Did Omelian People Choose To Stay Or Walk Away

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Would I walk away from the city of Omelas and leave the almost completely perfect, idealistic city (with an overabundance of pure delight and joy)? It would be an impossible question to answer one-sidedly. We could assume that anybody would need to leave after being exposed to the unpleasant truth of the child living in a dull, dark basement. Nobody would have the mental capacity to witness the dying, young child and be totally okay with it, and even in the short story, the Omelian people were appalled by seeing the child. They chose to completely erase the negligence from their minds to keep their society at peace. We read the story and shake our heads in dismay at the general population of Omelas. How would they be able to be so narrow-minded? …show more content…

But there is no absolute guarantee. The people that choose to stay are ethical, but the people who choose to leave are risking their happiness as well as what becomes of them in the future. This is reflected in religion in the real world as well. Those who choose to walk away from their religion, are risking their own eternal happiness and risking all they have. This short story is a reflection of real life and the choices that one has to make themselves. I believe that walking away could help one find their own identity and how one perceives life and its imperfections, such as the kid in the basement. Therefore, although guilt may be felt either way, I believe staying in the Omelas would make it more difficult to live a happy life and I would have to eventually walk away from utopia anyways because that is not a perfect society. It is merely a society filled with beautiful but flawed concepts that cannot evolve because of the people occupying the society and their mindsets. I would want to walk away and inspire change in a society rather than living with the guilt that nothing could ever change in the

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