Many Facets of Human Nature

Throughout the year, I have studied many books where a certain side of human nature has been showcased.  There has been self-reliance (The Power of One, The Fountainhead, Things Fall Apart), superiority complex( The Yellow Wallpaper,A Room of One's Own, The Awakening,A Thousand Splendid Suns[male characters]), greed(Dr.Faustus, The Picture of Dorian Gray), guilt(Oedipus the King), and revenge(Hamlet).  Self-reliance is normally a good.  It helps people work out their problems by themselves, but another term for self-reliance is autonomy which can cause a problem when it comes time to asks for very much needed help. In The Fountainhead and Things Fall Apart both main characters were very self-reliant, but neither were very well liked due to this independence from others, which complicated their lives.  How ever, in The Power of One, Peekay's self-reliance was a benefit for him because it allowed him to get ahead in life, but he wasn't so independent that he did not know when to ask for help.  It has only been in the past fifty years that women have had rights and were finally believe to be equal to men.  This inability to see that there is no difference between men and women is in actuality a superiority complex held by men that they are better then others.  In The Yellow Wallpaper,A Room of One's Own, The Awakening, and A Thousand Splendid Suns all of the females characters were treated differently from males and males treated them as inferior to them.  Some were well meaning and did not see that the way they were treating women was wrong, but they still believed themselves to be superior.  Dr. Faustus and Dorian Gray were both greedy men.  Dr. Faustus was so greedy for knowlege  that he was willing to sell his soul for this knowlege.  Dorian was so greedy to retain his beauty, that he was willing to lose his humanity.  Greed plays a large part in the business world.  Greedy Businessmen make choices that help them but cause pain and hardship for others.  Bernie Madoff was so greedy for mony that he created the largest Ponzy scheme in the world.  This affected thousands of people and ultimatly cost him his son.  Guilt drives people to do crazy things.  Oedipus felt so guilty when the prophesy came true.  He felt that the only way to alieviate this guilt was to gouge out his eyeballs and then exile himself.  Revenge..what to say about revenge.  Its probably one of the nastiest facet of human nature because revenge does not make a person feel better and it will more than likly harm many other people besides the target of revenge.  Hamlet allowed his need for revenge to not only cost him of his life but of nearly every major character in the play.  He essentially weakened Denmark and make it ripe for being conquered.  His need allowed for the suffering of his entire country.  Human nature is extremly complex beacause humans are complex.  It is nearly impossible to see every aspect of a human but you can catch glimpses of a facet such as the ones I listed above.

The Definition of Monster

What is the definition of a monster?  I  contemplate this seemingly simple question because the answer isn't quite so easy to find.  The definition changes over the years until what was considered a monster decades before, really isn't up to today's standards.  Now we have movies like "Shrek" and of course "Beauty & the Beast" that twist that definition further.  Even without characters such as Shrek and Beast, sometimes people find that the "monster" is a great character and can't help but like them.  Take Frankenstine's monster, in his original form he was nothing but a mindless beast driven by insinct to do whatever he desired. Now, in Koontz's hands Frankenstine's monster recieves a name and a true purpose, to save humanity.  Isn't he still that monster?  But now he's a "good" monster, he doesn't have to be bad. Another "likeable" monster, in my opinion, is Dr. Faustus.  He sold his soul in order to recieve knowlege, and this act deemed him the monster.  To trade one's soul was an irredemable act to his people and they condemn him.  Yet I happen to like Faustus because my definiton of a monster, while sketchy at best, sees this act as okay because he didn't hurt anyone to get this knowlege.  The only person he ended up hurting was himself.  Also I have read stories where a man sold his soul for power and wealth and ended up hurting people around them due to being corupted by greed.  What Faustus did wasn't really all that bad, at least according to me.  I believe that the defintion of a monster should somewhere include that they 'must hurt others'.   So I slighty touched upon "likeable" monsters, but what about the not so likable ones.  Well the next category of monsters are the ones I really don't think deserve the title.  Mersault was a man.  He did not believe in God.  Therefore to his people he was a monster.  He lived by a philosophy that no-one around him could understand, so therefore he was persecuted and condemned him to death.  Yes he did kill a man but he wasn't in his right mind.  Instead of the guillotine, he should have imprisoned for some years.  But he was considered a "monster" by his people, so he was tried for his differences instead of the actual crime.  So to contribute to the defintion, a monster 'must break actual laws' not insult people sense of normalcy. The last category would be the "true monsters".  This is where the definition of monsters really begins.  Dorian Gray exhibits many bad qualities which helps fill in the definition.  He was so absorbed in himself that he did terribe thing to others. He caused the death of his first girlfriend, and directly killed his former friend Basil.  And for what? Beauty?  Admiration from others?  Useless compared to the atrocities he committed in the persual of these things. The best definition for monster is a ruiner of life, someone who hurts others, something that sees what they are doing is right no matter what, and lacks compassion towards everthing and everyone. 

Double Jeopardy with Double Standards

The greatest teaching tool teachers at Oxford have found is the use of games, such as jeopardy and other games which pit students against each other. A little healthy competition never hurt anyone after all. (Except that one time in Spanish where the class almost rioted due to the teacher unfairly dividing the class with Andrew Raffa, Julie Mason, and Laci Facer all on the same team.  Lesson well learned.) But in Mythology the other day, Mr Long divided the class up Boys vs. Girls.  It was intense, people writing down answers seconds after the question was asked.  As the girls got into the lead, Mr. Long commented how well the boys were doing, they were only down 600 points.  Much better than most of his classes.  after the boys caught up, I felt this great inadequacy rise into my heart.  Why was the lead so small?  Why weren't we doing any better?  But then my sarcastic little voice in my head caught up to me.  What did I suspect?  The guys weren't stupid, they deserved a little recognition for their hard work in studying.  Yet I was still disappointed when the girls won only by 100 points.  This brought out the voice in my head again.  What was I so upset about?  I should have been glad that we won.  This began the thought about how far women have gone since recorded history.  Girls are now expected to be smarter then boys, yet we are still considered the "weaker" sex. This double standard has caused mass confusion in both men and women.  We have new standards, but have yet to relinquish the old. Even now, in this day in age men do there best to protect women in anyway they can.  This maddening act drives women to great lengths in order to prove their independence, that they have minds of their own and can choose to do something for themselves.  How many times has a telemarketer called and was turned away by the answer "I have to check with my husband"? Yes, telemarketers are annoying but they are also persistent.  That answer should not suffice a ravenous telemarketer. In The Yellow Wallpaper , the narrator shows us the affects of an intelligent mind wasting away due to an overprotective husband.  She slowly drifted into insanity due to not being able to do anything.  She was forced to sit in a room for the entire day with nothing to do other than wallow in her slowly decaying mind.  I believe that if the narrator was not able to write when she did, she would descended into madness earlier.  It didn't matter to her husband that her imagination was killing her sanity, as long as he "protected" her from the dangers in the world, she would be safe.  I see no reason that an intelligent girl can't "protect" herself.  I am a 4'11",110 pound girl and I always volunteer to do the heavy labor whether carrying heavy boxes or 12' beams.  The guys are always astounded when I easily match the number of things they are carrying and it always makes me laugh due to the faces they make.  They only know me as a quite smart girl so when they see that yes I have built houses, decks, helped put in plumbing, and have inspired fear in the eyes of a 6' 6" man, it amazes them to no end.  Yet I know that by next week they will have forgotten all about this and still insist that they carry the heavy things, that they handle the power tools. It's okay because I know that I will get to see them react again, and get to beat them in academics due to the standards.  I feel guilty when I fall into that mindset, because the times are changing and if the "academic" standard continues, the men will end up with near nothing except the ability to be bodyguards.

Suicide is Not an Option

Suicide is becoming more and more popular in the news.  People are unable to deal with a problem so they believe that the only way to solve it is to remove themselves from the problem, and from among the living.  Some examples of people unable to deal with their problems are Tyler Clementi and Mark Madoff.  Tyler committed suicide after his college roommate released a video on the Internet showing him having a "relationship" with another man.  Unable to cope with the fact that he was outed so horribly, and unwilling to face his parents, he killed himself by jumping off a bridge.  Mark, son of ponzi schemer Bernie Madoff, had to deal with not only being B. Madoff's son, but quite a few lawsuits that would ruined him.  He hung himself with a dog leash in his home with his young son sleeping next door.  Both men chose to end their life instead of facing their problems.  Tyler's parents were crushed to learn he committed suicide, but when they found out that he was afraid of their reaction to finding out he was gay, they were heartbroken.  Madoff, unfortunately, was surrounded by the hatred of his father, and some of the victims believe that he should have killed himself sooner.  This "solution" is a common theme among books.  Shakespeare's 'Romeo and Juliet' end in a double suicide because neither believed that they could live without the other, and if Romeo just tried to deal with his grief he would have discovered that Juliet was still alive.  In "The Awakening" Edna Pontellier was a spoilt, rich woman who tried to have everything she wanted.  She had a devoted husband and two children, but that wasn't enough for her.  She wanted a new life with another man, and when she was denied that life she decided that she would not go back to her husband.  She went for a swim in the ocean and never came out.  Another book with this outcome for the main character is Okwonko from "Things Fall Apart".  Okwonko was a violent man who demanded to be seen with respect, or else.  Nothing was more important to him then his honor and standing within the village.  When his village was introduced to the ways of the white-man, he felt threatened because he was nothing in the eyes of the white-man.  If the white-man's culture took over his own, he would be left with nothing.  Okwonko tried to lead a rebellion against the white-man, but it immediately failed and caused shame to be associated with his name.  Instead of trying to cope, or change villages, or anything else, Okwonko kills an official and hangs himself immediately afterwards.  These characters and people all decide that their problems are too great and there is only one option left to them.  If everyone decided that when life got tough, they should kill themself, then there would be more funeral homes than McDonald's.  Nothing is solved when someone commits suicide because; family is left with their debts, family must deal with grief, insurance will not payout so all the payments were for nothing, and the funeral costs hurt their family even more.  So the immediate problem is 'solved', but then more problems are created for the people who are left behind.