complans that nobody is building huts. They’re either hunting or just playing around. Similarly, Kid Nation supports this idea of Youth. The job board in Bonanza City burns down and the children took this as a sign that it the was ...

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...hts and disputes in LOTF, there was no apologies and compromising. Issues kept on getting worse and worse. Male and female youth are different. Boys don’t like to talk things out. It’s more of fight now, talk later. Girls just like to talk. It can get physical but talking is preferred. Both stories handle youth violence and issues differently.

In the end, Lord of the Flies and Kid Nation have similar subtexts about Youth. They can be different in other subtexts. LOTF says that Youth would be terrible without the supervision of adults and Kid Nation says that children will eventually come together and work things out between themselves.

Both say that “Kids will be kids.”

Works Cited

"We've All Decided to Go Mad." Kid Nation. CBS, New Mexico, 12 Dec 2010 Television.

Golding, William, The Lord of the Flies, New York: The Berkley Publishing Group, 1954. Print.