Do you carry a knife around in fear that you may find yourself in a situation where you’ll be forced to use it? Do you walk around hiding your emotions because society tells you doing otherwise is not acceptable? In The Outsiders, a novel written by S. E. Hinton, these are only a fragment of the struggles the characters face. In The Outsiders there are two main gangs, the Greasers and the Socs. Both gangs participate in illegal activities. The Socs jump Greasers ‘wreck houses, and throw beer blasts for kicks.’ The Greasers ‘steal things and drive old souped-up cars and hold up gas stations and have a gang fight once in awhile.’ (4) The main difference between the two groups is the Socs are the higher class and have more money than the Greasers. …show more content…
On the other hand, the Greasers are not as privileged and do not have as much money as the Socs. This class rivalry between the Socs and the Greasers causes many conflicts to arise in The Outsiders, all of them being instigated by the Greasers. The Greasers are the ones to blame for getting themselves jumped.
One of the most significant scenes in The Outsiders happens at a movie theater. When Ponyboy, the main character and a Greaser gang decides to go to a movie theater they run into some Socs girls. Dally, a dangerous Greaser who is described by Ponyboy as ‘tougher than the rest of us--- tougher, colder, meaner’ (10) starts to harass the two Socs, Cherry and Marcia. ‘Nobody else was there except two girls who were sitting down front… He started talking, loud enough for the two girls to hear. He started out bad and got worse. Dallas could talk awful dirty if he wanted to and I guess he wanted to then.’ (18-19) This moment displays how the Greasers started conflicts with the Socs. Later, Johnny and Ponyboy strike up a conversation with the two Socs girls in which Cherry asks Ponyboy, "What's a nice, smart kid like you running around with trash like that for?"(21). This quote gives a clear clue about what Cherry and Marcia thought about the Greasers. To add, by the way the Cherry talked about Greasers like they were horrible It would be safe to assume her boyfriend is a Soc. Later on in the conversation Ponyboy and Johnny were having with the Soc girls, they learn ‘they'd come with their boyfriends’(25). At this moment Ponyboy and Johnny should have stepped away from the Socs since the Socs were their rival gang. After the movie ends Bob, Cherry’s boyfriend, and his friends spot the girls with Ponyboy, Johnny, and …show more content…
Two-Bit. Two-bit is another member of Ponyboys gang. A fight almost breaks out between the two gangs luckily, Cherry prevents it by agreeing to leave the Greasers and go with Bob. In chapter four when Ponyboy and Johnny are walking around a park at night,Bob and his friends pull up in their car and confront them about what happened at the movie theater. Bob says, ‘"Here's the little greasers that picked up our girls”’ (48). This quote directly states the reason why the Socs boys attacked Ponyboy and Johnny. In the scene at the park, a fight breaks out between the two groups. Johnny ends up stabbing Bob, killing him. This reveals how if the Greasers had left Cherry and Marcia alone, they wouldn’t have been attacked and Bob wouldn’t have died. This shows that the Greasers are at fault since they started conflicts with the Socs. Many events happen in The Outsiders after Johnny murders Bob.
To sum it all up after Bob is killed, Johnny and Ponyboy decide they ‘“gotta get outa here. Get somewhere. Run away.”’ (50) They take shelter in an abandoned church. Unfortunately, after living in the church for almost a week the church catches on fire from a cigarette Ponyboy and Johnny dropped. While they were gone some kids had been playing in the church, feeling guilty Johnny and Ponyboy run in to pull them out from the burning flames. While on his way out of the burning church, timber falls on top of Johnny resulting in him becoming fatally injured. Dally isn’t able to comprehend Johnny’s death so ‘he's, just robbed a grocery store and the cops are after him.’ (130) By doing this he gets the police’s attention. When Dally is surrounded by the police he pulls out a gun ‘and even as the policemen's guns spit fire into the night I knew that was what Dally wanted. He was jerked half around by the impact of the bullets, then slowly crumpled with a look of grim triumph on his face.’ (page number). This quote reveals how another thoughtless decision made by a Greaser ended in a negative way. This time it was quite clear that it was
intentional. If someone wanted to create an opposing argument to these claims, one could state a number of things. Some readers might say the Socs started the conflicts that occurred because they were drunk. While this is true, if Bob and his Socs friends hadn’t brought drinks along Johnny and Ponyboy wouldn’t have met Cherry and Marcia. It was the decisions made by Greasers along the way during the novel that caused all the problems. No one forced Johnny to murder Bob, Johnny signed his own death warrant by running into the burning church as did Dally as soon as he pulled a gun on the police. None of decisions listed above were made by the Socs. A few other readers may say It was immature for the Socs boys to beat up Johnny and Ponyboy for hanging out with their girls. They could have just let it go. But, that’s not how gangs work. In the environment the Socs and the Greasers grow up in they are taught that the opposite side is always at fault. Both sides pick at each other trying to find the tiniest action they think will permit them to do something about. In conclusion, the Greasers are at fault for all the complications that occurred in The Outsiders. They started the conversation with the Soc girls, they murdered someone, they caused a church to burn down, and one of them even purposely got himself killed by running towards the police with a gun. (You should add something here that relates this to the real world.)
Johnny murders Bob to stop him from killing Pony. Dallas Winston - A member of the Greasers, Dally has spent time in prison. He helps Johnny and Pony by telling them to go to Jay Mountain to hide out and by giving them money. Two-Bit Mathews - The Greasers' oldest member.
In The Outsiders there are two rival gangs, one from the lower class, who are the Greasers and their rivals are from the upper class, they are the Socials. The story takes place in the mid 1960’s in Tulsa, Oklahoma. The story is set in a large town in the United States, The east side of the town is where the Greasers live and the west side is where the Socs live. The story is told in first person narration from Ponyboy Curtis’s point of view. The protagonist is Ponyboy Curtis and the other major characters are,
The Outsiders is a book about Greasers And Socs. The Greasers are the poor east side kids they would wear their hair long and greasy and they will dress in blue jeans, T-shirts, or wear they shirttails out and wear a leather jacket and tennis shoes or boots. The Socs are the rich west side kids that worn nice clothes, drove nice cars, and had all the pretty lady’s. They both was gangs in Oklahoma. The Socs they would jump Greasers, wreck houses, and throw beer blasts for kicks.
He is smart, and gets good grades in school. This is purposefully mentioned several times within the story, and people tend to be surprised to learn that he is a Greaser. In addition, some Greasers are nicer than people tend to think. When the church burned down, Ponyboy and Johnny run in to save the children without a second thought. They acted with selflessness, putting the safety of the children above their own. In the ambulance on the way to the hospital, Ponyboy is asked if he and Johnny are "professional heroes". He responds by telling the entire story of how they're Greasers and Johnny is wanted for murder, shocking the man in the ambulance. It is difficult for him to believe that a group of Greasers would do something so heroic. Johnny dies as a direct result of their actions, but neither Ponyboy nor Johnny regretted what they
The book “the Outsiders” (S.E. Hinton) is based on the story of two gangs the Greasers and the Socs. These two groups of individuals have conflicts. the Greasers are the East side working class people. The Socs are the West side rich kids. they drive around in a blue mustang, they “jump” the greasers and injure them purely because they are lesser than the Socs. The Greasers are a interesting bunch of individuals. the story is based from their perspective. They aren’t rich but they get by, they steal they fight they smoke but they aren’t bad guys.
Once, a wise soul has spoken, “Sometimes adversity is what you need to face in order to become successful”. Adversity means having troubles and difficulties. It’s what you need to persevere through in order to do something you’ve wanted to do for a long time. If you want to pass that test, you’ve gotta conquer your fears and fight through all the troubles that arrive in front of you. Become your own hero. Adversity is a situation that took place in the novel “The Outsiders”, by S.E. Hinton.
In the book The Outsiders, There is an obvious split of two groups in this town. They are the Socs and Greasers. They have differences and similarities like, how they view themselves, how they handle conflict, and what they have. This helps to learn about their lifestyle.
In the outsiders we learn that the Greasers and the Socs aren't so different because they feel the same way about teenage issues. Both Greasers and Socs want the other one gone. They both wants what’s best for their gang.They both feel the same about issues. In the beginning of the story the Socs and the Greasers seemed like totally different people, and I thought the Socs were just rich snobs and the Greasers were just hoodlums. In the Middle of the Story Randy confronts Soda and tells him that he doesn’t want to fight and that he’s sick of all the fighting. At the end of the story the Greasers and the Socs kind of make peace because they both lost friends just because of all they’re fighting and they realized that all of this fighting is
Throughout life individuals face many challenges testing their values and personality one situation at a time. In the evocative novel The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton themes of growing up and innocence are shown. Ponyboy is not your average 14 year old he is part of a gang known to many as the Greasers. He encounters many situations testing his values and beliefs. Having lost both his parents recently he and his brothers stick together like a true family but this relationship is tested when Darry hits Ponyboy. He also experiences the loss several close friends in a very short period of time. Throughout this novel, Ponyboy encounters many life changing experiences that prove he is a dynamic character.
The Outsiders is about the life of a 14-year-old boy. The book tells the story of Ponyboy “Curtis” and his struggles with right and wrong in a society in which he believes that he is an outsider. Ponyboy and his two brothers, Darrel (Darry), who is 20, and Sodapop, who is 16, have recently lost their parents in an automobile accident. Pony and Soda are allowed to stay under Darry's guardianship as long as they all behave themselves. The boys are greasers, a class term that refers to the young men on the East Side, the poor side of town. The greasers' rivals are the Socs, short for Socials, who are the "West-side rich kids."
The Outsiders written by S.E. Hinton is a book about two different groups that don’t get along, the Socs and the Greasers. The two unions may act like they are tough and have no emotion on the outside, but on the inside, they are full with feelings and are very caring people. After Johnny was hurt, Ponyboy says to himself “A pain was growing in my throat and I wanted to cry, but greasers don’t cry in front of strangers”(Hinton 102). The 2 social classes may put on a front in public, but deep inside they care about others and have
He needs them to have his back when the Socs show up and try to pick a fight. As part of a community, the greasers all fight for eachother. For example, on the night that the Socs tried to drown Ponyboy, he was saved by Johnny who stabbed Bob, the assailant. Without Johnny there for him, Ponyboy could have easily died with no one stopping Bob. Dallas Winston, known as Dally, and part of the Greasers, demonstrate that the greasers protect each other. When Johnny kills the soc, Dally helps them out by telling them where to stay, what to do to not get caught, and by giving them a gun and money to help them survive. Another example of how Greasers protect each other is when Ponyboy confides that he is feeling unwell to Two-Bit, another greaser member. Two-bit continually checks up on Ponyboy and strongly suggests he doesn’t fight in the rumble. Although Ponyboy ends up showing to the rumble anyways, Two-bit’s concern shows that he cares for the members in his gang and wants to protect
In the book The Outsiders there are many events that are provoked by the Greasers. The one event that caused every important thing that happened in the book is when Dally, Johnny, and Ponyboy go to the movie theater. In the second chapter of The Outsiders Dally, Johnny, and Ponyboy go to the movies and see a couple Soc girls. Dally starts hitting on them and ‘talking dirty’ to them, so they get really upset and ask Dally to go away. Johnny tells Dally to stop so he stops and leaves, Johnny and Ponyboy start talking to the girls. They learn that the Girls names are Cherry and Marcia and that they are Socs, they also have boyfriends. At this point Two-bit meets them there and starts
Although Johnny may have been extremely sorry about it he still killed Bob. The only reason why the Socs attacked them is because they tried to steal their girlfriends, they were mad about it so they wanted to fight. That doesn’t give you the right to kill one of them. If Johnny and Ponyboy never went and tried to steal their girlfriends Bob, Johnny, and Dally would probably be still
These types of conflicts have really changed the plot and help progress the plot because it is the main purpose of the story. In the Outsiders the whole book is about Ponyboy and how they fit into society. This falls into the category of person vs society. She has also included many of these conflicts because it adds depth and more feeling to the character and their roles in the story. This makes it incredibly interesting and enjoyable to read and follow along.