Lord of the Flies Fear Manipulation Essay Sample

Fear has been irrevocably imprinted in everything from birth to death, and it is essential for mankind's preservation. From the dawn of time, fear has been used as a protective mechanism; however, it has also been utilized for the purpose of causing death and destruction. In William Golding’s, Lord of the Flies the boys are massively influenced by their fear of the unknown beast that they believe lurks around them, as it manipulates their decision and poisons their way of thinking which ultimately leads to the destruction of civilization on the island. Mankind's inherent evil is the first representation of how the beast-like and primitive underlying nature of humans led to the collapse of humanity on the island. Manipulation of fear by those in control was an essential part of establishing complete tyranny and putting an end to the group's civility. The murder of the innocent Simon and Piggy marks the final marking of how fear of the beast led to the end of civilization on the island. These factors contribute to the fact that fear is a very strong motivator, but it is up to humans to use that for the benefit of others and themselves. It is either the fear that controls the person, or the person that controls the fear.

Right from the beginning, the fear of the beast fuels the creation of chaos on the island. During the first few days on the island, one of the boys mentions a snake-like creature that he saw on the island. "A snake-thing." Ever so big? He saw it "'(48). This moment was the root of all the problems, as it was the first time the boys felt genuine terror, and it was this fear that later became the reason for the deterioration of civilization on the island. As the novel progresses, a certain shift regarding the beast's true nature takes place. As the novel progresses, a certain shift regarding the beast's true nature takes place. The beast was first recognized as a snake-like creature, then as a figure lurking in the depths of the deep water, then as a ghost, and last as a dead parachutist who landed on the island, which the boys mistook for the beast. The boys created numerous iterations of the beast, oblivious to the reality that they were not scared of a creature that was utterly different from themselves, but rather of each other. The fictitious beast that terrorizes the youngsters represents the underlying instinct of ferocity that dwells in all humans. The moral decline of the boys is evident as the more time they spend on the island, the more the beast inside them develops. The youngsters get a taste of the dangers of mob mentality through horrifying sights of violence and torture as a result of their dread of the beast. Early on, After a successful hunt, they elevated their shared act of violence into a triumphant chant.‘“Kill the pig. Cut her throat. Spill her blood”’ (96). The boys turn the traumatic experience of killing an animal into a bonding rite by coming together as a mob. As a group, the boys are able to commit increasingly heinous acts, duping one another into believing in the beast's potential menace, which they believe justifies their brutality, demonstrating their loss of innocence and ushering in insanity. As a result, the boys' fear of the beast marks the start of their full loss of sympathy and empathy for another sentient being.

Manipulation of fear is another crucial aspect that led to the destruction of civilization on the island. In the novel, Jack recognizes the power to be wielded in stoking the younger boys' imaginations about the beast's possible menace, which is why the reported sightings of the beast and spreading conviction among the boys regarding the monster's legitimacy provided Jack with an opportunity to bring absolute chaos to the island. The beast was moulded as a kind of hostile "other" whose existence constituted an immediate threat to the group's survival.  The youngsters' terror and vulnerability towards the beast drove the boys to savagery, causing them to neglect their civic duties and feel no shame for their deeds. ‘“– we hunt! If there’s a beast, we’ll hunt it down! We’ll close in and beat and beat and beat - !”’ (130). Jack is convincing the boys that there absolutely is a beast, as a result, the dread of the beast and the validity of the beast grow within the group. As the story progresses, it becomes clear that the youngsters had been successfully brainwashed into believing that there was a beast on the island. An instance that depicts this descent into madness due to the fear of the beast is when Jack places the pig's head on a stick. ‘“This head is for the beast. It's a gift”’ (197). The pig's head on the stick symbolized that fear and evil had triumphed in the end. The beast was regarded as a godlike figure, a kind of totem Jack used to rule and manipulate the members of the tribe. He attributes to the beast both immortality and the power to change the form, making it an enemy to be feared and an idol to be worshiped. Therefore the manipulation of the beast and the fears of the boys symbolize the deterioration of civilization and the boys’ descent into savages.

The terror of the beast and its destructive tendencies serve as a vehicle in the novel's most horrific scene: Simon's murder. When Simon, unfortunately, stumbles into the area where the boys are dancing around, it appears as if they have gone completely mad. That is when the boys lynch and attack him brutally out of fear. The boys saw a dark figure sneaking out of the woods and stumbling around. They immediately assumed that it was the beast due to their being indoctrinated into believing that the beast was absolute. The blinding rage and fear of the beast devoured the boys to the point where, without thinking, they beat Simon up, leading him to fall, die, and have his body washed away by the sea off the island. The fierceness of the attack against Simon is highlighted, wherein zoomorphism is used to institute fear of the unknown, culminating in an unexpected and conclusive moral decline from which there was no return. "There were no words, and no movements but the tearing of teeth and claws" (219). The fear of the beast took over the boys to the point where they mistook Simon for the beast, and as a result, Simon was brutally murdered, allowing the boys' already shattered sanity to hit rock bottom. This murder of Simon marks a new step in the descent into savagery, as the boys lose all civility and remorse, and by the end of the novel, both Simon and Piggy have died at the hands of the tribe's barbaric boys, indicating that the island has lost all civilization and is now populated by bloodthirsty savages. Piggy questions the boys' identities early in the story as he observes the terrible practices in which they have become involved. "What are we? Humans? Or animals? Or savages? "' (129). Piggy becomes increasingly wary of the boys as they get progressively more vicious, as he is unsure whether they are actually humans or a horde of savages., Piggy gets warier of the boys as they get progressively more and more vicious. At the end of the story, Piggy gets the answer to his question when he gets crushed to death by the boulder dislodged by one of the boys in the tribe after a failed attempt to appeal to reason and get the whole group of castaways together again in cooperation. Therefore, proving that the boys had been completely blinded by their fear of the beast to the point where they destroyed mankind and civilization on the island by committing murder.    

Throughout the novel, it is clear that the beast played a major role in the island's decline of sanity and civilization. The boys' fear of the unknown beast damaged and altered them, as evidenced by the beast-like characteristics that haunted them until the very end, the manipulation of fears utilized by powerful individuals for their own gain, and the gruesome deaths of Simon and Piggy, demonstrating that the boys' who first arrived on the island as innocent schoolboys were drastically changed into barbaric savages as their fear of the beast grew. Due to the fear of the unknown, humanity on the island was destroyed. People went from being civilized and comprehending morality to torturing, murdering, and losing all compassion and empathy.