Violence vs. Nonviolence

Violence

Lacey Meek

   Fire consumed the pages.  Flames lapped up the paper greedily, and the white sheets curled in on themselves in blackened pain.  There was something final about the action.  It was victory.  A small victory, but the first one.  This moment was all the sweeter for it.  They treated us like animals, like pack mules.  It was as though our race was bred solely to serve as stepping stones for them.  We did all of the work, and they gained the rewards.  Today we were taking a stand against it.  I had stood in the masses, had tossed my pass into the grasping flames and watched it burn.  For this moment at least, I could close my eyes and imagine that I was free of the curse of apartheid.  This must be what it feels like to be white.

   We are a species that is infatuated with success.  We strive to pull ourselves to the top, towards prosperity, always reaching for perfection when it will always be just beyond our grasp.  Sometimes in that struggle, we forget about others or even purposely drag them down in order to make us feel superior.  This creates an unjust situation.  Unjust situations are everywhere, and range on a very wide scale.  This scale varies from Galtung’s latent violence where the attacker simply thinks of committing violence, to the cruelties of apartheid and inhumanity of murder.  Similarly, there is a wide range of solutions that will change these unjust situations.  What is the best solution?  This is defined by the person answering the question, and their definition of the word “best.”  My views are this: although violence may be the quickest path towards the resolution of an unjust situation, we see that far more often non-violence is the more effective of the two options.

   In The “Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas,” author Ursula LeGuin says: “The trouble is that we have a bad habit, encouraged by pedants and sophisticates, of considering happiness as something rather stupid.  Only pain is intellectual, only evil interesting… But to praise despair is to condemn delight, to embrace violence is to lose hold of everything else.” (2)  A similar idea is pointed out in the “Active Nonviolence” writing: “Many mistakenly think that power comes from violence and that it can be overcome only by greater violence.  Gandhi said, ‘strength comes not from physical capacity but from an indomitable will.’” (9)  I believe that these form the basis for all acts of violence.  In our seminar, I was shocked to hear just how many people felt violence was the better route simply because it was the fastest way to establish change.  This sort of reasoning is what causes our belief that power is violence.  Just because something can be accomplished quickly doesn’t mean that the method is powerful.  It means that the method is efficient.  This can become an easy out that we use to explain why we’d rather resort to violence first.  Of course, aggression isn’t always the worst way to resolve a conflict: America was the result of a violent resolution, and for better or worse, it is still around after many long years.  This is also seen in Libya, which has recently suffered heavy fighting between the government and its people.  Currently they are on the road to rebuilding their country in a fashion more acceptable to them.  This may last for a couple of years, though hopefully longer, depending on the government they build and outside forces.  Sometimes violence is the best resolution.  However, more and more it seems that we lose the ability to discern when violence is needed from when it is the easiest out.

   Force is often unnecessary and frequently a useless course of action for many reasons, but we tend to look past them when considering it as an instrument of change.  Chief among these reasons is violence’s inclination to create short term resolutions.  This is most likely caused by underlying tensions that linger even after the conflict is supposedly resolved.  These short resolutions are also caused when we lose control, as is explained in the “Active Nonviolence” writing: “Gandhi taught that one must not work for a noble goal by evil means, for means and ends are interconnected just as the seed is to the tree.” (9)  This is very true.  If we lose control of the means when wielding violence, we lose control of the ends, which can cause their instability.  If we resort to peace rather than war and conflict, then we choose a way that requires patience.  With patience we may control the ends which will secure long lasting terms, or at the very least, more stable ones.  We choose to build our relations with others, rather than destroy them, and this will discourage violence in the future as well.

   Peace can also be used to gain support from outside forces.  In fact, it may be one of the strongest ways to gain their respect and place pressure on the oppressors.  In the movie Gandhi, there were two strong examples of this: Gandhi burning the passes, and the opposition of the closing of a salt mine.  When Gandhi burned passes in opposition of a new British law on the Indians, he was beaten repeatedly.  This was one of his first demonstrations, and he gained quite a bit of respect from others. (Gandhi, 1982) Even though he was put in the hospital, jailed at least three times, and nearly killed by his fasting, Gandhi’s policy of peaceful opposition, and refusal to lash out when provoked earned him great respect and he earned a following rather quickly.  At one point, when he was in jail, the British closed an Indian salt mine.  The workers opposed this and lined up in front of the gates to go to work.  They marched to the guards, and line after line was brutally beaten back.  Yet they refused to fight, and this became a source of extreme fascination to the outlying countries.  (Gandhi, 1982) The Indians’ resolution was first really taken into account by the rest of the world due to its nonviolence, giving them more support and putting more pressure on Britain to give India its freedom.

   One of the most important lessons to be learned when dealing with violence is that it only breeds more violence.  In support of this theory, Gandhi said that: “an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind,” (Gandhi, 1982).  The theory of fighting fire with fire doesn’t apply to violence.  Violence will only grow and spread until the world is at war with itself.  Only peace can break the cycle of violence, and it will never end unless we make an honest effort to try.  Peace will douse the fire rather than fan the flames, relieving tensions and building stronger relationships.

   The fires will continue to rise though.  It seems to be a growing trend in human nature to allow them to go unchecked.  However with peace we can fight back, for a society free of the flames of unjust situations.  If we continue with violence, we will quickly learn that speed is not the only factor that determines the quality of a resolution.  What use is speed if countless lives are lost?  What promise is there in violence that it will even be quick?  Best, for me, is determined by its longevity, stability, and lack of loss.  Love is far stronger than hate, and there is always a peaceful solution to conflict.  We are not built to destroy each other, and no person should have ownership over another.  This is why peace is the best way to change an unjust situation in my eyes.

Works Cited:

   Gandhi.  Dir. Richard Attenborough.  Perf. Ben Kingsley, John Gielgud, Candice Bergen.  Columbia Pictures, 1982.

           

   Mandela, Nelson.  “An Ideal for which I am Prepared to Die.” Opening his trial.  Supreme court of South Africa.  Docks, Pretoria.  20 April.  1964.

   Deats, Richard.  “Active Nonviolence: A Way of Live.” Active Nonviolence, The Fellowship of Reconciliation.  Fellowship of Reconciliaion, 1991.

   LeGuin, Ursula K.  The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas.  New York:Harper and Row, 1975.

Being Peace

Seminar Reflection Part One

Lacey Meek

1/31/12

   To live in the present moment is to be aware of the situation you are currently in, to be aware of the past and how it affected you, and be aware of the future without letting it control the way you perceive what is in front of you.  Only in the present am I alive, and often I spend my time in the present looking forward to the future or looking back at what I could do better.  It is very hard to remember to live in the moment.  In the text he says: “Aware that life is available only in the present moment and that it is possible to live happily here and now.”  I believe he makes a very good point when he says this.  We may plan ahead to make ourselves happy, but only in the present moment can we truly be happy and experience happiness.  Furthermore, I believe that this goes for all extreme emotions.  It is only in the present that we experience them and it is only that harsh pull of emotion that tugs us into the present.

   I believe that like most people I spend most of my time planning for the future.  Often I will find myself worrying or obsessing about things that will happen to me and try to think up ways to sidestep them in my free time.  I make up plans for the future so that I can act on them and become happier for one reason or another, but I am pulled to the present if those plans don’t work out and I’m frustrated.  Similarly, I tend to live in the present of something is happening, though the extent of my living in the present is dependent on how interesting the subject is to me.  Even right now as I write this seminar reflection, my mind keeps straying to what I will do for the second part of the reflection, and how I will talk to Lori about making up for seminar during our break.  This is a rather unconscious action that takes place when I’m in relative peace as I am in this moment.  However, my knee twinges every once in a while and in that burst of pain I am definitely not thinking about the future.  I am thinking about my knee, and how it hurts right at that moment.  When it stops hurting then I will resume thinking towards the future and how I can prevent my knee from hurting again then.  I believe that this is the mindset of most people, to either live in the past or live in the future and I am unfortunately no different on this account.

The Thirteenth Whisper

Lacey Meek

   I was sickly as a child, with watery eyes and a pale complexion, and I had no penchant for sports.  I was picked on a lot by the other boys, and even the teachers had no words to say in my defense.  They chalked it up to laziness.   I can't even begin to count how many times they told me that if I just tried I would get better.  Even father believed it, and told me the same often before he left.  I tried, I tried.  On good days, I was shunned.  On not so good days, I came home in tears.

   Those were the days that mother would scoop me into her arms and hold me close.  “Those boys are still too young to understand,” she would whisper to me.  “Someday, they may learn, but today is not that day.”  I would nod silently.

   Together we would recite twelve of the fourteen mindfulness trainings:

   “Belief is important but pain is wrong.  I will never hurt another person in the name of my beliefs, no matter what.

   “I will never be narrow-minded, because every day holds a new opportunity to learn something new, and I must accept the new knowledge with an open mind.

   “I will never try in any way to force others to do things they don’t want to do.

   “I will never look away when I see suffering, but try to find a peaceful resolution instead.

   “I will always try to be content with what I have rather than focus my life on earning fame or glory because although they may be nice, they aren’t important.

   “When I am angry I will not look to hurt others but take a look at the source of my anger and find a peaceful solution to end the anger.

   “We experience life here and now.  I will always try to live in the present when I can.

   “Words can create joy or pain.  I will do my best to speak truthfully and constructively.

   “I will never lie in order to make others feel better.  I will always try to tell the truth, choosing my words in a careful manner.”

   Here we skipped the tenth mindfulness training because although my mother followed the trainings, she wish to force Buddhism on me.  That was the third mindfulness training.

   “I will always try to do work that is beneficial to others, and where I cannot, I will attempt to find a balance between what is peaceful and what I have to do.

   “I will work hard to encourage nonviolence and compassion in my daily life.

   “I will always try to keep peace and promote the wellbeing of people, animals, plants, and minerals.”

   Mother felt that I was too young to concern myself with the fourteenth mindfulness training.  Instead, she would kiss my cheek.  “What do we do when people are mean to us?”  She would ask, rocking me back and forth.

   “We show them love.”

   This was over fifteen years ago.  Eventually, I grew stronger to fit the lanky frame that had made me a rather stork-like child.  My ivory pallor eventually became less ghostly, and I began to excel in school.  People stopped picking on me long before that though, and I believe that it was because of my mother, and how she encouraged peace over violence.  She showed me that love can, with persistence, change the world.  The lesson of her thirteenth whisper is one I will never forget.

The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas

Seminar Reflection Part One

Lacey Meek

   The smell was indescribable.  That was the first thing that Ivory could think as the door swung outward smoothly.  It was absolutely putrid: the reek of sewage and tang of blood mixed with human body odor and goodness knew what else.  Her stomach churned wretchedly and Ivory clapped a hand over her mouth and nose.  “Look Ivory.  Look because it disgusts you, because it is cruel and inhumane, and because you must truly understand all of the blessings that we are given.”  Nate was grim at this moment.  Ivory took a step forward, and peered into the oily blackness.  It took a moment for her eyes to adjust, and then she was able to view true horror.  A naked child sat in the patch of light, blinking back at the siblings without comprehension.  It –for it was impossible to tell if it was male or female under the layers of filth and muck- was matted and abused, covered in sores and sitting in its own droppings.  Ivory gasped and stumbled back.  The creature shrieked back and filthy little fingers scraped at the polished hardwood floor as it tried to clamor up.  Nate shoved it back down into the cellar none too gently.

   That had been a little over four years ago.  She’d been counting.  Now it was night, and flames were popping and snapping in the hearth before her.  She couldn’t force herself to stay in that place any longer after seeing the child.  He still haunted her dreams, morphing them into nightmares.  Ivory shuddered and pulled the heavy blanket tighter around her shoulders.  “Are you cold, child?”

   “No, I’m alright.”  She looked up at the creased and weathered face of her rescuer and more memories flooded her mind.

   Ivory walked.  She walked in the middle of the night, down empty streets that wound uncertainly from Omelas.  In her small bag was a change of clothes, a blanket, and some bread and water.  She had packed in a haze, not really thinking.  Only when a league separated her and the village of Omelas did her mind finally begin to clear and her stumbling trudge turn to a stride of purpose.  There were other cities out there, though she had visited them before and found none particularly to her tastes.  She could walk to Salem and take a ferry to the next country.  No one would ever stop her.  The people of Omelas never tried to stop the walkers.  Maybe it was because they wished they were strong enough to walk as well.

   She had never expected to make it this far.  Ivory had expected that she’d either give up or die beforehand, and she nearly had several times.  But somehow, she kept walking every day.  This was the city of the mountains, Maelos, and for the first time in years, she was perfectly content to sit by a fire and rest.  “You walked, didn’t you child?”  That was Davis, the man who had found her collapsed by the city gates.  “You walked from Omelas.”

   Ivory nodded, staring into the flames.  “I did.  How have you heard of it though?”

   Davis laughed now, leaning back in an arm chair.  “I walked as well.”

   She peered at him more closely now.  “You did?  And you stayed?”

   “Yes, and I’m the same as many others who live here.  We’re all looking for the same chance, aren’t we?  To purge ourselves of the memories.  We want to make our own happiness and our own prosperity.  We want to escape the guilt.”

   Ivory stood now, and walked to the window.  The mountains rose like imposing monoliths, encircling Maelos within stone walls.  Outside, the full moon drenched the world in silver, highlighting the stone buildings that composed the city.  Maelos had the aura of a place much more satisfied and filled than Omelas.  She liked it.  “Maybe I will stay too,” She whispered to the city.  “At least for a time.”  Maybe for a lifetime.

Seminar Reflection Part Two

Lacey Meek

   1: What is the difference between the people who walk away and the people who stay in Omelas?

   Those who leave Omelas are the ones who can’t accept the cruelty that the child in the closet is exposed to.  It seems to be a unanimous feeling as well, because in the story she talks about how those who leave all seem to know where they're going.  Whether or not this is the best course of action when they could free the child, they still choose to do something.  Those who stay choose to do nothing, and can accept it, or at the very least, they can ignore the child because they’d rather be happy than miserable and see just how miserable they could be if they were like the child.  I'd like to think that the people who leave want to be happy without the child's help.  They leave because they feel helpless to help him, this causes the lack of guilt in the town.

   It says in the story that there is no guilt in Omelas, and I believe that this is chiefly due to the fact that those who leave are the ones who feel true guilt.  If all who can't get past it feel guilty and leave, then there can be no guilt because the rest get over it.  Maybe those who stay tell themselves that they can't help him, that it's for the greater good, and that they didn't put him in there so they really didn't do anything wrong to the child.  But those who leave do feel guilt and realize that simply by letting him stay there, they have committed several violences against him.  That, I believe, is the biggest difference between these two parties: the ability to move on and ignore the child's presence (or at least do nothing about it), or being so affected by the child that they felt there was nothing else they could do but leave.

   2: Are you more like the ones who stay in Omelas, or the ones who walk away?

   I believe that the biggest factor in answering this question is the difference between who I am, and who I wish I could be.  The person who I wish I could be is more courageous.  She can stand up to others and is strong enough to break the cultural hegemony that we have fallen into.  However, the person I am is far less brave, and is very keen on keeping others happy rather than standing up for her beliefs.  There are good points to being this person too, but by being who I am I don't believe that I am much like the people who walk away.  I couldn't walk away from my own towns of Omelas without a great deal of strain.

   To answer, I would have to say that I am more like the people who stay in Omelas but I am always working towards someone who has the strength to walk away.  A big question that I have though is how do I walk away?  In this world, what am I walking away from?  Where do I walk to, since this is clearly a metaphorical statement?  I believe that I use these questions often as stalls, and that others do too, so that we don't have to walk away.  We are situated comfortably in out lives and in a world with this many distractions, it becomes easy to turn the other way from our problems, out “children in the closet”.  But we can always do our best, and I will continue to do so, so that maybe one day I will be able to take a stand against injustice, sort of like how I feel the people who walk away do, maybe in the only way that they can.

Jihad V.S. McWorld

Click picture for full view

   McWorld

Lacey Meek

   Mass democide in the name of marketing and consumerism?  Why yes there is an app for that!  McWorld is the globalization of politics, and the market is what drives it.  Human rights, political justice, democracy, and cultural identity are little when compared to advancing technology and getting that newest iphone to the buyers in time.  Mcworld a world of porous national and racial borders, where we are one publically peaceful community, yet we overlook inhumane treatment as long as it doesn’t impede progress.  How is this equality?  Personally, if I am going to be killed, I would prefer to die fighting for something important to me, not as a number in a group of menial workers on an assembly line.  Progress may be important, but I value myself above technology.  My poster shows the world, which is breaking off near the top.  This is our culture, which once lost, can never be retrieved.  There is a cross, a musical note, and a yin yang symbol.  These are known symbols of religions and cultures, and they will dissolve if McWorld comes into being.  Of these two futures, Jihad is the lesser evil, for helping us retain our cultural identities, and for allowing the hope that democracy may return in the future.

Slaughterhouse Five

A new book in Humanities!  This time we read Slaughterhouse Five, by Kurt Vonnegut.  I'll admit that I didn't relate well to the main character so I can't say that I'm as enthusiastic about it as All Quiet on the Western Front.  However, it was still a good read and I believe it showed the chaos of the main character Billy's mind well.  It is the sort of book that requires reading and re-reading to fully understand, due to the complexity of the layout.  It is still a good book though.

Here is my reflection from the Seminar we had on the book!

My Reflection:

   There were several great comments in this seminar that made me really think about things.  The comment that made me think the most though was Claire’s.  She added at one point that every person has their own war.  This was a new line of thought for me when considering this book, with how it relates to the characters.  Billy’s war is the actual war, and if he’s crazy then the war is that much more prominent for him.  Mary’s war is how battles are depicted as being so glorious.  She doesn’t want her children to be hurt, and wishes to protect them.  Each character and every person in real life has their battles, and I feel that Vonnegut made his characters more real by including those wars inside of them.

   Question one: Is this an anti-war novel?

   This is an interesting question that I really had to think about during the seminar.  Vonnegut, both in his writing and seen in his interview, has shown that he has a very cynical sense of humor that masks a lot of grimness. “INTERVIEWER: What happened when you reached the front?  VONNEGUT: I imitated various war movies I had seen” (from the interview.)  “The third bullet was for the filthy flamingo, who stopped dead center in the road when the lethal bee buzzed past his ear.  Billy stood there politely, giving the marksman another chance.” (from the book.)  In both of these passages you can see his humor which is generously applied alongside Tralfamadorians.  When this question was first asked, all I could think was that this book had no opinion, because the humor balances out the grim realities quite often.  After thinking about it though, I believe that Slaughterhouse 5 is an anti-war novel.  Stripped of the humor and sci-fi, this would be quite a grim tale and it would be very hard to read.  This book is an anti-war novel in the fact that it speaks plainly about the harsh realities but also pairs them up alongside an opinion that these realities are unavoidable.  This can be considered an “anti-glacier book,” in the fact that there’s very little hat Vonnegut can do to stop the wars, only write-against them.  This is also supported by the fact that in the first chapter, Vonnegut states that it is an anti-war novel.

   Queston 2: Why would Billy Pilgrim want to believe in the Tralfamadorian views of time and free-will?

    This is a similarly tricky question, especially considering Billy’s frustrating neutrality to everything.  However, I believe that this neutrality is the main show of how he believes it.  If he is neutral, and just goes with the flows of time, he doesn’t have to change anything and he can always know the outcome of his actions.  If he changed something though, got angry, chose to swim when his father tossed him into the pool, things would become unpredictable.  This is protective.  He doesn’t have to wonder or keep guessing at what will happen, he just knows, and if he doesn’t commit fully but doesn’t back out either then the worst that will happen is that someone will be frustrated with him because of it.  They won’t become his enemy.  He can use the Trlafamadorian views of free-will to back up this decision to just float along and take everything that happens, good or bad, with the same reaction.  Similarly, if Billy believes in the Tralfamadorian view of time he doesn’t have to acknowledge the fact that he’s probably crazy or that he can’t escape the war, no matter how much time has passed.  Not acknowledging that makes him trapped and, in a way, strips him of his free-will, only backing up the view.    So I believe that he wishes to believe in their views because then he can, to a greater degree, control the outcomes of his actions.

   While I was writing up this reflection, I came upon a connection to a quote.  “If you don’t stand for something, you will fall for everything.”  The author of this quote is greatly disputed.  However, I believe that it ties into Billy’s life quite well.  He’s never happy or sad, doesn’t fight or stand down, doesn’t laugh or cry.  He just is.  Until the plane crash, which I now believe drove him off of the edge.  When he is free of the hospital, Billy becomes a whole new person, all because he stands for his beliefs in the Tralfamadorians.  He has a motive and is ready to accomplish it.  This, standing up for what he believes is real even if he’s probably just clinically insane makes him a much more interesting person.  “The temperature in the house was down to fifty degrees, but Billy hadn’t noticed.  He wasn’t warmly dressed either.”  (from the book.)  I believe that this quote shows Billy as a person who finally has something to work for: educating the world about the existence of the Tralfamadorians.  He becomes more animated and works for something for the first time in his life so hard that he doesn’t even notice that it’s freezing in his house.  By standing for something he’s become a completely new person.

   On first glance, there are very few similarities between these two books.  To start with though, they are both anti-war books, and they both have segments about what it is like in the war. They both talk about prisoners, though one person is guarding them and in the other, the person is a prisoner.  The Russians are prominent to the prisons in both books, though in truth I still don’t understand why.  In each of these books, the main character is disconnected from civilians by their experiences in war.  I believe that the message is similar: once you join war, there is very little that you can do to escape it no matter what you would like.  You can ignore it and you can leave the front but war has still permanently effected you.

All Quiet on the Western Front

So, seminar one!  We have been reading All Quiet on the Western Front, by Erich Maria Remarque.  I really enjoyed this book as it follows the tale of a young soldier, Paul, and his friends in World War two.  It is somewhat anti-war, but it is a great book and I definitely recommend it to anyone who would like to read a good war story!

My Reflection:

   Reactions:

   There were several opinions expressed in this seminar that made me think harder about this book and the project that we’re studying.  Helen and Dusty both made good comments about war in general.  Helen said that, “war takes and takes,” and it really does.  Paul could no longer be the person that he used to be because slowly, it was all being stripped away in return for the instinct to react well on the battlefield, and the ability to go on even after a friend dies in the war because he just had to accept things like that.  Dusty said, “war’s an addiction,” which really adds on to Helen’s idea.  War is a completely alien world to most of us, something that can be talked about and considered, but not really understood until you participated in it.  Once you become integrated into war, it’s very hard to pull yourself out of it, because as I mentioned before, it’s so foreign to what we do in everyday civilian life.  I believe that that disconnection makes everything about war difficult and dangerous.  You can’t make any decisions or opinions about something that you’ve never experienced, so that even leaders of countries send them in somewhat blindly.  It’s a scary thought.  This is what Dusty and Helen’s comments made me think about.

   A Question from Seminar: Was Paul’s death the best thing for him?

   A:  It’s really hard to think about Paul’s death being a good thing.  However, at the exact same time, there is another question that you have to consider: Did he have any chance at life beyond the army?  He spent so much time working with life or death decisions, direct orders, and a true understanding of what it is to be at war.  If he’d gone home, he would have to completely relearn and refine every single aspect of society that the war had so harshly stripped away from him.  It’d be hard, and he’d be surrounded by people who wanted to know what war was like, what happened that made them lose, why couldn’t they have done a better job?  He’d have no real way to answer them either.  So even though he loved people like his family and friends, he would still be incredibly alone because of this factor.

   If his only life was in the army, because that was the civilization he was used to, then what happened when everyone died?  He lost Haie to a gunshot in the lung, Mϋller to one in the side.  It is assumed that Kropp killed himself after he left the hospital having his leg amputated.  Kat, Paul carried on his back after he’d been shot in the leg, and still he died because of a sliver through the skull.  If the army was Paul’s only life with people who would actually understand him, what happened when he was the last one left?  That would be the hardest thing, being alone in that war, which was the only place that they understood you.  Of course, he could always make new friends, maybe help out the new recruits, but eventually the war would’ve ended and he would’ve gone home, which returns me to the first paragraph.  I don’t believe that death was the best thing for him, because I myself believe that if you look, there is always something or someone worth living for.  However, I believe that this was the only way that he’d die peacefully, and is one of the happiest endings he could’ve had: on duty, surrounded by the life that he had chosen and people who he could relate to.

   Connections:

   The thought of Paul’s life after the war, or at least outside of the war, reminded me of the movie The Shawshank Redemption.  In this analogy, war is like the prison, all of these people using cigars and other oddities as currency, only able to understand each other and only able to do your best.  Both the prisoners and the soldiers had to follow direct orders and the veterans reacted far more calmly to the atrocities or shelling (in AQotWF).  In the Shawshank Redemption, they used a term that I believe applies very well to both stories: institutionalized.  To be institutionalized is to be completely adjusted to the prison or war, unable to turn back to normal everyday civilian life without feeling a sense of complete loss.  Eventually you want to stay, simply because it’s familiar, it’s something that you understand, and there’s a sort of routine to everything that becomes as regular as breathing to you.  I believe that Paul, like Red in the Shawshank Redemption, had become institutionalized, and unable to turn back civilian life that had continued to go on while they were away.  There were many new things that hadn’t been there when they left, and it wasn’t like going home anymore; it was like going back to some Picasso rendition of your home, already complete and fine without you.  I feel that there were many similarities between these two and it’s fascinating because the more I think about it, the more similarities I see.

   Lori’s Choice:

1)      “It is a great brotherhood, which adds something of the good-fellowship of a folk-song of the feeling of solidarity of convicts, and of the desperate loyalty to one another of men condemned to death, to a condition of life arising out of the midst of danger, out of the tension and forlornness of death – seeking in a wholly unpathetic way a fleeting enjoyment of the hours as they come.  If one wants to appraise it, it is both heroic and banal- but who wants to do that?”  page 272

2)        I feel that this quote captures the truth of war very well, partly because it’s mostly unbiased.  It balances the grimness of war with the strength in fellowship, how close they are.  It mentions people as “Men condemned to death,” which considering the book’s ending, and how in one battle, they lost over eighty men in one barracks alone, seems very correct.  However, it also mentions “the desperate loyalty to one another,” and how, “It is a great brotherhood,” which depicts the atrocities that they’ve seen together as a sort of bond that pushes them together.  Even if they wouldn’t have liked each other before the war, they now trust each other with their very lives, because they don’t have much room much bickering.  I feel that this quote shows both the harsh reality and the finer points very well.

3)      If I were to represent the idea in the quote, I would use a combination of art and poetry.  It would have a black frame that was coated in crushed mirror or glass if I was allowed, and the background would be a series of dark colors.  The words would be stark white and have little segments set here and there around the depictions.  This would be a painting with a picture for each segment.  The segments would probably morph from a dislocated view of war, the softer depiction that everyone knows, then would move to the truths of war before ending in something speaking about the brotherhood and maybe a picture of hands, one clasping the other as though to help each other up.  They would be wearing uniforms from both sides of the war (Germany and France for example).