The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas By Ursula Le Guin

Utopia: what is it really? The conclusion that most scholars have come to is that is the ideal world, a perfect society. The debate comes in whether it is achievable or not. Many famous authors; Ray Bradbury, Shirley Jackson, Kurt Vonnegut, and Ursula Le Guin to name a few, have tackled the topic in short stories they've written, and the conclusion they've come to is simple: that utopia is impossible. These short stories all share something in common: in them, at least one person in the utopian society is suffering for others to prosper. This is why utopia can not be achieved by human society until there has to be no one suffering for others to be happy.

In "The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas" by Ursula Le Guin we’re are introduced to what

seems like a true utopia at first sight, but as it was shown later on how the community worked, the society became far from a good vision for a utopia. Everyone is rich, intelligent, good looking, and happy. As the story goes deeper, it becomes clear that someone is suffering for happiness in this society, and that the society knows that someone is suffering and needs that person to suffer for their society to work. Halfway through the story the narrator describes a suffering child, left there by the community in terrible conditions. The child suffering isn't even kept a secret in Omelas, it is known by the entire population. Le Guin states "They all understand that their happiness, the beauty of their city, the tenderness of their friendships, the health of their children, the wisdom of their scholars, the skill of their makers, even the abundance of their harvest and the kindly weathers of their skies, depend wholly on this child's abominable misery" (5)
This evidence shows that for people to be happy in the society of Omelas, apparently the miserable child has to be kept that way.

But in doing so, the whole concept of a utopia falls apart. Later on it is found out that even though most people live with the knowledge that their society is built upon the suffering of one child, some cannot. The text states "At times one of the adolescent girls or boys who go to see the child does not go home to weep or rage, does not, in fact, go home at all. Sometimes also a man or woman much older falls silent for a day or two, and then leaves home. These people go out into the street, and walk down the street alone. They keep walking, and walk straight out of the city of Omelas, through the beautiful gates. They keep walking across the farmlands of Omelas. Each one goes alone, youth or girl, man or woman." So it is not only the child unhappy in Omelas, but other members deemed fit to the society cannot take the guilt of having a child suffer for their happiness, so they leave the society. As a rule, happiness of the people and Utopias go hand in hand. If people suffer for a world to succeed, it is not an ideal world. Some may argue that a "food chain" or a "pecking order" is necessary in any society; it cannot be necessary in a utopian society since not everyone in the society is satisfied and happy. In this case the one suffering child brings the happiness to most citizens of Omelas, but most is not enough for a true

utopia.
In conclusion, there cannot be a utopian society until there a system in place in which no one has to suffer for others to be happy. This is shown in many utopian short stories, the best example being “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas”, an innocent child is kept suffering for the society in Omelas to be happy, which contradicts the whole purpose of utopia which is a perfect world in where everyone is happy. Even though the suffering child in Omelas is an obvious version of this, everywhere in our current society people are being exploited and suffering for the benefit and happiness of others and until we learn to lose our toxic belief that a “food chain” is necessary for any society to work out, we will never come close to having a perfect or even good society.