Let us face it, mankind admires violence. It may not be moral, but it is entertaining. For example, fighting is prohibited, but wrestling is just a popular pastime. As a result of loving unreasonable habits such as violence, one might wonder if the nature of mankind is naturally evil or good, but they do not know what to do without adults. Mankind is born naturally evil, however, your surroundings can determine whether or not you stay that way.
In regards to this, William Golding’s novel, Lord of the Flies, is a story is told about many guilty boys, however, the boys are very young. In so, many wonder if the boys are naturally evil or good and they do not know what to do without adults. As Simon said in Lord of The Flies, “Maybe," he said hesitantly, "maybe there is a beast." [...] "What I mean is, maybe it's only us.” (Golding 89). In Lord of the Flies, the boys are afraid of an imaginary figure called “the beastie”. In the novel, there really is no beastie, but the idea of the beastie represents fear and evil. This quote means that there is nothing for the boys to fear but themselves. So, in a sense, the boys are “the beast”. Piggy exclaims his fear of Jack to Ralph by stating, “I'm scared of him, and that's why I know him. If you're scared of someone you hate him but you can't stop thinking about him. You kid yourself he's all right really, an' then when you see him again; it's like asthma an' you can't breathe.” (Golding 93). Jack bullies Piggy endlessly throughout the novel, but one would wonder why someone would do such a thing. Obviously, Piggy is really upset. It is believed that Jack bullies Piggy because Piggy found the conch shell, which gives Ralph and Piggy more power than Jack. Jack feels that he has to have lea...
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...one begins their life in an evil phase, but adults and surroundings shape your personality in the end. Mankind is born evil because violence, greed and power are favored. However, you can change depending on your surroundings and others who help shape who you are. The purpose of Lord of the Flies is not just for entertainment, but it is also a way that Golding chooses to show to us that mankind is born naturally evil, but our surroundings and peers help to shape who our personalities.
Works Cited
Golding, William. Lord of the Flies, William Golding. New York: Putnam, 1954. Print.
Rampell, Catherine. "How Old Is Old Enough?" The New York Times. The New York Times, 14
Nov. 2009. Web. 13 Dec. 2013.
Sachs, Susan. "The Age of Reason; A Chilling Crime and a Question: What's in a Child's Mind?" The
New York Times. The New York Times, 16 Aug. 1998. Web. 13 Dec. 2013.
In the Lord of the Flies fear takes over the boys and cause things to go downfall. The boys in Lord of the Flies might be afraid of the beast, but that fear turns out to be more dangerous than any beast could possibly be. The Lord of the Flies even says to Simon that “Fancy thinking the Beast was something you could hunt and kill! You knew, didn’t you? I’m part of you?
When we hear the word “beast,” most of us will immediately think of some enormous hairy creature with razor sharp fangs and massive claws coming to kill and eat us. Although these types of beasts do exist, the boys in William Golding’s Lord of the Flies, show that a different, much more sinister beast is present in all of our everyday lives, and, like the boys in the book, most of us don’t even know about it. Throughout the book, the existence and meaning of the beast go through significant changes. In the beginning, the boys believe the beast to be a substantive being. At first no one believes it, but later they begin to believe its existence. Later though, the beast reveals itself as an internal flaw within everyone on the island, and slowly begins to take over the children’s free will. As the belief in the beast goes up, its manifestation as the “typical beast” that we all think of goes down, which is ironic because they are creating the beast in their minds, while also living it out in their actions.
Woolfe, Zachary. "A World of Childhood Innocence Intersects With a Grown-Up Reality." The New York Times. N.p., 13 Oct. 2013. Web. 15 Dec. 2013.
...tic, darkness lies within all of humanity, and when provoked, everyone is capable of evil.” ( Teen Ink, Kenzie Treub ) William Golding’s true intent of writing Lord of the Flies was to expose the true nature of humans and show the world that it is possible for human beings to turn their backs on one another for the sake of survival.
“Everybody has good and evil within them. All we're trying to say is that people are not all good or all bad. People are more complicated than you think, and one has to be more knowledgeable about the complexities.” This quotation from Stephen Schwartz establishes that even the best of people can be bitter by their own nature. In the novel, Lord of the Flies, William Golding removes the restraints of society to prove that it is human nature to live primitively and that evil lies within all of us. The sanctions of society begin to deteriorate due to the loss of communication, Jack’s obsession with hunting, and the inhumane nature of Jack and his “tribe”.
Whether or not humans are instinctively good or evil has been a much talked about debate for many years and is known as an unanswerable question. Determinists, such as Thomas Hobbs, have come to the conclusion that humans are naturally evil and it is within our basic instincts to be greedy, selfish and otherwise drawn to chaos. Hobbs states that “our true nature arises in times of strife and it is within us, when threatened, to self preserve.” I on the other hand disagree with this famous philosophers take on human nature. In this short essay, I will argue that human beings are born with the instinct to be good and to love one another, as well as to be loved.
At many points throughout Lord of the Flies, Golding writes for the characters to become gradually more and more evil. This attribute even reaches the symbols of goodness and order, such as Ralph. Once, when Ralph and Piggy go to the feast on Jack's beach, they begin to meld with the others and their evil ways. "Piggy and Ralph, under the threat of the sky, found themselves eager to take a place in this demented but partly secure society" (Golding 138). This really only proves their common longing for a place with others, not any depth of evilness.
While they agree that the beast is not a traditional monster, it is Simon’s philosophical understanding that allows him to fully realize the meaning of the beast. At the assembly, Ralph plans to discuss the beast, hoping to bring the fear to an end. Simon suggests that the boys themselves are the beast. Later, when Simon encounters the “Lord of the Flies” in a hallucination, the reader learns the extent of his understanding. The Lord of the Flies mocks Simon by saying, “Fancy you thinking the Beast was something you could hunt and kill...You knew, didn’t you? I’m part of you?”(128). Simon realizes that there is something within humans that can cause them to act savagely. However, at the assembly, in an effort to understand what Simon meant about the beast, the boys suggest that the beast could be a ghost. Piggy firmly rejects this idea because he approaches the beast in the same way he handles most situations: logically and scientifically. As Piggy states, “Life… is scientific, that’s what it is…. I know there isn’t no beast- not with claws and all that, I mean- but I know there isn’t no fear either… unless we get afraid of people” (72). Piggy understands fear can have detrimental effects, but he does not yet understand that fear is within every person, and this is the “beast” that can cause people to act without
Mankind is innately evil. The allegorical novel, The Lord of the Flies, allows for little interpretation about human nature. William Golding depicts the idea, “evil is an inborn trait of man” (Golding). Throughout the novel the children who have crash landed on the island begin to uncover their savage nature. Although all of the children somehow succumb to a heinous behaviour, Jack, Ralph, and Roger become most noticeably corrupt. Ultimately, it becomes clear that malicious intent is intrinsic in mankind.
How exactly does the human brain work? Are humans evil by nature or are they good samaritans most, if not all, the time? As studies throughout history have shown, this is not the case. Humans are inherently evil because they are always seeking as much power as they can, revert to challenging authority and selfishness in times of peril, and become intimidated easily by “authority” figures egging them on, which is reflected in The Lord of the Flies by William Golding, as well as The Zimbardo Experiment conducted by Psychologist Phillip Zimbardo.
My sense of the book Lord of the Flies is as follows, people are who they want to be. Rather it is to be good or bad. It is our self that needs to accept the fact if we are good or bad. We all have choices, what we have to do is make the right ones. In the book they all started off pretty good but then they started to become animals in a way. Because it got inside their head and drove them all crazy. Letting evil into your life can cause
“In the long run, we shape our lives, and we shape ourselves. The process never ends until we die. And the choices we make are ultimately our own responsibility.” (Eleanor Roosevelt). This is just one of the infinite examples of how human nature has been explored by so many different people. Each and every human is born with the capability of making their own choices. The decisions that they will make in the future will determine how evil they are viewed by others. Although one’s nature and nurture do affect their life, it is their own free will that determines whether or not they are evil.
Beforehand, everything was all fun and games on the island, and Piggy was the only one that actually worried about anything. However, the idea of the beast brought fear to them again and again. Whether it was when it was first mentioned as a snake, or when it was thought to come from the sea, or when it was guessed to be ghosts, the idea of something being there at the island made the boys afraid even though there was no actual evidence of the beast. Golding wrote, “‘He says in the morning it turned into them things like ropes in the trees and hung in the branches. He say will it come back tonight?’ ‘But there isn’t a beastie!’ There was no laughter at all now and more grave watching.’” At the idea there there was some sort of mysterious fearsome monster that might come after the boys, the previously joyous atmosphere quickly bursted as fear settles on them. Though the beast only symbolized fear in the beginning, by the latter parts of the novel, it had become a representation of the savagery within a human. Simon was the first one to notice, at how he pointed out how maybe the beast lived within themselves. Also, Jack’s bloody offering to the beast, the sow’s head, represented how the darkness has taken over the hunters. Their belief in the beast strength as their savagery increased, it was almost as if they worshipped it, leaving offerings and such. Also, the Lord
It seems as though there is so much more evil than good in the world today. We hear of war and fighting 24/7 but we rarely hear about the good things that happen. Everyone is born with both good and bad within them. We, as humans, must choose which one we want to be. In The Lord of the Flies, Ralph is good while Jack is evil. Ralph represents the good side of us while Jack represents the evil side. Although sometimes it is easier to be evil, it pays off to be good. The novel is a perfect example of how all people are born with both sides. At the beginning, the boys choose the good side, with morals and civilization. But as the story moves on, the boys find it more exciting to be on the bad side. It shows that all the boys are torn between good and bad and there is a very thin line that separates both. We realize that people are born inherently good and bad because in life there are always right and wrong choices, children are born good but are easily influenced to do bad, and it is always harder to do what is right than what is wrong.
...ing, it is safe to say that humans are not by nature evil but instead, they are good but easily influenced by the environment and society to act in evil way and do such evil things. You choose the road you want to take; either it’s the bad road or the good road. We are all born to live a life where we will be faced with good and evil things. We were not born to be an evil or bad person, but as you get older you make that choice. What do you want to be remembered as: the good or the bad person? Choose to be good over being bad because the rewards to your family, your friend, and yourself will always outweigh the bad.