Animals In Lord Of The Flies Persuasive Essay

Man an animal beneath the mask
In the novel “Lord of the Flies” by William Golding the author uses literature to support the belief that man is wild and will always be wild. Golding supports that statement made by Arthur Schopenhauer; Schopenhauer claimed that “Man is at bottom a wild and terrible animal”. Man through the ages has evolved in intellect that has furthered technology, medicine, understanding and more but one thing that we haven’t moved past is our instincts the instinct to survive at all means necessary. Humankind has got up to where it is now by “war” without war we wouldn’t have had the Neolithic era and ergo our present day. Instincts…..What are instincts? Instincts are what we possess as an organism something that is passed on from generation to generation. Instincts consist of knowing not to touch hot items or to look both ways before crossing the road, these instincts are there to stop you from harm’s way or imminent threat but one that lurks in our mind is the “fight for survival”. Fighting for survival as a human being is to the point that anything will be done at any cost to live; whether that is to sever you’re arm to get dislodged from a rock or to kill and eat a human being to survive. In the “Lord of the Flies” the civilized group of British kids turn from what was a
democratic form of thinking to a primitive one. The will to survive ignores what “civilized” thought a person or a group has, in the “Lord of the Flies” go from trying to rationally solve problems to the point of animal like thoughts when they say “Kill the pig! Cut his throat! Kill the pig! Bash him in!” this shows the true nature of human being when law and society is not present.
War an inevitable part if progress has to be made, progress has stemmed from human beings settling and farming Land was a resource so they founded armies and armed them so they could protect it and so others fought to gain more of it. They fought for land and other resources expanding their own property and this is cycled over and over again, nowadays they do it for other reason including political motives but not limited to. The idea of war is inevitable and is possibly the only civilized act we do due to it being known by the opposing party and the setting rules before started (Rules Of Engagement).There has only been one war in which we blatantly ignored them, that war was the “Vietnam war”. War has brought tremendous changes in technological fields and in medical science, during World War two the Nazi’s invented Penicillin which fights bacteria and also provided the basis of the production line which was significant contribution to way is now the modern day production line.
In the end human kind has always clung on to the one instinct; the instinct to survive.
Human beings at heart are a vicious and a vile group of organisms when the shackles of law and society are removed. I go to survival class on a regular basis and one of the main tips is; stay away from people who are stranded because when push comes to shove they will contemplate of killing you for resources and such, to survive. Schopenhauer is right in his statement but there is an exception, there are a few on this earth who really are good at heart and will always put others lives over their own and these people are the true hope for mankind that can make a difference. A
change.
In the end I conclude by saying that no matter how much we try war is inevitable, but what we must not forget is that it is not a bad thing it provides good yields too. War has brought peace and freedom to many and has been a major contributor to the modern day science and technological fields. Human kind is a terrible animal in general but there are still a few who are pure from the anger and hatred that the rest share to one another. Instincts such as the “Fight for survival” is a terrible thing and the sad truth is that the majority would kill each other if need be I hope that we change and become more kind hearted to one another from the few that are.