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There are many different points of view about human behaviors. Through specific characters mentioned in Fahrenheit 451, “A Very Old Man Enormous Wings”, and “The Lottery”, individual attitudes are exaggerated to the point that their evil motivations behind their behaviors are obvious. Everyday humans attempt to attach the connotation of good to humanity, but it’s just because humans want to look past the fact that we are realistically not good. It is very difficult for us to reflect on our own behaviors. Even though people try to avoid admitting it, we always try to be the best in whatever we do. We naturally make our own survivals the best we can make it. Harming others knowingly and enjoying it is a hallmark of being evil. Good is not only …show more content…
The villagers don’t care about the black box or the ritual, but they do care about the stones which signify murder. In “The Lottery”, each villager cares about his or her own individual survival, even if it means stoning one’s own family. An example of a family can be seen through Hutchinson family and their daughter Tessie, who got stoned. They’ve done this for so long, they don’t question how sinful it is. It just seems like the ordinary thing to do for them. That behavior can be proved by “… the whole lottery took less than two hours, so it could begin at ten o’clock in the morning and still be through in time to allow the villagers to get home for noon dinner (Jackson 278).” The quote demonstrates that the villagers can murder someone, then casually continue on with their daily lives. They can do that action without thinking they did anything wrong. “The Lottery” encourages the villagers to have egotistical
A common phrase used in courts is that someone is “innocent until proven guilty.” Through the plot’s of “The Lottery” and The Crucible, this idea of people being innocent until guilty is shown, however, the part of this phrase about proving that guilt is conveniently left out. Of course, both stories took place in a time in which the villagers felt no need for there to be any kind of trial or reasoning for someone’s death. Rather, the persecutions that occured in these stories took place to ensure that barbaric tendencies did not spread among the people within their villages. This idea of keeping people from being barbaric or evil enforces the idea that perhaps people truly think that the people who choose the marked paper are really deserving
Comparing "The Lottery by Shirley Jackson" and "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas" by Ursula K. Le Guin
Shirley Jackson describes the lottery being an annual event where someone gets randomly drawn to win the prize of getting stoned to death, Tradition which no one has ever questioned its purpose or opposed to it. “Although the villagers had forgotten the ritual and lost the original black box, they still remembered to use stones” (Jackson 7). People in “The Lottery” were so accustomed to the tradition that no kind of emotion or feeling was shown at the time of stoning, no matter if it was a family member or a close friend. Their blind acceptance to the lottery made murder become natural that time of the
The seemingly normal village is using a lottery system to pick a human for sacrifice that is executed by the villagers themselves. In one analysis it is thought that, “In a sense, the villagers of “The Lottery” are paying homage to sympathetic magic: One human sacrifice equals another good year of crops.” (Ball 1). It appears that this is why they are continuing the tradition of yearly human sacrifice around the time of harvest or summer solstice. This horrific event is amplified by the characters attitudes, environment, and outward normality. In another analysis, it states, “Nevertheless, the characters seem so wholesome, so stereotypically small-town American, that it is easy for the reader to overlook the clues that Jackson provides.” (Du Bose, 1). The slaughter of a fellow villager has become such a mindless habit to the villagers that they don’t question the reasons or morality of the lottery. The village is almost desensitized from violence and appears that they are unable to make their own conclusions about morality or human nature. In Patrick J. Shield’s article, he analyzes the characters and states, “They do not question the authority and tradition of these executions that has convinced them that what they are doing is somehow in their best interest”
“Inside each of us, there is the seed of both good and evil. It's a constant struggle as to which one will win. And one cannot exist without the other” (Eric Burdon). People do not think they are doing good or evil, they just think that they are doing the right thing. Evil comes from within each one of us. You just need to something to bring it out.
Toward the finale of the short story, Shirley Jackson, the author of “The Lottery” declares, “Although the villagers had forgotten the ritual and lost the black box, they still remembered to use stones” (873). Many of the residents display no knowledge of the lottery and only participate because of tradition. In fact, only Old Man Warner recollects the authentic purpose of the lottery. He furnishes some insight behind the tradition of the lottery by declaring, “Lottery in June, corn be heavy soon” (Jackson 871). Old Man Warner reveals the original reason for holding the lottery, but Jackson clearly demonstrates that the original purpose no longer exists. The villagers comprehend the procedure of stoning the victim but nothing else. Nick Crawford articulates in an easy about “The Lottery,” “The most disturbing thing about Tessie Hutchinson’s unexpected demise is its...
War as seen through the eyes of Ambrose Bierce in An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge depicts it as truly gritty. The author successfully sends a message of how death is a part of war, and it is not as noble or glorious as one would think it is. Due to popular media, we have this attitude that the protagonist is going to go down in a blaze of glory, and while it may be true for some, it is not like that for everyone. War is rough, dark, and gritty but no one ever wants to talk about those parts of war because it would ruin the fantasy of it.
What drives people to act in an improper way, is not evil, but rather a lack of empathy hardwired into their brain. When a
Although people can fear an outcome of telling the truth or standing up for what they believe is right, being a bystander in a poor situation doesn’t exempt someone from innocence. Whether it involves a murder or telling the truth, if someone knows it is wrong and does nothing to take part in what’s going on they are no better than the ones involved in the conflict. In To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee and The Lottery by Shirley Jackson, both stories involve bystanders. A bystander is not innocent when they do nothing about the problem going on around them.
The lines that define good and evil are not written in black and white; these lines tend to blur into many shades of grey allowing good and evil to intermingle with each another in a single human being. Man is not inherently good or evil but they are born innocent without any values or sense of morality until people impart their philosophies of life to them. In the words of John Locke:
Every year, the lottery is held, and every year a person is killed. Each villager neglects to acknowledge the unjustness of the lottery and continue to participate because of the tradition it represents in their society. The lottery was a cultural tradition passed down from the very first settlers of the village. It makes up a huge part of the village’s history and culture. The villagers pay recognition to their culture by continuing the tradition of the lottery even though the lottery is not morally right. On page 93 it states, “There was a proper swearing-in of Mr. Summers by the postmaster, as the official of the lottery; at one time, some people remembered, there had been a recital of some sort, performed by the official of the lottery, a perfunctory tuneless chant that had been rattled off duly each year… There had been, also, a ritual salute, which the official of the lottery had had to use in addressing each person who came to draw from the box…” This quote shows the tribal-like rituals and traditions associated with the lottery. Through the years, some of the rituals of the lottery were lost, but the main elements of the lottery remained the same. The idea behind the lottery was that the ancestors, of the villagers, believed that human sacrifice would bring in good harvest. This led to the development and continuation
The point of view of tradition in The Lottery by Shirley Jackson is the normal once of year gathering on the townspeople. This gathering is held in order to pick, via a lottery drawing, to decide who in the town is going to be stoned to death. “The people of the village began to gather in the square, between the post office and the bank, around ten o’clock; in some towns there were so many people the lottery took two days and had started on June 26th, but in this village, where there were only about three hundred people, and the whole lottery took less than two hours, so it could begin at ten o’clock in morning and still be through in time to allow the villagers to get home for noon dinner.” (Kennedy & Gioia, 2013, pp. 251). The fact that the people gather and discuss everyday issue prior to the start of the lottery all point to the blind tradition of selecting some to be stoned to death.
The townspeople seem to have mixed emotions about the lottery; they fear it yet on a very barbaric level they enjoy it. By standing "away from the pile of stones," and keeping their distance from the black box, the villagers show their fear of the lottery (Jackson 863). However, once they find out who is going to be stoned, Tessie Hutchinson, they seem to actually enjoy the stoning. One villager picks up a stone so big she can barely carry it; someone even gives Tessie’s youngest son a few pebbles to throw at his mother. Their overall attitude about the stoning is summed up by the phrase "and then they were...
In "The Lottery" Shirley Jackson fills her story with many literary elements to mask the evil. The story demonstrates how it is in human nature to blindly follow traditions. Even if the people have no idea why they follow.
Death can come in many ways. It can be sudden, or over a strenuous period of time. It can seem random, but sometimes is planned and thought out. There are just about as many ways to deal with death, as there are ways to die. While both The lottery and The Story of an Hour explore the theme of death and grief, The lottery tells a tale of the sacrificial death for a community (necessary, no grief) while The Story of an Hour depicts the natural death of a loved one (grief, but, later, revelation) and how we eventually come to terms with it.