I believe fear and people being scared is among the most likely causes of conflict. In relation to the issue of radicalised Australian teenagers fighting in the Middle East for the Islamic State, I’m convinced that they are fighting because they are scared and fear their own religion being defeated and fear losing to other nations in war. If these teens didn’t have the fear they did, they wouldn’t have chosen the path of fighting for an extremist group of terrorists. While at the heart of conflict is fear, at the heart of fear is conflict. Fear is defined as being an emotion generated by a threat perceived by living entities which causes a change in brain and organ function and ultimately a change in behaviour, such as running away, hiding or freezing from traumatic events.
Nicolas Cage states, “I think what makes people fascinating is conflict, it's drama, it's the human condition. Nobody wants to watch perfection.” Anger, Death, Violence, Chaos, the past, speaking silently in the darkness. These nouns draw our attention by the main and forefront inclination of human nature, and how our bodies are programmed to maintain focus on such events. An inescapable collision course, since the dawn of time conflict, has arisen deep within our souls, along with the obscurity that ensues, being a fundamental factor in how we cannot process the cause or reason of why individuals let negativity, personal gain, hatred, and other emotional charges take control of their mouths and body. These uncontrollable acts can be viewed
March 11, 2013 Fear conquers “Oedipus the King” Everyone has had to face it at one point in his or her lives. Whether you sense it when you are over a hundred feet off the ground, or when a certain insect lands on your arm, everyone has had a familiarity with fear. Fear is like a double-edged sword, a little fear can be decent and upsurge blood flow and adrenaline, but too much fear can be constraining and cause terror. Fear can be understood in many methods. Webster’s dictionary portrays fear as, “a distressing emotion aroused by impending danger, evil, pain, etc., whether the threat is real or imagined; the feeling or condition of being afraid.” Fear may cease a person frozen in their pathway, or encounter them to exceed beyond the task and attack the situation.
In the Leviathan, Thomas Hobbes provides a blatantly pessimistic portrayal of humans in the state of nature. According to Hobbes, self-preservation is the driving force of all decision making. The state of nature is referred to as a war of every man against every man (p. 79). Hobbes goes on to say that this unending season of war is fueled by competition, diffidence, and the quest for personal glory (p. 77). Humans in the state of nature, motivated by fear of violent death and the desire to survive, are willing to give up their own private wills in order to obtain peace.
Hobbes named this condition as ‘war’ which also meant that every man is enemy to every man. Hobbes exposed that man in the state of nature lived with an authoritarian logic of fear and man has always been on the defensive side to protect himself and his position in the society. Hobbes said that man has always wanted to escape from the state of nature and war by following the path towards safety which allocates man to soften feelings of fear. A social contract is an agreement where people gave up their evil state and entered an organized society, which was controlled by the powerful government to preserve safety. Locke viewed human as innately good.
Thomas Hobbes’s belief in the state of nature was that it is a state of violence and war (Slideshare.Net). In this state of nature, no morality exists because of the human nature of self-interest (Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy). Also, in the state of nature, all men are completely equal to one another. This along with the human nature of self-interest is what Hobbes believed caused constant fear and danger in the state of nature (Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy). It is this danger and fear that causes a lack of true freedom in the state of nature.
Both authors illustrate the idea that because of oppression the victim develops a self-hatred that enforces a desire to change. Within The Bluest Eye, Morrison utilizes the Breedlove family as a prime example of people who desire to be anyone but themselves. Cholly, Pauline, Sammy and Pecola Breedlove have all experienced different devastating and painful moments in their life, but they all are unified by one idea: they are ugly. As the narrator explains, “you looked at them and wondered why they were so ugly; you looked closely and could not find the source. Then you realized that it came from conviction, their conviction.
Term Paper: The Denial of Death: Man's Necessary Delusion Part 1: Analysis Ernest Becker's The Denial of Death is a significant work due to the way in which it provides an existential framework to post-Freudian psychoanalytic findings, making the striking, yet morose claim that the underlying motivation of human life is the terror of our impending death, and consequently all of our human constructs, such as personality, heroism, and civilization, are subconscious defense mechanisms against this reality. Perhaps one of the most crucial claims in the book is that made on p. 53, in which Becker states: "…the basic anxiety of man is about being-in-the-world, as well as anxiety of being-in-the-world. That is. Both fear of death and fear of life, of experience and individuation. Man is reluctant to move out into the overwhelmingness of his world, the real dangers of it (Becker, p.
The film V for Vendetta directed by Jimmy McTeigue presents a negative view of society and humanity; he portrays society as being repressive, cruel and creates a feeling of discontent. This is done through setting, using techniques such as lighting, dialogue, propaganda and technology. As a result the audience feels trapped by the unpleasant world of V for Vendetta and thus this creates a negative view on society. McTeigue has subtly used lighting as a technique to create a feeling of oppressiveness and establish the power that the party exerts on the public. In the scene where we witness Sutler addressing the party leaders after V has destroyed the Old Bailey, we are confronted with just the lit up faces of the leaders and darkness in the background.
Since resources are scarce, humankind is naturally competitive, inevitably creating jealousy and hatred, which eventually leads to war. This constant state of war is what Hobbes believes to be man’s original state of nature. According to Hobbes, man cannot be trusted in the state of nature. Limits must be put on freedom and inalienable rights. Hobbs believed that if man had complete freedom it would result in chaos.