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Recommended: Pros and cons of fear
Analysis of Frightening Fear in “Little Brother”
Fear is what many of the dictators are made out of and it has now become one of the biggest and most common ways of ruling over people today. The use of fear is being spread across the world quite fast and it is being used as a top technique for many things. Whether it is a mother teaching behaviour to her kid or a bank loan that you still haven’t paid, fear will always do the trick and this is what our world is turning into. Kids that need love and care to have a good upbringing and to be told not to do bad stuff are now being taught off by fear not because they want control of their child but because scaring a child is easier than teaching manners. Some people have begun to question whether the use of fear is justified and if it always leads to everyone being happy and unaffected. In Cory Doctorow’s “Little Brother,” a teenage boy taking on the Department of Homeland Security for revenge of being mercilessly detained and interrogated for days. After the bombing in Seattle by unknown terrorists, the DHS suspects everyone in the city and are fully supported by the government on this. The DHS uses fear as a force factor to control the whole city of Seattle so that citizens are scared of them and are under their control. Moreover there are many people out there wanting to take revenge on the DHS for spreading such terror throughout the city and changing many people’s lives. Therefore the DHS’s forced fear on the
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citizens of Seattle in “Little Brother” enforce the fact that using fear is not the right way to protect/control a society.
The drastic change in the city of Seattle after the terrorist attack is a result of how much uninvolved the citizens ...
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...Track passes to know exactly where each person is going and to show any movements that relate to potential terrorist involvement. This shows to what extent forcing fear and terror can have on others leading to making people angry and having the society being fragmented and people being isolated. Forcing fear on others is not the right solution to a problem (terrorist attack) and people like Marcus have shown why. If the DHS had acted in a different manner or had been spying secretly on others then maybe they wouldn’t have gotten taken down, who knows? It may have actually worked or acted differently. Would other people be able to make the same sacrifice Marcus did to get back his freedom if it was the only way to prevent this terrible tragedy of a fear filled city?
Works Cited
Doctorow, Cory. Little Brother. New York: Tom Doherty Associates, 2008. Print.
In the murder mystery “Scared to Death”, there are several suspects to who had scared Marcus Farley to his death. The suspects to the mystery are Claire, the faithful housekeeper; Tom Paisley, the Scottish medium; Sasha, Marcus’s Australian model wife; and Rachel, who is the younger sister to Jane Farley and had been in London for 27 years. Jane was Marcus’s daughter, who committed suicide and is claimed to have been a ghost. Marcus Farley read a threatening letter that was stabbed into the door with a knife, which caused him to have a heart attack and die. He could not find his nitroglycerin pills in the medicine drawer. Claire had the motive, opportunity, and the means to kill Marcus Farley.
...d with fears and those fears rule us. They can make us confess to things that are not true or can make us accuse other to take blame off ourselves. The fear incited by others and our governments is a dangerous thing that we should be aware about.
...iation factors. We learned that the selfishness of one person or group of people can have a major ripple effect on other things. Sometimes not fast forwarding and looking into the future of effects are not realize until it actually takes place. Unfortunately, in this situation that is exactly what happened and effected an entire nation.
that was effecting there very lives. It rallied the people to make the government find a
In addition, the Cold War is what brought this fear. Elaine Tyler May says that it has become an obsession to gain security. She says that because of fear, movements, such as feminism and black equality, prevented these individuals from being fully accepted into society as equals. I believe that fear has only distracted America from these movements of becoming fully successful. The article also refers to America being less of a democracy by citizens refusing to have faith in their government and refusing to trust one another. Reputedly, fear is what shaped America the way it is
In every society, throughout all of time fear is present. It is a an evolutionary instinct thought to have kept us alive, throughout the darkest moments in human history. However as time has progressed fear has had an unintended consequences on society, including the suffusion of incomprehension. During the Salem Witch Trials and Cold War a large sense of fear overcame these societies causing tragedy and misinformation to become commonplace. It is in these societies that it is clear that fear is needed to continue a trend of ignorance. Although bias is thought to be essential to injustice, fear is crucial to the perpetuation of ignorance because it blinds reason, suppresses the truth and creates injustice.
Throughout A Monster Calls by Patrick Ness, Conor, the protagonist worries about many issues. He suffers through all the emotions he has to combat about his mother's battle with cancer. However, the greatest emotion Conor has conflict is with fear itself. He is so fearful of countless issues he has to struggle with such as the fact he might have to possibly live with his grandmother for the rest of his life, or if he might not stay with his father the way Conor would like to. Primarily what Conor suffers through the most is the fear of his own mother's health. Conor cannot handle the fact that his mother is not getting any better and her health is slowly failing. Conor has an incredible amount of conflict with his fear, he tries to hide it, pretend it is not there, but soon his fear will grow until his fear finally get hold of him. In similarity, it is like procrastinating on an assignment in some sort, when there is no time left the assignment must be done. When there is no time left Conor has to acknowledge and face the fear. Patrick Ness tries to say that, through the way Conor deals with all his fears, Ness says it is better to overcome his fears than hide them. Also, not acknowledging his fears will lead to painful internal conflict, and acknowledging fears is difficult, but facing them is for the better of Conor.
In today’s society the word “terrorism” has gone global. We see this term on television, in magazines and even from other people speaking of it. In their essay “Controlling Irrational Fears After 9/11”, published in 2002, Clark R. Chapman and Alan W. Harris argue that the reaction of the American officials, people and the media after the attacks of 9/11 was completely irrational due to the simple fact of fear. Chapman and Harris jump right into dismembering the irrational argument, often experienced with relationships and our personal analysis. They express how this argument came about from the terrorist being able to succeed in “achieving one major goal, which was spreading fear” among the American people (Chapman & Harris, para.1). The supporters of the irrational reaction argument state that because “Americans unwittingly cooperated with the terrorist in achieving the major goal”, the result was a widespread of disrupted lives of the Americans and if this reaction had been more rational then there would have been “less disruption in the lives of our citizens” (Chapman & Harris, para. 1).
“When you say 'fear of the unknown', that is the definition of fear; fear is the unknown, fear is what you do not know, and it's genetically within us so that we feel safe. We feel scared of the woods because we're not familiar with it, and that keeps you safe.” – M. Night Shyamalan
Our nation seems as if it is in a constant battle between freedom and safety. Freedom and security are two integral parts that keep our nation running smoothly, yet they are often seen conflicting with one another. “Tragedies such as Pearl Harbor, 9/11 and the Boston Marathon bombings may invoke feelings of patriotism and a call for unity, but the nation also becomes divided, and vulnerable populations become targets,” (Wootton 1). “After each attack a different group or population would become targets. “The attack on Pearl Harbor notoriously lead to Japanese Americans being imprisoned in internment camps, the attacks on 9/11 sparked hate crimes against those who appeared to be Muslim or Middle Eastern,” (Wootton 1). Often times people wind up taking sides, whether it be for personal freedoms or for national security, and as a nation trying to recover from these disasters we should be leaning on each other for support. Due to these past events the government has launched a series of antiterrorist measures – from ethnic profiling to going through your personal e-mail (Begley 1). Although there are times when personal freedoms are sacrificed for the safety of others, under certain circumstances the government could be doing more harm than good.
Fear is a powerful tool. Throughout history, tyrants have used fear to pursue their ruthless ambitions as men fear death most of all. They threaten subjects with imprisonment, torture or being put to death. In order to eradicate any means of secondary thought, challenging their oppressive regimes violence is a tool and dictators are well equipped and not afraid to use it. History has shown this repeatedly. From Benito Mussolini to Adolf Hitler who killed and tortured countless thousands in World War 2, individuals were imprisoned without charge beaten at will cruelty became these dictators ruthless commodity.
These days, America is filled with those people who disagree with our system of government. Most times, these people suffer silently, expressing their opinions through their votes, or within the discussions that they hold in their own private homes. When these people act upon this anger, and their disagreement, the feelings are brought beyond the point of normal behavior to vigilantism and violence. This animosity, when pushed to these limits, often results in tragedy, a tragedy that we call domestic terrorism.
Fear influences people to make irrational decisions and take extreme measures. Often times, these actions are done to protect one’s reputation. Fear causes people to lie and manipulate to those they care about in order to escape what they are scared of most. Fear of failure has caused higher levels of anxiety, and has made society put blame on each other, rather than owning up to their mistakes. Fear can also cause one to forget one’s true identity and lose one’s values. There are two options that one can take when being faced with a fear: run away from the fear, or go through it and learn a valuable lesson in the end that will make you a stronger person. Fear is a harmful emotion that everyone has to go through in order to succeed.
In the words of Bertrand Russell, “Fear is the main source of superstition, and one of the main sources of cruelty. To conquer fear is the beginning of wisdom” (Russell). Fear causes many problems in our lives. Fear influences many of a person’s actions and decisions. However, people usually regret the decisions or actions they made out of fear. Also, these actions and decisions can cause problems for those people in their future. Fear is a harmful emotion, for it clouds people’s judgement, disables them from taking action, and causes them to make decisions that they will regret later.
President Roosevelt once observed, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” Nevertheless, people need fear, people love fear and people fear fear for multiple reasons. It fuels society and its decisions in ways that people do not realize. In fact, fear is one of the strongest and most influential emotions people experience. One’s perspective of fear might be vastly different from another, since it provides a unique experience for each human being. Nonetheless, fear, the emotion of darkness, is a weapon that cannot only be used against people by others, but be an obstacle one faces within one’s self.