Driscoll
Sophomore English, Period 3
February 19, 2017
The Roots of Extreme Human Behavior
It is surprising to see how some of the lessons presented in a fictional book published in 1954 apply to some situations around the world currently. William Golding’s Lord of the Flies is about a group of young boys that are stuck on an island. Without any adults, they struggle to hold a social order and have peace among them. Ultimately they go crazy and become savages until they are rescued by a naval officer. Although these events are fictional, similar behaviors occur in the real world. The Muslim band that trump created is a result of fear. The terrorists that come from these countries mean harm to the United States of America so out …show more content…
During their time on the island, the boys were haunted with the fear of the beast. The boys killed Simon after he finally realized that the beast was actually a “poor body that [should’ve been] rotting away” (Golding, 146). The fear of the beast on the island and without hope of rescue led the boys to have a distorted perception. This distorted perception clouded their minds, which then caused the boys to act in a savage matter. They imagined things that were not real due to the fear that surrounded them. While Simon walked around in the woods, he stumbled across the dead pigs head on the stake. Simons mind allowed the lord of the flies to talk to him with “the voice of the schoolmaster” (Golding, ). All the fear around him caused his perception to change and imagine the lord of the flies. Fear itself is its own distorted reality so the more fear you have in your environment the more your perception is distorted. Many of our current world problems stem from peoples distorted perceptions. For example, many of the races that live in our world face stereotypes. One of the largest focused races is Muslims. Many of the terrorists that attack the United States are Muslims. Many people say that “Not all Muslims are terrorists, but all terrorists are Muslims”. This is false to many people that inhabit our world currently. The amount of fear that is present in our world currently causes our perception to become distorted. These stereotypes then begin to become a reality in many people lives. These people with distorted perceptions end up inflicting pain and suffering on the targeted group. We know these stereotypes have become a reality due to the recent ban that was enacted against several Muslim countries. President Donald trump signed a banned to “[Protect] the nation from foreign terrorist entry into the United States”(New York Times).Although this ban will