Do other people dictate how you look at others? Have you ever felt like you can’t be friends with certain people because of what others may think? If you have ever felt this way you are not alone. Many people feel pressured into doing things that they think will be beneficial for them. More often than not, you would be better off staying away from people who you feel could potentially have control over you. In the book, Breaking Point by Alex Flinn, the main character Paul is with a group of people who have control over what he thinks and does. Paul thinks that leaving his first true friend for the more popular crowd will benefit him, but in the end, it ends up backfiring terribly for him. In only the first few pages of the book, you can tell that the popular crowd is going to end up badly influencing Paul in some way. He ends up doing things he never thought he would and things that he never meant to hurt anyone. Within the first chapter of Breaking Point, there are many events that foreshadow the overall theme of the book, you can’t let others define who you are or how you see people.
All of Paul’s encounters
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Without Binky’s guidance and with Charlie’s manipulation Paul makes some bad decisions during his time at Gate High School. The first chapter of the book was used to foreshadow those bad decision that he would make. For example, stealing the bagels, changing Charlie’s biology grade, and planting the bomb in the school. Paul had a tough time being his own person and not listening to everything that people told him. He wasn’t able to make his own decisions without other’s input. Many people are in this situation without even knowing it. If you ever find yourself in a situation like Paul where you feel the need to act out, seek help. Violence, even if you don’t mean to hurt someone, is never the
As the novel goes on, Paul develops and stands up to Erik and Arthur. On pages 263 and 264 of Tangerine,
As previously stated, in the beginning of the book, Paul was super quiet, shy, and lonely. In fact, his only friend was his mom. Paul never tried to change anything, and never made his voice heard. He had terrible self esteem - mainly because he felt it was his fault he was blind, and had to
On page 227 paragraph 13 it says, “I saw you face down Erik and those other guys, and I saw Arthur Bauer hit you with a blackjack.” This choice impacts Paul because Luis was someone that Paul cared about and to know that it was Erik and his friend Arthur that hit Luis that caused Luis’s death, will cause Paul a lot heartache and emotional pain. But this inevitably makes Paul stronger because now he has the drive to somehow get back Erik for all the horrible things that Erik has done. On page 245 Paul is very distraught because he finds out that Luis has died and knows the reason why. This bothers Paul an incredible amount that he even goes home early from school. This shows that Erik’s choice affected Paul because Paul will forever acknowledge himself as Erik’s little brother, the brother of the person that killed Luis Cruz and this is something that will take Paul a long time to get
Paul does feel guild of abandoning his mother but handles it by running away, opposed to Dunny who is trying to pay off his guilt or not by forgetting it even happened like Boy. To accomplish this, he lives as a new person and takes on the persona of this great and mysterious magician.
My evidence is on page 211 it states, “Arthur reached Luis, turned, and whipped the blackjack around with a loud whack against the side of Luis’s head. Luis’s arms shot up to cover his head but he staggered to the right and fell on one knee. Arthur stuck the blackjack into his gym bag and continued walking, as if nothing happened”. I did not like that Arthur had to use violence for something bad that they caused. This impacted Paul because it gave him the choice to tell or not to tell about Erik’s violence. The evidence that supports this is on page 246 it states “should I come right out and say, actually mom he wasn’t killed by a tree branch he was killed by Arthur Bauer on orders of Erik”. Even though someone else’s choice makes it more challenging for us, we can still do the right
These temptations, many times, often lead to an increase in the chances of George, Rameck, and Sam's character cracking. For these reasons it made it hard for them to stay on the right track in life and to deviate away from what they were being raised in and to become better than that. Positive influences in their lives prevented them from succumbing to the calls of the streets and of the accepted norms. People such as the karate teacher who helped build self confidence and respect. Unfortunately for Paul he did not have these positive role models in his life to keep him focused and eventually got involved with drugs. He was a senior in high school with graduation just around the corner. Everything was going for him, he was on the Varsity football team, was heading off to college in a few months, and more importantly he wa...
We do not know exactly how old Paul is but it can be assumed that he is not very old, he may be a teenager. In his ages insults are much more damaging than knifes.
...victim to one of the physical dangers of war. The mental beating that Paul was bound to take meant that he was doomed.
How do the actions and words of a society affect the way people act? In Never Let Me Go, author Kazuo Ishiguro depicts a society in which individuality is threatened by the pressure to conform through methods such as peer pressure and social expectations. Without a doubt, peer pressure is most commonly found in schools today just as social expectations are suffocating the middle class’ desire to become their own unique person.
That had happened because of a traumatizing experience when he was in kindergarten. His brother, Erik, and Erik's friend, Vincent, had sprayed Paul's eyes with white paint. (Pg. 264) Before Paul had remembered that incident, Paul had always thought he was foolish. On page 35 it explains why he thought he was irrelevant. It says "I was the boy who had not listened and who was now paying the price." That shows that Paul had always thought low of himself because his parents never told him the truth. This decision made Paul feel weak and miserable because he had always thought it was his fault. On page 265 Paul gets his parents to admit what had actually happened to make him blind. They said they didn't tell him the truth because they didn't want him to hate his brother. What Paul mentions was quite sad. He said,"So you figured it would be better if I just hated myself". (265) In that scene, his mom and dad both broke down crying. All along, Paul had felt guilt in himself for something he hadn't done.
...ly he went home, back to his hostile environment, never escaping reality. Paul refused to give up on his dream and refused to go back to reality. Instead of giving up his dream on a glamorized, extravagant life, Paul gave up on his average life and killed himself.
Paul believes that he was tricked into joining the army and fighting in the war. This makes him very bitter towards the people who lied to him. This is why he lost his respect and trust towards the society. Teachers and parents were the big catalysts for the ki...
“Acceptance of each other's differences is the key to change”.In the novel Phillip does not really get along or understand Timothy,but once he listened to what Timothy had to say the began to become close.At first he would have that kind of connection with an “ugly black man”
In the beginning of the story, Paul seems to be a typical teenage boy: in trouble for causing problems in the classroom. As the story progresses, the reader can infer that Paul is rather withdrawn. He would rather live in his fantasy world than face reality. Paul dreaded returning home after the Carnegie Hall performances. He loathed his "ugly sleeping chamber with the yellow walls," but most of all, he feared his father. This is the first sign that he has a troubled homelife. Next, the reader learns that Paul has no mother, and that his father holds a neighbor boy up to Paul as "a model" . The lack of affection that Paul received at home caused him to look elsewhere for the attention that he craved.
There are two paths to choose from, one leads to the right way while the other leads you to the wrong path. Jim tells John that the right way is the cool looking one with monsters, violence and illicit drugs. James tries to persuade John that the decent path with is the one with priorities, goals and success. John thinks for a second and decides that he wants to be cool instead of responsible. He listened to Jim and before you know it he took the wrong path and chose to be cool for a while than in the long run. Such is the life of being a pressured teenager when there are people with good or bad intentions. Peer pressure affects us all in our lives and it is most potent in our teenage years. When we are growing up as children all we want is to have fun and focus more on what kind of fun will there be next instead of self-discovery or identity. As we mature then we start focusing more on what we like, our interests and who we want to be. A big portion of that is determined by our peers or who we hang around with. That is what makes us become mature adults or broken souls, “It's not unnatural for peer behavior to affect us, but following your peers blindly is not a wise thing to do”. This is when the person decides to make a decision on his own or let his peers decide for him. Will it be the best possible path or will it end up being a disappointment?