This piece is nothing but the contents of my brain. It is the regurgitation of the thoughts and philosophies that have gathered dust in my mind through the months I’ve been idle. This whole thought process was ignited by a “déjà vu” that occurred Saturday the 9th. Years ago I would attend parties and, instead of gargling down mass amounts of alcohol or dabbling in illegal substances, I observed and analyzed the people around me. Doing this gave me a deeper understanding of myself and I was a better person for it. Since then, I had succumbed to peer pressure and was right in the middle of the alcohol consumption at each party. But somehow, last Saturday, I found myself back in time:
I was at some random party the other day and for once I opted not to drink or be under the influence of some brain cell depleting drug. It seemed I was the only sober and fully functioning individual among these kids. I looked around me and I realized that everyone was running from something, from someone. And this lifestyle - the alcohol, the drugs, the partying, the gathering just to have some sort of human interaction, longing to show off just to feel better about oneself - all of this allowed them to get away. It’s almost sad. But almost like looking into a huge mirror. They were all broken in a sense, like me, but with different masks to cover their true selves. It was quite odd and I found myself staring at these drunken bastards, trying to figure out what it was they were running away from. It was sort of amusing. Everything was so plastic and fake – all the smiles, the hugs, the hellos and goodbyes. It was all meaningless.
I’m so sick of everything. I try to change my environment but it's the same. I feel helpless in my own downward spiral. I can't figure things out. I’m trying, I’m trying with every strength of my being, but every effort seems futile. It feels like my little world is caving, sorry to be cliché, but that’s what it feels like. I try to separate myself from that reckless lifestyle, but I end up alone and left with too much time alone with my thoughts. So I go back and I just feel so incompetent around all these kids. I know my actions and self-pity is inexcusable, yet I allow myself to fall prey to the adolescent curse, which is to fuck up immensely.
Huckleberry Finn’s conscience and morality about regarding Jim as a friend changes throughout the novel as their bond with each other increases. In most parts of the story,Huck has internal conflict about whether or not he should turn Jim in,but Huck keeps thinking about how bad he would feel afterward. In chapter 8,Huck finds that Jim is a runaway. Jim explains to Huck that he overheard Miss.Watson talking about how she was going to sell Jim to a slave trader in New Orleans for $800 which would separate Jim from his family. Plus,he and Jim are traveling together for the same reason;freedom. Huck is escaping his own home life from the Widow Douglas and his abusive father believing that they're keeping him from being who he wants to be.
A true friend is someone who is always there for you through thick and thin. During bad times and good times, true friends always have each other’s backs no matter. In The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, by Mark Twain the main character Huckleberry Finn develops an unbreakable bond with Ms. Watson’s slave named Jim. Huck and Jim’s relationship doesn’t develop right away, but as the novel evolves, Huck opens up to Jim when they journey down the Mississippi river together. Huck begins to care for Jim and treat him as equal.
Jim's character traits are easy to over look because of his seeming ignorance, but in reality Jim possessed some qualities that created a positive influence on Huck. He began by demonstrating to Huck how friends teach friends. His honest compassion also eventually causes Huck to resist the ideas society has placed upon him, and see Jim as an equal-- rather than property that can be owned. Huck knew he was going against society, and of the consequences that he could receive for freeing a slave. "It would get all around, that Huck Finn helped a nigger to get his freedom; and if I was to ever see anybody from that town again, I'd be ready to get down and lick his boots for shame", (269-270). Huck then claims, "All right, then, I'll go to hell…"(272) This shows that Huck was willing to put himself on the line for a slave, because he ceased to view Jim as property and recognized him as a friend. At the beginning of the story Huck would have never done this, but after the many adventures that occur, Jims unconditional love for Huck pierces the shell society placed ar...
In chapter 16, Huck goes through a moral conflict of whether he should turn Jim in or not. “I was paddling off, all in a sweat to tell on him; but when he says this, it seemed to kind of take the tuck all out of me (89).'; Right off from the beginning, Huck wanted to turn Jim in because it was against society’s rules to help a slave escape and Huck knew it. But when Jim said that “Huck; you’s de bes’ fren’ Jim’s ever had; en you’s de only fren’ ole Jim’s got now (89),'; made helped Huck to grasp the concept that there is a friendship in the making. Even though Huck didn’t turn Jim in, he is till troubled by his conscience when the slave catchers were leaving because he knows it is wrong to help a slave. Still Huck cannot bring himself forward to tell on Jim, thus showing that his innate sense of right exceeds that of society.
In Fools Crow', Fools Crow is the central character. He is at a period in his life where he questions himself in a wistful daze about what he is; he wants to find out what his place is in this world and what is meaningful to him. He explores among his dedications to his people and among the potentials of breaking free and living a complete life without being interrogated by any one.
He started to feel guilty for keeping Jim hidden all that time and even attempted to write Mrs. Watson. He wrote a letter to her telling of Jim’s location but ripped it up immediately after. Huck came to a conclusion when he says, “I was letting on to give up sin, but away inside of me I was holding on to the biggest one of all” (Twain 204). He knew that what he was doing was not considered right in that situation but he felt okay with the choices that he had made. At this point, the reader can see how Huck is conflicted and acknowledges that his lies could have been immoral. In the end of his meltdown, he decided that it was all for the best and he wanted to continue to protect Jim at all
Throughout this novel the relationship between Huck and Jim differs in and out of society because of Huck's feelings towards Jim. These two adventurers had planned to leave the Mississippi and go North, but missed their chance. The river took them farther and farther South. If Jim was caught, he would be in big trouble. If Huck didn't turn Jim in, he would also be in big trouble. Huck found himself battling with his conscience, when he realized how close Jim was to his freedom, "...I begun to get it through my head that he was most free-and who was to blame for it? Why, me. I couldn't get that out of my conscience, no how nor no way." (pg.85) Turning Jim in would be difficult, since he was a benevolent and amiable man. It was not righteous that he should be hurt, but if Huck helped Jim run away, he would have to turn his back on his own people. He would be saying slavery, and everyone who believed in it, was wrong. Huck came to the decision to tell someone about Jim that will force him back into slavery. Soon enough they encountered two white men on a skiff. During this incident Huck perceived that his feelings to protect Jim were stronger than his feelings to turn him in. He lied when the men asked if Jim was white or black.
Throughout the story Jim is characterized as a mature person and more of a moral catalyst. He is a loyal person and he does not hate anyone, even though the society ignores him (Brownell 1). Even when he was a slave, he did not do anything wrong or cheated Miss Watson; rather he was very loyal to her. In any point of the story, he did not hate anyone or complained to anyone even though the society was against him. When he heard Miss Watson he is going to sell him, he was afraid he will have to leave his family and in this situation he decided to run away. He always valued his family most in his life, which clearly shows how much he loved and cared for his family. Jim has very caring and loving nature, and for Huck he is more like a father figure rather than a friend. When he is with Huck, he always worried about him. He always teaches Huck something new and loved him. When Huck lost in the river, he worried about him, which clearly shows he is more than a friend to Huck. Huck sees in him the value of love and more over his dedication towards his responsibilities, that Huck’s fathers lacks. Their relationship between them is so deep that is beyond a friendship.
The idea of “Outliving Oneself” depends on the concepts of trauma and most importantly the self, in a situation where said trauma obliterates the self for an indefinite amount of time. Brison presents the self in three interwoven parts: the embodied self, the self as narrative, and the autonomous self. Any of these parts of self depend largely on the individual’s society, culture, and interactions with other people. The embodied self represents the self in conjunction with the physical body, which our society separates from the self, to intimate a soul or personality, and also assigns genders to certain traits. Trauma dissolves this separation of body and mind because violence brings the traumatized to face their own mortality. They have to see their body as an object because their assailant treats it as an object. Trauma is so damaging because the self cannot exert any power whatsoever; the interaction between the assailant and the victim, essentially a social situation, robs the victim of a voice, because the assailant ignores it, a personality, because it is of no consequence to the assailant, and a self, because the assailant uses the body as an object, and the body plays a more central role in the interaction than the self does. Brison quotes Cathy Winkler in saying a rape is a “social murder,” because the rapist’s part in the interaction defines the victim through their actions that take away the victim’s sense of self. Any control that the victim felt over their body gets taken from them by the rapist. The consequences of this trauma include a loss of control over physiological functions, such as emotion and incapacitation from anxiety; the body and mind are out of balance, which leads the victim to be stigmatized by societ...
From 1920 to 1929 consumerism partially caused the Great Depression due to speculation and installment buying. Speculation is the act of investing in a stock with the hope of a big gain but the risk of a big loss. Many of the investors were sure that the stocks they were going to buy were going to grow, therefore they received big loans that, once the market crashed and all the money was gone, they could never pay b...
Existentialism, which spread rapidly over continental Europe after the First World War, is essentially the analysis of the condition of man, of the particular state of being free, and of man's having constantly to use his freedom in order top answer the ever- changing and unexpected challenges of the day. According to the Existentialists, the starting point of every philosophical investigation is concrete human existence. That means that human personality in itself should point the way to the absolute value of reality. A single definition of existentialism is impossible. Definitions, provided by dictionaries are only part of what existentialism is about. …central to each definition is the assertion that existentialism is a theory or statement about the nature of man's existence. (1) The term is so difficult to define because, unlike other terms, existentialism is not universal. In other words, there are no two existentialists, which share exactly the same values or beliefs. Although, here is one major theme: a stress on individual existence, subjectivity, individual freedom, and choice.
While in Russia, Nihilism became identified with a loosely organized revolutionary movement happened during the time period of 1860-1917, that rejected the authority of the state, church, and family.
The way Huck and Jim encounter each other on the island, draws parallels in their similar backgrounds. Huck is torn between a life of manners and etiquette and a dangerous life a freedom, and while Jim at an impasse because he is being sold into slavery farther away from his home and away from his family. Each choice, for both characters comes with a cost so they both decide to runaway, in an attempt to assert some control over their lives. After spending much time together, the pair establish a connection which at times Huck feels guilty about since it violates everything he was raised to believe. At a certain point, Huck considers turning Jim in by, writing a letter, but after recalling the goods times they shared, Huck exclaims, "All right, then, I 'll go to hell!” (Twain) and quickly tears up the letter. Twain depicts Huck and Jim 's eventually friendship as a source of emotional strife for Huck and Huck constantly has to decide whether to abandon Jim and turn him in or abandon his religious beliefs and stay with Jim. The ripping up of the letter that would have turned Jim in symbolizes the choice Huck 's has selected. For this moment onward, Huck is dedicated to keeping Jim from being sold back into slavery and has no intent on going back on his choice. While there are times, Huck pays attention to the color of Jim 's skin he believes that
The friendship between Huck and Jim is constantly changing with the chain of events. The two characters encountered many things while floating along with the pace of the Mississippi, such as making decisions. In the novel Huck was forced to make the decision whether or not he would turn Jim in because it would be the, "right thing" to do because Jim was a run-away slave. It was a close place. I took...up [the letter I'd written to Miss Watson], and held it in my hand.
If we take a step back from the world that we live in today, we can see that people are very different all over the world. This is because people all over the world, or even in different areas in the same part of the world have different views. Looking at how different people’s religion is on an individual level we can see that they vary from believing in Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Buddhism, no religion, or many more. These different types of religions can lead people into having different beliefs. Since people aren’t the same all over the world it may lead every individual to see things differently and when asked what is the meaning of life. We may receive many different answers to this question. Looking at the definition of life we can