Comparing The Scapegoat In Friedrich Nietzsche's Short Stories

Friedrich Nietzsche’s quote, “Battle not with monsters, lest ye become a monster, and if you gaze into the abyss, the abyss gazes also into you,” describes the void and fear we humans often times feel. That sometimes the human mind cannot fully comprehend with explanation and reason what is happening before it. Thus, causing a transformation of man into an animal at the precipice of a great cliff. That any confidence and reason at the time is stripped away, until the only question that seems reasonable is, “why not jump?” We often times believe we are afraid of the dark, but in reality what we really are afraid of is what’s in it, and the uncertainty of the unknown.

The idea of the “scapegoat” is then formed in our minds that allows for society to actively seek out a reason and thing to channel its blame and fears on. This is done as a way to alleviate our own internal turmoils and angst. This motif is expressed in the two short stories, “The Ballad of the Sad Café,” by Carson McCullers, and “The

Displaced Person,” by Flannery O’Connor. In these two similar, but different stories, we experience this idea of the “small town intimacy of the mob” that is formed by fear within the two communities. These messages can be seen in two different ways: how Amelia is perceived to the town after Lymon is introduced and how Mr. Guizac is seen by the small community of Mrs. McIntyre’s farm.
Both of the main characters, Amelia and Mr. Guizac, in these two pieces are seen as the outsiders and scapegoats of their small communities. What I find most interesting about this story is the transformation of the scapegoat in relation to what is considered this theory of evil. In the beginning, you assume Cousin Lymon will be the obvious pariah of the story because of his description when he first appears in the town: “It was not until the figure was quite close, within the range of the yellow light from the porch, that they saw dearly what had come” (McCullers 3). This description of evil encroaching and this image of the color yellow, like discussed in class, is sometimes used to represent evil and something that is obviously different. His appearance from out of the darkness of the night concerns us as the readers, especially when the narrator acknowledges that “the man was a stranger, and it is rare that a stranger enters the town on foot at that hour” (McCullers 3). We immediately assume this man is there to do harm because he has arrived out of the darkness, which we associate most with fear and the unknown.
For Mr. Guizac, this idea of evil is not seen with the color yellow or darkness, but instead with the idea of religion when he is called the devil by Mrs. Shortley. She states that “she had never given much thought to the devil for she felt that religion was essentially for those people who didn’t have the brains to avoid evil without it. For people like herself, for people of gumption, it was a social occasion providing the opportunity to sing; but if she had ever given it much thought, she would have considered the devil the head of it and God the hanger-on. With the coming of these displaced people, she was obliged to give new thought to a good many things” (McCuller 203-204). This fear of this “unknown” entity assimilating into their society creates great unease with its residents, especially that of the workers on Mrs. McIntyre’s farm.
Mrs. Shortley represents the idea of society’s influence on the thoughts of people around them, and when presented with this idea of the devil, only then is she able to categorize Mr. Guizac and his familys’ arrival into the community as that of a negative occurrence. Although he is innocent, he is associated with being the source of disruption and demise to the social infrastructure of Mrs. McIntyre’s farm. Therefore, creating a causation of blame to be cast upon him, along with all other wrong doings that may happen during the duration of his presence.
His identity is seen as a threat to the structure and intimacy of the community. This community of Mrs. McIntyre’s, views Mr. Guizac as a threat to their infrastructure because, as discussed in class; he is from Poland, is Catholic but not reformed, speaks Polish, is a hard worker, does not smoke and is a gifted mechanic. The concerns about Mr. Guizac are first seen when “Mrs. Shortley recalled a newsreel she had seen once of a small room piled high with bodies of dead naked people all in a heap…” (O’Connor 196). Mrs. Shortley continues to refer to this account whenever she discusses Mr. Guizac with others within the community. She says “this was the kind of thing that was happening every day in Europe where they had not advanced as in this country, and watching from her vantage point, Mrs. Shortley had the sudden intuition that the Gobblehooks, like rats with typhoid fleas, could have carried all those murderous ways over the water with them directly to this place. If they had come from where that kind of thing was done to them, who was to say they were not the kind that would also do it to others?” (O’Connor 196). She allows her fears to perceive the Guizacs as these “carriers of violence,” and in turn she is the one who becomes a carrier of violence as a result of her fears that spawn her rumors and gossip.
For example, this can be seen with muslim communities and how they were perceived after the events that occurred on September 11th.

Muslims were cast as the scapegoats to why we needed to go to war and who to blame as a result of all the people who lost their lives. When in reality a group of people were the cause for this event, not the entire muslim culture. Again this culture of fear is created that rallies groups of people into this idea of a mob mentality. This mistrust and fear is also seen with Amelia’s identity, after she strangely welcomes Cousin Lymon into her life with open arms. The transformation of her personality concerns the people of the town: “Only a few times in her life had Miss Amelia invited anyone to eat with her, unless she were planning to trick them in some way, or make money out of them. So the men on the porch felt there was something wrong” (McCullers 5). This change of character made them question if she had killed the hunchback,

Lymon.
This happens as a result of this rumor that is spread by Merlie Ryan when this idea of the “fever” comes over him. He states that Miss Amelia must have murdered the hunchback for something he had with him in that suitcase he carried. “He said this in a calm voice, as a statement of fact. And within an hour the news had swept through the town. It was a fierce and sickly tale the town built up that day. In it were all the things which cause the heart to shiver— a hunchback, a midnight burial in the swamp, the dragging of Miss Amelia through the streets of the town on the way to prison, the squabbles over what would happen to her property— all told in hushed voices and repeated with some fresh and weird detail” (McCullers 6).
This power of the rumor and gossip can act in two ways: Either it creates this social cohesion and information transmission within a society, or it works to create a divide in the group between the gossipers and the one(s) who are being gossiped about. Furthermore, this can be seen as an adaptive learning tool within a society. Because of this gossip we are able to identify who we believe we can trust and who we cannot trust. These rumors cause red flags to go off in our thought system and we begin to question that person, even if we have known them for a good while. This power of group thinking takes over and makes us question who that person really is out of fear that they could in some way do us harm. O’Connor questions this cohesion and scapegoating with groups in her story, and prompts this idea that in the end everyone is displaced and we ultimately do not like that.
This is seen with Mrs. McIntyre and the rest of the workers on her farm: “She felt she was in some foreign country where the people bent over the body were natives, and she watched like a stranger while the dead man was carried away in the ambulance. That evening, Mr. Shortley left without notice to look for a new position and the Negro, Sulk, was taken with a sudden desire to see more of the world and set off for the southern part of the state. The old man Astor could not work without company. Mrs. McIntyre hardly noticed that she had no help left for she came down with a nervous affliction and had to go to the hospital” (O’Connor 235).
This fear which brought us together before as a community is now what is tearing us apart. Like expressed in Nietzsche’s quote, if we continue to battle amongst the monstrous thoughts of the masses we fail to see the light and understand that the threat we perceive to be associated with these outsiders and displaced people, is one merely created by our fear of our inner selves and of the unknown. We must continue to challenge not only ourselves but the thinkings of a mob and societal mentality. Fighting to reframe from being engulfed by the dark abyss of society’s thinking and rumors, or our fear will eventually become our reality and undoing.