Literature: Bullying (Man's inhumanity to Man)

There are many reasons why society and our own school's community don't attempt to cease bullying. Most bystanders do not have the courage to become an upstander and support the victim because often, they fear the bully and don’t want to take a risk to save someone because it could jeopardize their self. One of the causes of bullying is a negative event in the bully's past. The bully may have been put down and made fun of before and in order to vent his/her anger, he/she imposes it on innocent victims, thinking that they would find out how it feels to be bullied. In Lord of the Flies, in order to gain power, Jack, who can be called the antagonist of the book, bullies Piggy. Since Piggy is plump and does not have much physical strength, Jack plays on these weaknesses to crack up the assembly and turn them against Piggy. In reality, Jack might fear Piggy because of his high intelligence and his potential to be leader of the little community on the island. Furthermore, Jack says "Bollock to the rules!" on page 89 because he wants to ignore the rules of the assembly. Also, he tries to indirectly persuade the assembly members to stop following them. He does this also to gain power and eventually, I predict that he will break up from Ralph's leadership and lead his choir and anyone else who sides with him to a new group where he will be chief. In Lord of the Flies, Ralph doesn't support Piggy much and goes along with Jack and the rest of the group whenever they make fun of Piggy or laugh at him. This is because if Ralph openly supports the victim of Jack's bullying, then he will be made fun of, too, and he could potentially lose his ranking as chief. Ralph knows that agreeing with Jack is wrong, but he sacrifices his friendship with Piggy to keep his power. Ralph also may not have the bravery to oppose Jack, knowing that Jack is his equal, in physical strength at least.Therefore, even though bullying is a moral wrong that should be rectified, people either don't have the courage to oppose it, or don't want to lose power, which is why they don't attempt to end bullying.