Was Lord Of The Flies Selfish Essay

Humans are naturally selfish creatures. Selfish is defined as not having consideration for others, the environment or other living things. The boys in William Golding’s Lord of the Flies were selfish for a number of reasons. At first the boys were civilized, but the first show of selfishness is when the boys bully Piggy. Order slowly disappears from a once organized group to a group that is killing each other and it is very clear that self gain is a priority. They torture pigs and burn down the forest, they steal and fight, they kill other boys. The island reflects the outside world as order crumbles and man’s inherent evil shines through. This is because humans are naturally selfish creatures, we may not admit it, or we may try to not be but

is our evolutionary instinct to do so.

The boys on the island bully Piggy because they were inconsiderate of his feelings, it is fun for them but they do not consider that he is being hurt from what they were doing.

This is seen as early as the second chapter when Piggy suggested that the boys learn the others’ names. He states that he does not care what they call him, just that it not be what the bullies used to call him back home in school. Ralph takes interest in this, asking him what his nickname was. Piggy says:
“They used to call me Piggy.” Ralph shrieked with laughter. He jumped up. “Piggy! Piggy!” “Ralph—please!” Piggy clasped his hands in apprehension. “I said I didn’t want—” “Piggy! Piggy!” Ralph danced out into the hot air of the beach and then returned as a fighter-plane, with wings swept back, and machine-gunned Piggy. “Sche-aa-ow!” He dived in the sand at Piggy’s feet and lay there laughing. “Piggy!” Piggy grinned reluctantly, pleased despite himself at even this much recognition. “So long as you don’t tell the others—”

(12-13)
Ralph directly ignored Piggy’s intentions of keeping his unwanted nickname a secret, and instead mocked up, shouting it and dancing around, zooming in like a jet. Ralph does not realize the emotional effect this has on Piggy, and how it makes him feel. He probably thought that he could start anew, and that he would not have such a nickname anymore. Piggy is likely bullied because he is an outsider and is physically different from the others - overweight, cannot swim, has asthma and wears glasses. No one takes anything he says seriously and his opinions were quickly shushed. There are countless examples of this when Piggy asks for the conch to add his input and the others tell him to shut up, that “The conch doesn’t count on top of the mountain.” (58), which Jack made up on the spur of the moment, and was certainly not a real rule, “You shut up, you fat slug!”(129) which silences Piggy and makes fun of him for being fat. This type of bullying that started out as teasing, insults and the names Fatty and Piggy, led to physical harm when Jack “stuck his fist into Piggy’s stomach.”(100) and eventually death when “The rock struck Piggy” ... “Piggy fell forty feet and landed on his back across the square red rock in the sea.”(260) The latter one being the most important to understand, that the boys cared so little about Piggy that they murdered him. Another example of bullying on the island was that the littluns were bullied by the older kids, a prime example is when “Roger led the way straight through the castles, kicking them over, burying the flowers, scattering the chosen stones. Maurice followed, laughing, and added to the destruction.” (84) There was no real reason for the boys to collapse the sandcastles, they did simply for fun, and it illustrates the bigger boys bullying the littluns and ruining their fun. They have power over them, because they were older, stronger, more intelligent and the littluns could not do much to stop them.

Furthermore on the topic of selflessness, the boys have no concern for the environment.

The trees, plants and the pigs that inhabited the island were not considered by the boys. They accidentally let their very first attempt at a signal fire out of control and burnt down a quarter of a mile squared of forest. This was mostly accidental, but it was apparent that they had gotten carried away and should have been more responsible. From their carelessness, the first life on the island was lost and the boy with the mulberry coloured birthmark perished. “That little ’un–” gasped Piggy– “him with the mark on his face, I don’t see him. Where is he now?”(64) They were so caught up in what they were doing on the mountain that Piggy is the only one responsible enough to realize that the little boy is missing. The other boys were silent for a short while but continued what they were doing. Piggy asked again, but no one knew. In the very end, Jack “had smoked him [Ralph] out and set the island on fire.”(269) This is of course, ironic, as in the beginning Ralph thought the signal fire was the only way to get them rescued, but in fact it was a purposely set forest fire made for the purpose of killing Ralph that saved them. He tried the entire book to keep the boys maintaining the controlled signal fire but in the end that was not even what saved them. Another prime example aside from fire that shows the boys lack of care for the environment is the torture of pigs. They use the dead bodies

as entertainment and dance around the fire singing chants, which by itself is not harmful, but this escalated into “Right up her ass!”(195) when they were pretending to brutally murder a pig. And because the boys were so caught in their ritualistic killing in chapter nine, they accidentally mistook Simon as the beast and savagely stabbed and ripped his body apart.

Additionally, Jack is very greedy for power and selfishly uses the boys to his advantage. He beats them when they were powerless, not even telling them why they were being attacked. He does it for the feeling of power - for fun. At castle rock, he beat a boy named Wilfred by making the other boys tie him up and did not explain why he did wrong, which was nothing. “‘He’s going to beat Wilfred.’ ‘What for?’ Robert shook his head doubtfully. ‘I don’t know. He didn’t say. He got angry and made us tie Wilfred up.’” (229) Wilfred is a minor character, and is only mentioned here. He serves to demonstrate the malicious nature of Jack, there was no reason for him doing this, and he did it specifically to assert his dominance over the littluns. Jack became an expert on manipulating the boys and using their fear of the beast to his advantage. This enhances his own power. He tells the boys that the beast can take on any form and was disguising as Simon. This makes them still scared of the beast, and they think that it is still alive, and there is still a threat. Jack is a dictator, who rules with absolute power. He beats and assaults his own citizens for no reason, he is evil and selfish. The second example of Jack’s malicious nature is the nighttime attack on Ralph’s tribe. Ralph would have shared the fire but Jack beat him and his tribe up while they were in their huts. They took Piggy’s glasses so they could make fire on their own. “Ralph hit out; then he and what seemed like a dozen others were rolling over and over, hitting, biting, scratching... He began to pound the mouth below him... A knee jerked up between his legs and he fell sideways, busying himself with his pain, and the fight rolled over him... ‘That was Jack and his hunters,’ said Ralph bitterly.’Why can’t they leave us alone?’” The boys were fed up with Jack’s violence, they did not understand why he was attacking them and they wished he and his tribe would leave them alone.

As order crumbles on the island and in real life, man’s inherent evil shines through and the true instinct of humans - selfishness - is revealed through various acts of cruelty such as bullying, lack of empathy or concern for other living things and manipulation of the littluns. Piggy was bullied and teased throughout the entire novel, humiliated, his opinions were shot down and not even given a chance. He was punched and had his glasses broken. To the other boys, Piggy is not important and they do not consider his feelings. Jack uses the innocent and following of his tribe to his advantage. He manipulates the boys in his favour and manufacturers fear within them and beats them. The boys have no concern for the environment, just as most of the human population does not. Humans show up to unfamiliar places and think we own the place, that we can do whatever we want to it. The boys burn part of the forest down in the beginning and burn most, if not all of the jungle down in the end and brutally murder pigs, treating it like a game, trying to shove spears “Right up her ass!” (195) In conclusion, humans are naturally selfish creatures whose primary goals are for the benefit of themselves.