Desensitization In Oryx And Crake

When a man is a product of his environment and the environment is filled with violence and hatred, the possibilities are horrifying. Richard kuklinski is a prime example of just that. His childhood was something no human, let alone a child should go through. His anger built up and his life eventually was overcome by it. He then progressed to a cold-blooded killer, starting small, and then ending with the mob until his capture.

There is a level of degree that the most violent types of crimes are more severe toward women. Solnit combines rape and violence, “We have an abundance of rape and violence against women in this country and on this earth though it’s almost never treated as a civil rights or even human rights issues.”

People might become accustomed by the violence going on around them in order to keep themselves sane and not paranoid, but that does not necessarily mean that they see it as being correct. Back to the Goetz incident, the citizens in New York might have seen Goetz as a hero. Some citizens of New York City would say that Goetz had “fulfilled the secret fantasy of every New Yorker who had ever been mugged or intimidated or assaulted…” (Gladwell 150). However, there is a massive difference between committing a crime and wanting to commit a crime. On certain occasions, people want to do something they cannot. These citizens might have wanted to do what Goetz did, but deep in their conscience these New Yorkers knew it was wrong. Although these New Yorkers were living in New York during a time where it’s violence epidemic reached an all time high their conscience did not get changed or altered because of the violence. Loffreda talks about a student, she talked to in which after “seeing students cry in one of his classes as they discussed Matt’s death, he had what he called, a real breakthrough: he felt a little sick, he told [Loffreda], that he had thought things about gays that the two killers had probably been thinking about Shepard” (Loffreda 248). Although this student, whose name was not used, might have not agreed or like LGBT people, deep down in his conscience he viewed that his

When someone is a part of or witnesses any one thing enough times, that person will become desensitized to it, whether it is gradually accepting abortion, homosexuality or anything else for that matter. People can even become accustomed to violent murder if it is ingrained into their lives enough. Take the Einsatzgruppen (Nazi Officers that were partly responsible for the death of millions) The Lithuanians showed them how to murder women and children, and they became accustomed to it (Cesarani 165). Shirley Jackson most certainly takes this "desensitization" into account when she writes "The Lottery." The characters in Shirley Jackson's "The Lottery" are so accustomed to their tradition of

them, killing them and even raping them. I can not believe how they could think

This case is an example of the feminist theory and of female oppression. Robert could have believed that since he was a male he was the more dominant sex and this could have led him to express his superiority towards women through the murders. This is an example of radical feminism. Radical feminism looks at the exploitation of women and their role in the patriarchy. Marxists feminism theory focuses on the unfair divide between men and women and how each are expected to have certain roles in society. Women are most likely expected to be stay at home moms where men are expected to have a higher income and have more serious jobs. Robert only attacked women that were sex workers or drug addicts. There must be a reason for this pattern and it could be that he was attacking women that were in a lower class then he was. It was just another way of making himself feel more powerful then the women. Roberts’s anger towards women could be because of his relationship with his mother when he was a child. She wasn’t always the most affectionate and supportive mother and the anger he felt towards his mother could be the reason he feels anger and aggression towards women. If he kept the feelings he had towards his mother locked up inside him that could be what brought him to the point of murdering all of these women. The feminism theory can shed some light on why Robert Pickton decided to murder these

However, there are many characteristics that remain uncontrolled in the Crakers, and these people eventually begin to create art and place both Oryx and Crake in God-like positions in their society: two things against which Crake had warned. Crake’s understanding of biology and psychology leads the Crakers to initially have none of humanity’s flaws. This shows Crake’s grand understanding of biology, but not any knowledge of how these people will soon acquire notions of art, gods, or symbolism. He has done few trials, and consequently has little evidence to prove that the Children of Crake will be successful.

Rory Miller once said, “The only defense against evil, violent people is good people who are more skilled at violence”. What he means by this is that everyone has a sense of violence in them, but some people choose not to express it, but under circumstances it’s a man eat man world. The prisoners in the book, Night by Elie Wiesel, were nice regular people before they were put in camps and at the beginning, but as time passed by they were being deprived of food and every human need, they started to change. They became more aggressive and violent. In certain situation people change, they will start worrying about themselves and only themselves.

"Systematic desensitization" is a method of conditioning the human mind to be less fearful. This means that the more someone is exposed to something, the less likely they are to be affected by what once scared them. Systematic desensitization has negative effects when one becomes so numb to his or her surroundings that the person stops thinking about what is truly frightening. When a person is no longer compassionate and has un-human reactions to violence, he or she is desensitized beyond repair. Most people were deadened to brutality in Elie Wiesel’s book Night. This novel demonstrates that prejudice dehumanizes both the perpetrators and victims.

McCarthy’s novel, Blood Meridian, is an interesting story about a boy who grows up in the chaos of the world, but unlike most authors, McCarthy, creates a more complete image of humanity. McCarthy includes violence and barbarism as a natural part of who we are as humans. The protagonist, the kid, grew up with a father who was a drunken teacher who did not care for him or teach him how to read or write. The kid was not taken care of, wasn’t shown love, and wasn’t given love; therefore he did not know how to care or what being taken care of was. In the very first pages of the novel, McCarthy constructs a violent image of the kid by stating, “… in him broods already a taste for violence” (McCarthy 3). McCarthy uses this quote as a starting point

Fear can be an influence on someone's descent into a bad situation. In the play The Crucible the Puritan town of Salem is under suspicion of witchcraft. When a group of girls is discovered dancing in the forest, their leader (Abigail) tries to cover it up by accusing people in the town of witchcraft. All the accusations of witchcraft result in many different events, including the arrival of Judge Danforth and Reverend Hale. If anyone were to be under suspicion they would be tried for a confession that they dealt with witchcraft, and if they didn’t confess they would be hanged. The characters in the play are conflicted with different types of fear that change their personality and causes them to act differently. Fear influences people to take extreme measures and act irrationally.

In the novel, Kindred, Butler shows that race is not the only factor in the power hierarchy between white men and black women in the story. Gender plays just as a significant role in power than race. We, the readers, see how white women like Margaret Weylin are seen as inferior to their husbands, who have a public presence in society and can do as they please. In addition, society expects them to be nothing more than wives and mothers. On the other hand, black women are constantly victimized and treated inhumanly even till the present but in more subtle forms. This is shown with the treatment of 20th century women like Dana who still seemed to be undermined by white men like Kevin, who is shown to reinforce patriarchal values through his treatment of her. Moreover, it is repeatedly shown in the novel that 19th century black women were even more oppressed than their white counterparts as they are deprived of their basic roles as mothers and wives and even indiscriminately raped. Due to their gender and race, black women had their human rights rescinded and were subject to even worse condition than black men. In the novel, when Dana gets back to the present after being away from Rufus for fifteen days, she recounts her horrific experience to Kevin. She states, “You mean you could forgive me for having been raped?” (245). Dana is in a state of disbelief when Kevin insinuates that he could forgive an intimate act with Rufus if she has been raped by him in the past. This comment

These examples of senseless violence only serve to widen the perceived gap between the “classes” of people.

The “Green River Killer” was mentally abused by his manipulative mother and that is represented in his killings of prostitutes and young women. The women seem to be a sort of surrogate for his mother in his mind. He would force his victims to do whatever he wanted to serve his needs and basically make him feel better about himself. He was in control and had all the power

Starting off with one person that was specifically alienated from society and gravely hurt due to her action was Sofia, Harpo's wife. From the start Sofia is a big strong lipped girl raised in a rough environment (Much like many of the women that come out of this story) who primarily doesn’t take smack from anyone, refuses to be hit without the opportunity to hit back, and most of all isn’t afraid of men as Celie and Nettie are. In this particular time period women were socially accepted if they were quiet, did chores, listened to their husbands, and overall accept that men are superior to them. Sofia frankly ignored all of these things and although Harpo tried many times to “tame” her oftentimes than not he was unsuccessful and was left with bruises to indicate his failure. Ultimately Sofia’s actions didn’t only affect her, they also affected Celie one of the four noteworthy women in “The Color Purple.” Celie had the perfect mix of jealousy and admiration when it came to Sofia, she wanted to be the same as Sofia when it came to men and putting them