At the village of Yele, a pivotal shift in this memoir begins when Ishmael goes from being an observer and victim of savage, war-triggered violence to being both of these things as well as a perpetrator of such violence. On page 107, Ishmael indicates that they "had no choice." Do you agree? Did Ishmael and his companions have any choice at all? Or were they condemned to become brutal killers?
Further, how powerful do you think the value of choice is in your life?
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Ishmael and his friends were just the kids at that time.These kids had seen too much blood and tears,they had also sufferred those pains.At that time,there were just 2 choices:stay there and fight -they would be full and they had weapons,atleast they had something to fight for their safe-or wandered and kept escaping from the war.Nobody,especially a child,wants to hold a gun and shoot people.Sometimes we choose between what we like,what we want and what we don't.But sometimes we must choose between what we hate to do and what we less hate to do.Ishmael and his companions were in the second situation.
ReplyDeleteEach choice that we've made always affect our lives, somehow.A wrong decison could cause the huge damages,a right decision could not only bring your achievement but also help other people.I'm making choices all the time and obviuosly they can't be all right.Wrong choices were sometimes really costly,i lost my friends,hurt people whom i love and hurt my self.But we can't say our decisions are right or wrong till the end.
Yeah I personally agree with Ngan because in most cases, there is always a choice, but when in times of extreme circumstances and in times where you are pulled into the middle of something horrific and unexpected, you make blunt decisions. At the time, I believe it was either fight along side the RUF or die. Running away from the RUF was too much. For instance, imagine yourself without your parents. Sure, it might be possible to survive on the pantry for a few days, though eventually, you will become emotionally and physically broken that you will be screwed. The three kids were all great friends and shared many of these horrific experiences which brought them even closer, though a strong bond will not hold them together for the rest of the civil war and coup'. What I am saying is eventually there "draft" into the RUF was inevitable.
ReplyDeleteChoice in my life plays a big role. For better or for worse, it will always be a value that at times, I may take for granted but at others, could ultimately lead to a drastic movement in my life. Sometimes I choose not to study or other times I choose to say something stupid. I don't believe in a determined and set future; I believe in making your own destiny along the way (with guidance of course).
--Victor Ng
I disagree with Ngan. Ishmael and his friends have no choice at all because they are just kids who stay without parents at that time. Maybe they feel very nervous and scary. It is hard time to escape the war without food and impossible to them. Also if they have choice, they can't go anywhere else because Ishmael and his friends have no idea where they would go or even how to get a safe place.
ReplyDeleteI sort of agree with Victor and Ngan. There isn't much of a choice in staying with the army or leaving at that point. From a literal point of view, they had a choice because they could have gone back to what they had been doing before which was scavenging through the forest and sometimes ending up in villages. But personally I agree that there wasn't much of an actual choice. The Lieutenant, an adult who the kids relied on to survive, told them they had two choices: join the fighting in the army cause or leave the village and end up like the dead father and son he showed everyone. It was a mentally forced choice.
ReplyDeleteChoice is a very powerful thing. I don't really like making some choices and sometimes I find it hard whether to do one thing or the other. I end up thinking about many choices I make. Some choices I make sub-consciously, which I am trying to stop making those kind of choices.
It seems as if they had no choice, except maybe they did. Are values such as not taking the life of another worth your own life? Is it not said that one is supposed to stick by their values no matter what? and that death can never destroy strong morals? These are debatable, but in order to survive he had to be in the RUF.
ReplyDeleteI think that it is more important to regret nothing in your life, than to make better choices. Because regret can never be satisfied, no matter what, something that has happened in your past will always be there, and it is more important to live your life with no regrets, than to focus the importance, and stress yourself with the choices at hand. If one keeps a goal set in the future and looks at the big picture of things, choices do not seem to be very individually important, because if you truly make something a prime goal in your life, you will have to make decisions to reach that goal inevitably (if it truly is important). Therefore living life more happily and having no regrets, leads one to making better choices.
-Andreas
I agree with Vitor saying that they had no choice
ReplyDelete. First of all their mental state was not normal. Also they were forced by unavoidale force. Surviving. Lastly they were children.
Choice is very (i do not know how to put it..) usefull but dagerous thing. There is always consequence of their choice. The consequence can make a huge difference in individual's life or the entire earth. Therefore i think that it is very powerful thing
I think that everyone has a choice just not always. There was not one for the character of the Long way Gone. I must agree with Dean on this. Those boys were just clueless. They did not know how the world worked; they werent ready to face it on their own. They had went through some awfull stuff: always in dangere, starvetion, and most important of all they did not have their parents. Their only hope was to stay at the place where they would be fead and have some care after them. Choice is a powerfull thing!
ReplyDeleteChoices are defined by our actions. Everyday we make little decisions that affect our lives forever. Ever since Ishmael and his friends set out in the first pages of the book, they have been making decisions that will change their lives.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Victor in that we always have a choice, and to answer Andreas' question: We have to do what is best for us in the end. You can place nothing above your own life. But there is a way to look at it that many people fail to realize. The world is at our fingertips, and if you are strong enough, you will rise up above any circumstances. Because what might not be a choice now, maybe could have been a choice if you had taken another path in the past. A previous decision affected your current choice in a substantial way. We can make the excuse that Ishmael and his companions are weak, but in the end it is the strong who survive or rule, and the weak who serve or die. The sooner Ishmael realizes this, the better.
i believe as though when it comes to life and death situations, people would naturally react to life. so although Ismael was forced to brutally kill others, i believe he was doing this only because if he hadn't dont it, it would have lessened his chances for survival. so survival instincts forced the boys to join in with the barbaric behavior simply because if they were to chose not to do it it was have caused them death.
ReplyDeleteI agree alittle with everyone...
ReplyDeleteLike Dean said, they literally did have a choice but it seems like, in their situation, they didn't because it was so unexpected and so shocking that they immedietly became scared and reacted. I think they thought that if they went back to traveling through the forest that eventually, there wouldn't be anymore villages to tail on to. Also, I think that they were mainly scared that if they didn't join then there would be consequences.
Again, there is always a choice. No matter how harsh the conditions get, you have to be able to stand up for yourself. If standing up for yourself means death, so be it. I know I would rather die for what I believe in, than have to kill innocent people for food. Aparently, conditions got so bad for them, that he thought he had no choice but to join.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Patrick's statement on how everyone has a choice, but until one of us is actually in that situation, not one of us knows how we would react in a situation like that.
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ReplyDeleteIshamel and the other soldiers were given lots of drugs by the lieutenants, this definitely affected their mindset. The children were told that these people killed their families and that they need to avenge them. The lieutenants took advantage of their tragic losses to use them to fight their war in Sierra Leone.
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