The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas Essay

In "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas" author Ursula K. Le Guin uses the utopian society of Omelas to symbolically highlight the ugly and unsavory state of the human condition. The stories unidentified narrator paints a colorful picture of Omelas and ironically describes its residents as happy, joyous and not at all barbaric. Although Le Guin describes Omelas as a delightful even whimsical place that affords its citizens “…happiness, the beauty of their city, the tenderness of their friendships, the health of the of their children, the wisdom of their scholars, the skill of their makers, even the abundance of their harvest and the kindly weather of their skies”; we come to discover just the opposite (5). At its core we find a

In "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas," Ursula K. LeGuin makes use of colorful descriptions and hypothetical situations to draw us into a surrealistic world that illustrates how unsympathetic society can be. LeGuin's ambiguity of how the story will go is purposeful; she cunningly makes her case that each of us handles the undesirable aspects of the world we live in differently, and that ultimately, happiness is relative.

Le Guin cannot or will not elaborate on any of the details about Omelas ' happiness but, she has no issue describing its horrors in detail from the mops "with stiff, clotted, foul-smelling heads" (Le Guin 866) to the "eh-haa, eh-haa" (Le Guin 866) noise that the captive child hidden beneath the city makes at night. She does not allow any wiggle room for the reader, who was responsible for creating Omelas, to imagine anything that might mitigate or rationalize the child 's misery. The author points out that one thing that the people of Omelas do not have is guilt, but behind this seemingly flawless city’s outward appearance, the community knowingly and willingly inflicts horrible suffering on an innocent child out of their own selfishness to ensure that they can live free of any pain or misery. Perhaps the people of Omelas are without a conscience.

From a close look at the current situation in the world - globalization is drawing more and more countries, and on the other hand, more and more are getting further from each other in terms of life level. In the story "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas" Ursula LeGuin reminds her readers that walking away from a problem is not a solution of it. Omelas’ well-being in some supernatural way is associated with the life of one child, who is caring a lonely existence in a dark basement. However, citizens of this city did not dare to change lives or try to come to the child with a gentle word. Otherwise, the happiness for the whole city would be over. At the same time, all the people of the city knew this child. The author raises many humanitarian questions that will influence the civilization’s future survival: will people do something about a problem or keep walking away and enjoy their happiness for someone’s suffering?

In the short story “The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas” by Ursula K. Le Guin the theme is that in order to be truly happy, one must stand up for what’s right, even if it means leaving everything that they know. Society creates traditions and ways of thinking that are not easy for everyone to follow. In Omelas, the citizens have the choice to ignore the suffering of a child locked in a cellar, or leave the life and the city they are familiar with. The people of Omelas must ask themselves whether it is better for a child to suffer for the city’s happiness and wealth, or should the city suffer, just to give the child a shot at happiness? It is ironic because Omelas is a

Utopia is any state, condition, or place of ideal perfection. In Ursula LeGuin's short story "The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas" the city of Omelas is described as a utopia. "The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas" presents a challenge of conscience for anyone who chooses to live in Omelas.

The citizens come to the consensus that nothing can be done for the child, and nothing should be done. To help this one miserable child would lead to the suffering of an entire city, after all. This is what the narrator persuades us to think. She uses many methods to prove her point. For instance, she tells us that if the child were to be saved, “in that day and hour all the prosperity and beauty and delight of Omelas would wither and be destroyed.” (1552). She defends the people of Omelas, who are not heartless, cruel, mindless “simple utopians,” but instead as passionate, intelligent, gentle people capable of sympathy. However, they understand that “the beauty of their city, the tenderness of their friendships, the health of their children, the wisdom of their scholars…the kindly weathers of their skies, depend wholly on this child’s abominable misery.” (1552). Not only this, but she asserts that the child is too “imbecile” to recognize love anymore; it has grown too used to the darkness of the cellar to ever revert back to normal civilized life. At every turn, she finds a way to argue against compassion and in favor of causing pain; she portrays the assessment the Omelasians make of the child to be so logical and responsible that even the reader starts to buy into it. Why help the child? There is no point, is there? Continuing this abusive treatment of it is for the good of the order, isn’t it? The narrator makes it extremely easy to

There is no way the city of Omelas could imprison all children or citizens in the city of Omelas, so if it cannot be made into a universal law then there is no justification of the action being done. Additionally, the second maxim relates to treating no one as a means to an end. Treating no one as a means to an end means behaving a certain way towards an individual just to get something out of them. With the child’s suffrage in the compact cellar room, they are respecting it as a means to the overall happiness in the city of Omelas. By behaving towards the child this specific way, they are treating him or her in a certain way just to get satisfaction and happiness and the end result shows it is a terrible action. Another problem deontologists view is that the people of Omelas know about the suffrage of the child, so there is nothing hidden from the citizens. Several of the townspeople even go see the child, but yet no one has done anything about it. All of the people that do nothing or the people that leave the city of Omelas are no help to the suffrage of the child due their action of entirely leaving or ignoring the situation has no good will. With all of these mistreatments given to the child living in horrible conditions, there is no way that anyone in the city of Omelas should be enjoying happiness.

As the people of Omelas continued to accept the truth of their city, some have begun to see the child as more of an it than a person and regarded the child similar to a wild animal. “One of them may come in and kick the child to make it stand up. The others never come close, but peer in at it with frightened, disgusted eyes” (245). Not only do the residents accept the child’s misery, they have also

Due to the desire for a lasting idealistic society, no one entity will ruin the lives of all in order to satisfy one’s wellbeing. Therefore the child goes on being treated as a low-rate animal, lower than livestock. This cowardly behavior is highly despicable, based on the manner perfection is attained. People of Omelas should be able to throw away the false utopia and ultimately save one blameless soul. Innocent children do not deserve illogical suffering in order to preserve a distorted society. The moral responsibility to society is to allow each person to control his/her own life and retain the guaranteed freedom. This child is forced to be the sacrifice for the society without any prior consent. It is cruel fate that the child is forced to suffer for Omelas. The people who leave relieve themselves of the responsibility, while abandoning the child. Their action of leaving brings no changes to Omelas, thus it remains

In “The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas” by Ursula Le Guin, the informally-speaking narrator depicts a cookie-cutter utopia with perpetually happy citizens that sing and dance in the music-filled streets during the Festival of Summer. However, under one of the beautiful public buildings lays a child, no older than ten years-old, who lays in its own excrement. Although the citizens know the emancipated child is there, they refuse to act upon the child’s suffering, for their happiness depends entirely on the child’s abominable misery. Through ethos, the narrator illustrates this utopian society with a casual tone and frequently asks the audience for their input. Le Guin’s fairy-tale introduction of the story establishes her credibility through her extensive knowledge and understanding of the people of Omelas. Le Guin utilizes logos through the narrator’s second person point of view which incites the audience to draw their own conclusions about the city of Omelas and question their own justifications of the child’s existence. The concept of the happiness of many relying on the necessary suffering of one forces the reader to question their own morals and their justifications for the child’s physical and mental condition. Through ethos, logos, and pathos, Le Guin presents the contrast and divide between the citizens of Omelas and the child in the cellar in order to challenge the reader’s capacity for moral self-conception.

There lies a basement under one of the buildings and in there prevails a locked room with no windows. There’s dirt in the cellular and many rusty old necessities in the room. The narrator continues to describe that the room is three paces long and two wide and unlocks a discovery of a lonely child sitting in the room. Some people walk past and look at the kid, but don’t say a word. The narrator then says, “The child used to scream for help at night, and cry a good deal, but now it only makes a kind of whining, “eh-haa, eh-haa,” and it speaks less and less often.” (Le Guin). It’s important to realize that this city might not be so perfect after all and these people are living in a fake society. This child plays an essential role in exhibiting misery to make activity probable in the city. Those who encounter the child and feel empathy for him/her have experienced other emotions. They also feel the other emotions of guilt, anger, disgust, sickened, and shocked at the sight of the child. They want to do something, but they can’t. Provided this, they soon realize their happy lives have been phony and they leave Omelas to start a new fresh, real, and happy

Men and women walk the streets, and weep at the fact of the child in the cellar. The child in the cellar is the existence of why the Omelas treat their children gentle but yet full of compassion and joyful love for happiness. The tearless rage, treatment, freedom, and acceptance of the Omelas to the child have long ever to be free and fearful.

The people of Omelas are materialistically happy but are morally unhappy. The narrator implies that happiness is knowing the differences between what are needs, desires, and detriments to a person. Every person alive has basic needs which are deemed necessary, such as sustenance and shelter. All honest humans will admit that they have wants and desires that are not necessary, and many push the limits to attain them. And always there are those who are willing to allow the suffering of others to achieve their own desires. The adults of Omelas are not using just discrimination, and because of their immorality, are not happy.

"The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas" demonstrates how happiness can’t exist without moral sacrifice through its use of symbol. The child being kept alone in a locked room underneath the most beautiful building of the city is a symbol of how someone’s happiness in Omelas depends entirely on that child’s misery: "they all understand that their happiness, the beauty of their city, the tenderness of their friendships…depends wholly on this child’s abominable misery" (246). This passage makes it clear that happiness can only occur if Omelas’ citizens act like they constantly forget the child’s existence and let it "live" in its constant suffering. It’s evident that this symbol illustrates the delicate relation between happiness and moral sacrifice.