Watching action cartoons was somewhat of a ritual as a kid. After a long week of study and play, I would sit front of the colorful box on Saturday and openly absorb as my favorite superheroes, the Teen Titans, beat up bad guys. Little did I realize, I was being programmed into a way of thinking that would influence my values and behavior for years. In the Teen Titans episode, “The Beast Within,” the creators generalize the term “animal” to negatively stereotype non-human animals, in a similar fashion to how misanthropists stereotype humans. This prejudice creates an inhospitable word for our fellow earthlings. First, a little background of the show is necessary. Beast Boy, a member the Teen Titans, has the power to become any animal …show more content…
In previous episodes, his reaction might have been something like, “thanks for freeing me from channel surfing, I’m gonna go make tofu burgers! Want one? They’re gonna be juicy!” But now, in addition to acting like a jerk, he stopped being vegan. The morning after the chemical incident, he woke up to the smell of ham and eggs. Normally he would find the thought of his animal friends dead on a plate sickening. Instead, he steals the animal products from his human friends at the breakfast table and proudly swallows the food in one gulp. This action is immediately followed by a guitar strum that mimics the effect of a drum set playing Ba-Dum Chhhss. While the viewer is supposed to find this hilarious, it worries Beast Boy’s friends who know he would never do that. Society dictates there is a hierarchy to all species. Non-human animals are lower on the social ladder than humans because we stereotype them as savage, unremorseful creatures who don’t have any feelings. This Teen Titans episode compounds the attitude by depicting the “Animal” version of Beast Boy as negatively as they can get away with. The show concludes with Beast Boy drinking an antidote to the chemicals from the lab and returning back to his human form. Along with it, his old personality comes back in this dialogue with Raven(R), another roommate of …show more content…
One school of artistic thought dictates that the stories must end with a broad generalization. The generalization here is that Beast Boy’s wrongdoings were animalistic and only humans can exhibit compassion and control. To this affect Alaimo said, “Monster movies… feature human/animal hybrids that rouse the viewers’ recognition of the animality of the human only to conclude by assuring us that we are certainly not animals after all” (Alaimo 2). By placing humans on a pedestal and non-humans below, it makes us feel proud of our human birthright. However, such ego helps us turn a blind eye when we exhibit the qualities we deem “animalistic”. Another hypocritical view on the opposite side of the spectrum is misanthropy, meaning hatred towards humans. The irony is that misanthropes are humans themselves. Speciesism, or discrimination based on species, follows the same logical fallacy. The people who “assure us that we are certainly not animals at all” (Alamo 2), are in fact animals themselves. The truth belongs to neither speciesists nor misanthropes. Every single sentient being has a different personality because we all encounter different experiences in life, no matter how slight. The act of labeling is a misnomer because labels are too narrow to represent all the differing experiences. For example, someone receives a slap and responds angrily. That doesn’t mean that this individual is angry all the time, nor that everyone
The first representation of the beast that the author portrays is fear. In document A, “... Begin to people the darkness of night and forest with spirits and demons which had previously appeared only in their dreams or fairy tales”. To clarify, the children’s imagination runs rampant without their parents to banish their fears, so their imagination creates something of a beastie-thing. In document
I chose to research The Beast, because it’s one of the few shows I have seen that has made me feel uncomfortable and question the ethics and morality behind the story of a performance. So much of the arts industry pushes us to take responsibility and be more conscious of being environmentally friendly and stand up for animal (and human) rights, so it was such a shock to sit down to a performance that did almost the opposite. Initially I found it extremely difficult to stomach as a joke. Once I began researching the motivations and reasonings behind this performance, I realise that I could very well be the kind of person that this play is placing in the spotlight – hence those feelings of offense! Now being able to understand more clearly the mindset from which Eddie comes from, I am able to easily respect, understand and enjoy the hilarity the story portrays.
Species egalitarianism is an easily outmoded form of communicating treatment of species because of all the questions and speculation it ultimately raises. The equivocation of animals is absurd. We can’t compare them because of all their fundamental differences, and to do so is insulting to all species that fall below the parameters we instill. Ultimately, there is no possible situation in which species egalitarianism is correct.
The creature was also misguided, his treatment from others led to him becoming a monster but he realized this and did the right thing in the end, showing that he was just misunderstood.
He did not fear the jungle, and he did not fear the Beast. "Maybe,' he said hesitantly, 'maybe there is a beast . . . maybe it's only us" (89). The Beast takes many forms in the boys' imaginations; once, t...
In chapter five, the beast was made-up and did not exist. Many of the boys were afraid of it. Ralph called a meeting because he saw the boys were having problems with their fear of the beast. It is Jack who states, “If there were a beast I’d have seen it. Be frightened because you’re like that- but there is no beast in the forest (Goldberg, p. 83). Symbolism for the beast changes in the novel from a real beast that they think exists to realizing that the beast exists within them. It is Simon in chapter five who states that perhaps the beast exist within them. He states, “What I mean is … maybe it’s only us (Goldberg, p. 89). Simon felt that the beast does not really exist but evil exists among them.
The narrow ways of men continue to put constraints on that which is acceptable and that which is different. Similarly, the things that are repulsive, scary, hideous and vile. Humans have a constant need to categorize things they do not understand, so they attach a label to everything. The Creature's father and creator Victor Frankenstein berthed him to life with out a name. This is possibly the saddest aspect of The Creature's character. Viewed this way a perspective on humans as compassionate and caring individuals is distorted to show people as cold and inconsiderate. Attempting to define difference, humans socially segregate distinction and inconsistency.
A group of children creating a society is destined to corrode. In the beginning of the novel a little boy asks the older children what they are going to do about the “beast.” Although the older boys do not believe the thought of the island being inhabited by a beast, it does mark the start of their paranoia. As their paranoia rises, the children begin to wonder if there really is a beast on the island. "They talk and scream . . . as if the beastie, the beastie or the snake-thing, was real” (52). In this quote, Ralph, Jack, and Simon talk about the beast and whether it is real or not. The beast had created a fear that made
Another of the symbols that was used to present the theme of the novel is the beast. The boys believed that the beast is an external source of evil. Though, in reality, it represents the evil present within them, which is causing life on the island to worsen. Simon begins to realize this even befor...
The last decade of the twentieth century in America saw a rise in programs for human’s “self betterment.” A popular form of betterment is that of the inner animal. Interest in Native American animal mysticism, vision quests, and totem animals have increased dramatically in the past few years. No forms of media have been spared; Calvin Klein’s supermodels come on during sitcom commercials to tell viewers they need to be a beast, or to get in touch with their animal within. In the last decade of the nineteenth century, however, animalism was viewed not as a method of self-improvement but as the reprehensible side of humanity that lingered beneath the surface, waiting for an opportune time to come out and play. In Frank Norris’ novel McTeague, humans are no better than the beasts they claim to control. They cage and torment defenseless creatures, but cage and torment themselves far, far, worse. McTeague, Trina, Zerkow, and Marcus are animals in thin human’s clothing, walking the forests of McTeague, waiting for the opportunity to shed their skin and tear each other apart, while the real animals of the world continue leading lives far superior to their human counterparts.
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
The beast symbolizes the growing fear that lies dormant, deep in the children’s souls and turns the boys into uncivilized beings. William Golding uses the beast to instill fear in the souls of the boys. While everyone is scared of the beast and questioning what it exactly is, Simon suggests something else. He agrees with everyone that the beast might just exist. But unlike everyone else, Simon comments, "maybe it's only us.” (Golding 89) This comment shows that the beast might just coexist in their bodies. The beast is just made up and not real, and only a product of their increasing fear of the unknown. The fear of the beast activates their primal instincts and makes them lose all grasps of civilization. Without the mindset to survive, the boys struggle to find food and build shelter efficiently. They slowly lose everything they had when they came to the island. The boys are acting like Native Americans in a sense because their actions resemble the Native Americans through the chanting, dancing and face painting to represent power and fierceness. The settlement on the deserted island triggers the fear that lies deep in them. Each person on the island comb...
to reassure and respect him. The beast also confesses that he is lonely and disliked (Shelley 105). The creature’s confession indicates the impact prejudice can have on a victim. Though he
...t the group more than the short-term enjoyment that this new attraction presents. He knows that finding the beast will provide the entire group of boys with emotional security due to the fact that they will literally face their ultimate fear: the beast. Because Ralph values the emotional security of the group of boys, he serves as father-figure. He symbolizes someone who will always be looking out for his peers, through thick and thin, just as any father would.
The evil inside all of the boys is what causes them to show actions of evil. It causes people to think maybe the beast is a representation of the evil inside them. Simon states, “‘maybe it’s [the beast] only us”’ (Golding 89). This backs up the idea that the beast could potentially be the evil. Arnold states in his article, “The beast is an externalization of the inner darkness in the children’s (man’s) nature” (Johnston). This justifies the idea that the beast is the evil inside of them. The beast is just a way of putting their evil into a figure. They use the beast and other objects like the parachutist to let evil take over them. The evil in them is shown through figures that the boys are taken over by fear of. (Johnston)