The laws say that men may not write unless the Council of Vocations bid them so” ( Rand , page 1). In Anthem individuals have no choice they can not get married or date with the opposite sex.As we can see by those couple of many examples that society influences individuals all the time. I have looked at four different authors and three out of four all had society influencing individuals decisions and actions. “ I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life , and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not when I came to die, discover that I had not lived” ( Thoreau, page 207). Thoreau left society and normal habits to live in the woods with nature around him. Usually society lives as a community but Thoreau broke that rule and lived by himself in the…
Jean Cocteau, 1889-1963, once written, "The instinct of nearly all societies is to lock up anybody who is truly free. First, society begins by trying to beat you up. If this fails, they try to poison you. If this fails too, the finish by loading honors on your head." He meant to say was that people should not let their society take control of how they should live their own lives. People should not be threatened by their own society, but they should be themselves instead of mindless puppets of society. Ayn Rand, a Russian-born US novelist, creates related personalities between Equality, from Anthem, and Howard Roark, from Fountainhead. Both characters are different from the society they live in, have a female companion who supports their ways…
In conclusion, people of today should follow Equality’s example and break away from societies chains on a person’s ego. Equality ended up doing this, because he strived to know what the Unthinkable Word was, he found joy in being free, and believed strongly in the word ego. All of this can lead anyone to be an overall better person who can stand out as an…
In “Harrison Bergeron” physical and mental handicaps such as masks, body weights, and brain buzzers keep everyone equal. “They weren’t just equal, they were equal in every which way” (Rand 1). This shows that equality was very important to them and was tried to be kept that way. In Anthem everyone in the community had been brainwashed since birth to believe that there was no single unit of a person in society only the society itself. “All men are good and wise and it is only we” (Vonnegut 4). This shows that even Equality believes that there is no individuality in society. In both of these societies, everyone is equal in one way or another. Now these two pieces of writing might have more in common than was…
Is it possible to go from someone who conforms, to becoming a full on individual? Is it safer for people to stick to their community’s ideas, beliefs and morals, or is it nice to have parts of them that make them stand out? In Fahrenheit 451, there are characters that stick to following the crowd, while Montag believes that having a little individuality can only benefit him. The author, Ray Bradbury reveals the theme that despite the fact that every character shows some form of conformity, Montag breaks out of the ordinary to become an individual.…
In the story “Leopard” by Wells Tower the narrator is an 11 year old boy who has troubles dealing with his stepfather, he wants to stay home from school because of a fungus on his lip which the kids would bully him for. When he makes the decision of staying home from school, he goes through many hurdles coping with his stepfather which shows us the protagonist is self-conscious and a deceiver. The narrator’s encounter with Josh Mohorn revealed self-consciousness when he told the narrator to “take the seat down there” and “I can’t eat my lunch with your fucking burger in my face” which made the narrator feel like his “irremediably a fungus man.”. These things that the kid say to him and he said about himself show his self-consciousness and how…
not those people with blue and green hair you see on talk shows. Those people…
Ayn Rand’s Anthem portrays a scared world with a homogenous culture and mindset, imprisoning its citizens with their thoughts. This imprisoned mindset caused a regression of technology out of fear of being different and the consequences that came with that. When an individual is erased to be a part of a whole and they are not allowed to question what is “known” nothing new can come about without retaliation, which is depicted in Equality’s story of the society he lived in. Equality 7-2521, a street sweeper, is about to challenge the morality and ethics of his society. In Anthem the rules and restrictions of the society stifled the questioning of established “norms,” showing that to progress, people must be allowed to be individuals, people must be allowed to question, and they must not be afraid to stand alone.…
Society growing up has taught me to fear the world around me. Today most women walk in groups when going out. This is very bad because women shouldn't fear the world around them. Yet again, during this statement of the privilege walk, it was mostly only men who stepped forward. This statement is a problem that women face in the world daily, and should be…
Although the comparisons are well hidden both today’s society and the story ‘Harrison Bergeron’ share a good amount of similarities. They both have to deal with equality, which leads to problems and consequences. Secondly having to deal with competition and trying to prevent it from occurring, which also leads to problems. Lastly both struggle with normality, and it’s hard to accept that different is okay now.…
Throughout life there are moments where an individual must conform to society and the people around them in order to be accepted, however it is the individual actions and how the individual chooses to conform that creates their unique identity and place within that society. Ralph Ellison published the novel that follows a sense of outward conformity and obedience to an established order while at the same time invoking an inward questioning of the roles an individual plays within such an order. The main character is forced to conform to the cliché laws and expectations of the laws and expectations of the society that he lives in, in order to survive and function within them, while he privately goes against these societies in order to define themselves as individuals and uncover the truth about those societies that they live in. The outward conformity and inward questioning constantly clash, causing the character to doubt and confuse with what he knows is the truth and what he wants to believe is the truth.…
In our everyday lives we come across barriers, barriers of inequality, barriers of exclusion, barriers that prevent us from accomplishing our goals and ambitions. However, do we let these obstacles get in the way of our wants and desires or our basic rights and privileges? No, we do not. We work as individuals and together to encourage positive change in today’s society. People of the past and present have demanded equality and the right to be included in things rightfully owed to them, resulting in either an influential change that is usually beneficial or occasionally, a hindrance.…
In both “Black Men In Public Space” and “It’s Hard Enough Being Me” we see characters who, at first, view their identities a certain way. It is after they move to a new area and see the reactions of those around them that they begin to question their individual identities and start to consider how the opinions of those around them influence how they perceive themselves. Both stories call in to question the ways that gender and particularly ethnicity can influence how a person is expected to behave by the others around them, and how the individual may not always live up to the stereotypical expectation, be it good or bad. In these two stories both characters feel the expectations of those around them and eventually come to the conclusion that it does not matter as long as they try to stay true to their own individual identities.…
Conformity is like a virus that you are bound to catch, and there is only one real cure. People conform to society because society has strength and power over us. People delude themselves into believing that majority is society. If someone’s views go against society then society will pounce upon them like a hungry lion to eat them alive. Rather than going against it, people follow along even if it isn’t always right. People must do what is right, but the question is what is right?…
In collectivism one’s single life does not matter, it is the survival of the group and its stature that matters. Throughout the novella Equality 7-2521 is taught and told to only care about the well being of his brothers. Equality, due to his intelligence, has seen beyond collectivism and has realised there is something more important than your “brothers”. “If this should lighten the toil of men . . . then it is a great evil, for men have no cause to exist save in toiling for other men.” (77) this quote; which was said by the scholars signifies a key aspect of collectivism, that all men should work for the benefit of their brothers. Equality has worked with the intention to benefit himself, he wanted to learn and become smarter. However, later on he tried to share that information with the scholars, leading to his expulsion from the community. During this part in the novella individualism starts to sprout and give off it’s effect. Equality realises that he should start caring about his own well being and stature, rather than focusing only on his community. Even though the novella tries to elaborate on these philosophies, it still has a biased towards individualism. Throughout Anthem, the main character (Equality) discovers Individualism and tries to change his community. Then he tries to introduce it to the ones that are of knowledge, “Many men in the Homes of the Scholars have had strange new ideas in the past . . . but when…