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War In The Rain Essay

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From the crossing of the Potomac River to the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, war has been an effective tool that different societies in the global community have used to push their political/cultural agenda on another. Whether justified for reasons such as self-defense or even unjustified for reasons such as social gain, war has time and time again proved its disregard of the average global citizen compared to the rest the global community as a whole. How so? Consider the utilitarian approach utilized at the end of World War 2: the lives of the rest of the world, in terms of the number of bodies outweighed that of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, so the decision to bomb the two cities was considered sound (despite the overlooked fact that it would negatively affect the health of that region for many …show more content…

Ultimately, O'Brien and other bodies of war literature can provide an effective critique of war as they often communicate to their audiences themes such as the nativity of blind patriotism, the loss of innocence, and reality of war's grotesque nature. O'Brien's "On the Rainy River" and Felix Pollak's "Speaking: The Hero" both examine and critique the way countries instill their citizens with such a blind loyalty that any slight opposition to war is considered unpatriotic or cowardly. For example, Pollak does this through the use of paradox, repeatedly employing the use of couplets to highlight the discrepancy between those in power and the average soldier being drafted. As the poem starts in lines 1-4, the unnamed soldier does not want anything to do with the war, confessing to his audience that "I did not want to go" or "I did not want to die" in lines 1 and 3. However,

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