In Part 2 of HOD, the reader gets a better insight of Marlow's experience. He meets new characters and encounters some conflicts and the reader receives a better view of the natives. Whether or not the natives are liked by Marlow is unknown. Are they evil or just like the white men? Various sentences from the book make the answer unclear.
I believe that everyone has their own idea of what evil is. Society makes us see things in a certain way. This creates fear. Evil arises from fear which arises from ignorance. Each society is ignorant of another society. Although I have never conquered a new land, I can relate to Marlow's situation. In the summer of 2011 I went on a family trip to Turkey. The cultural was new to me and I was definitely ignorant. The way women dressed surprised me and I felt very uncomfortable. I thought it was bazar that the women would completely be covered up in such a hot climate. When I asked my parents, they said that it was because of the men. In their view women were not important. They were lower in social status and they did not need to be respected.
I found this cultural idea insulting. I could not believe that the women allowed themselves to be treated like trash. I would think of the men as evil demons. Looking back on it now, I realize that I was just being ignorant. Our society finds theirs as evil because they lack women's rights. They find it to be something normal because they have never had it. I am sure that many of the women there think that the men from our society are evil. Many of us just don't realize that the other society is just different.
The women of our society have the fear of being mistreated. That is why we think that Turkish men are evil. We are threatened by them. In my opinion, evil doesn't exist. There is right and wrong. The things that we believe to be evil are just things that we fear. We fear the unknown. We fear things and people that are different then what we are accustomed to. The question that comes out of this is:
Do evil things really exist or is it just fear of different ideas?
Jessica, the connection you made is very relevant to the book, and I think it's very good. You went straight to the point, and were very concise and direct with the post. It wasn't very wordy as it was clear, and didn't mingle around what you were trying to say. I think it is a very organized post, and your ideas are very straight forward. :)
ReplyDelete