Inequality And Social Injustice

The article "Of the Cannibals" from Michel Eyquem de Montaigne speaks about two major problems. The first one is the problem of men telling stories subjectively instead of objectively. This problem is dealt with only in very short and there is no real solution presented in the essay. The other problem is men calling others barbarous just because they are different. The essay also deals with the word "barbarism" and what can be meant by that.

Cannibalism, before the witch craze, was associated with heresy (Roper, 2004, p. 72). As this era's events unfolded, so too did this era's fantasies. Cannibalism, like witchcraft, was used as a horrible venue for abstract cultural fears. Roper, writing on the Thirty Years War, states that "...rumours of cannibalism...expressed the terrifying disorientation and collapse of German society," (2004, p. 72).

Lu Xun’s short story, “Diary of a Madman,” illustrates the possible dangers of traditions and cultural norms. Lu Xun uses a rather savage, extreme example for a tradition which people blindly follow in the story: cannibalism. The story is presented through a series of diary entries. After being enlightened by the moonlight which he has not seen for thirty years, the narrator who is also the diary writer, is drastically affected when his perspective on life changes. He lives his life with the paranoia that everyone around him is determined to eat him. Convinced that everyone is practicing the evil act of cannibalism, the narrator attempts to persuade them to change their ways for the greater good. The story is filled with irony as Lu Xun demonstrates just how strong tradition can be in its influence, longevity, and deception, even when the tradition is immoral.

Social inequality stems from many facets of life and mindsets reproduced continuously in America. The main backbone of systematic inequality is formed off of race, gender and class, which all contain crucial aspects that further oppress those subjected to inequality in various aspects of life. The resources-schools, occupations, invested parents- around one fuels the opportunity in their lives, a concept highlighted by Malcom Gladwell, in his book, Outliers. Situations one are brought up in or uncontrollable genetic aspects can very easily restrain their opportunities. Racial discrimination, gender roles and inferiority and the lack of fluidity in the low and working class push inequality, which simultaneously influencing the rich and privileged.

Social inequality can practically be made apparent at any moment of someone’s life – whether at work or school amongst peers or simply watching the news in the morning. According to Dalton Conley, social inequality is narrowly defined as “a condition in which a difference in wealth, power, prestige, or status based on nonnatural conventions exist” (2017 p.241). Moreover, social inequality is a process whereby society can determine how a class of people is expected to coexist within predetermined social, political, and economic boundaries. The affected class will live within the predefined constraints, and the affected class will then pass the predefined constraints on to future generations. It is imperative to understand that social inequality is a result of social stratification, which according to

The townspeople, however, refuse to believe him and think he has gone mad. Moché appears in every book; his role is usually that of messenger in the tale he tells. Madness is an essential element in all Wiesel’s works. On the one hand, it is indicative of the malady that struck the world during the Holocaust years. Wiesel, however, treats his madmen sympathetically. Their madness is not clinical but mystical. They are visionaries, saints, or messengers, endowed with the task of saving the world. As such, they become one with humankind, God, and creation. Wiesel’s point is that madness can be a force of evil or good. Hitler and his Nazis were mad. Their madness was employed to destroy the world. Most of Wiesel’s madmen want to bring about the Messiah; they want to redeem the

“The possibility of madness is therefore implicit in the very phenomenon of passion.” Present throughout centuries, insanity is constantly being redefined. Consequently, the lines have been blurred as to where the true madness lies in society, as explored in Gogol’s Diary of a Madman, de Broca’s The King of the Hearts, and Miller’s Death of a Salesman. These texts illustrate just how flexible the concept of madness can be and inspects the infrastructure of which the human mind depends on. In Diary of a Madman, Gogol depicts the protagonist’s descent into his own delusions–characterized by the breakdown of communication between the him and the world. On the other hand, de Broca’s The King of Hearts portrays a reversal of roles that leads the audience to question who the insane truly are. Miller’s Death of a Salesman follows as the aftermath of such delirium by portraying a man blinded by his fantasies who brings suffering to himself and his family. Within these texts, the protagonists all face a sort of alienation from society that varies in

He soon believes that his town is full of cannibals. The main character’s realization that everyone is cannibalistic leads him to question the society he is in. The reader, by understanding the idea of cannibalism, can see the greed and

In “The Hunger Artist”, the artist was a man who knew he had a value of life and talent, but some of the locals felt differently. Some viewed the hunger artist as a joke, or even fraud, doubting his ability to go without food for a lengthy forty

Though the concept of social injustice is universal in nature, the experience varies with each person. Factors like a person’ race, or gender can further influence the severity of the injustice; victims caught in the overlap between discriminations often go unrecognized by the law and society. Many people recognize the names Michael Brown, Eric Garner, and Tamir Rice as African Americans who were murdered by local police. But names like Michelle Cusseaux, Tanish Anderson, and Meagan Hockaday often receive less feedback even though they are also murdered African Americans. The only distinction between the sets of names is gender. Even within racial injustice, discrimination is present between genders as some cases get national

The aim of this essay is to address the problem of inequality and oppression through three separate texts, The Second Sex, The Death of the Profane and Killing Rage. The Second Sex focuses on the woman and her role compared to man. The Death of the Profane and Killing Rage are both texts that describe experiences about the constant racism felt by blacks. To thoroughly examine these texts and how they are related to oppression and inequality it is important to first define what each mean. Oppression and inequality each have different definitions but they go hand in hand. Oppression is the state of being subject to prolonged unjust treatment. While inequality is defined as lacking equality, equality is the state of being equal especially in status,

And so every time a man eats human flesh a malignant spirit possesses the cannibal, and the Wendigo is born.

The three cannibals complain that the European society shouldn’t be run by a child, but rather an older gentleman to command. They continue to criticize the society by saying that there is variety in wealth, and that it is not a proper place where only half can dine and live in wealth while the other half is hungry.

The Film “Delicatessen” is where comedy, psycho-horror, cannibalism and romance all intertwine within one another. Set in a fictional small-town post-apocalyptic France, although this film never addresses whatever political conflict or natural catastrophe might have led to this apocalypse in the first place as one critic points out (Tobias). A population is devastated by the effects of famine and must resort to rationing and, cannibalism. Circus clown Mr. Louison, who has fled from another town where people killed and ate his chimpanzee partner Livingstone, comes across a Delicatessen at the foot of a building where many boarders reside. The butcher Mr.Clapet offers him a room in return for handiwork, but his true motives are uncovered at night whenever a boarder is enticed to the dark, isolated confines of the stairwell. Apparently food has become so scarce that food has actually become a currency. Basically people pay for things with bags of corn or split peas…or human flesh. The butcher’s daughter Julie Clapet discovers feelings for Louison, and madness ensues as the two plot to escape. This paper will focus on the film as being a comedic parody of the typical apocalyptic genre. While also examining the climate change, cannibalism, collapse of political authority, and the decadence of French culture that are shown throughout the film.

In particular, the author allegorically refers to a story in which Yi Ya boiled his own son as a sacrifice to Jie Zhou (Laws 42). Lu asserts that the culture of controlling the society from free expression of ideas was incarnated in the Chinese mythology in which he uses the novel to reveal that cannibalism started from when Pan Gu separated the sky from the earth down to YI Ya’s sacrifice, to XU Xilin and down to the man who was killed in Wolf Cub Village, where the locals ate the liver and heart of the individual in order to attain an esoteric heightened level of awareness and courage (Laws 42). Though the events used to interpret cannibalism remain specific to just the person killed at Wolf Cub Village, none could confirm the story except one young man. The madman, in this context, exaggerates cannibalism out of proportion. However, the protagonist points out that the government executions in the local village are a source of cannibalism in the story and the society. Execution of human life is a criminal offense unless someone is guilty beyond reproach, yet, in China, the government at Lu’s time used excessive power to control society through intimidating actions. The narrator is afraid of becoming the next target of cannibalism because of being labeled as a madman. The first section of the book terminates when the narrator insists that the cannibalism state in China