...To the editor, the recent police shootings of mainly african-american men are very concerning and they raise a lot of questions about racism in the police and in the justice system. Many victims arte both unarmed and innocent. More has to be done to prevent these kinds of shootings from happening and to rid the American justice system of its racism. Minorities have been facing discrimation for a long time but in most ways things have improved. The justice system is one of the places were racism still exists and it's one of the most important causes of the problems black people are struggling with today. One of the early shootings that got attention was the shooting of Michael Brown, an unarmed black teenager who was shot multiple times by a police officer, but since then too many similar shootings have occured. These events are examples of how african-americans and other minorities are treated differently by the police and by courts. An african-american man isn't just more likely to be shot by the police. If he's found guilty of a crime he's more likely to end up in prison, recieve a longer prison sentence or to recieve the death penalty than a white man guilty of the same crime. There has to be more focus on preventing these shootings and eliminating racism in the justice system. Black lives...
Words: 516 - Pages: 3
...questions later. In the past few years that have gone by we seen a lot of unarmed black males killed by white police officers and how the police officers got a “pat on the back” and let go. This caused an uproar among the black community and it caused them to come together and protest that justice be served. It all started back in 2012 when George Zimmerman was acquitted for the murder of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin. But before Trayvon there was Oscar Grant, a 22-year-old who got shot by BART police officer Johannes Mehserle in the early hours of New Year’s Day 2009. Oscar and his friends were involved in an altercation on the train which needed the police to get involved. He was then...
Words: 1349 - Pages: 6
...When I saw we would be watching Fruitvale Station, I was overcome by memories. I am from the city Pleasant Hill which is no more than half an hour away from Hayward. In 2009 when Oscar Grant was shot, everyone had heard about it. For the entire week you couldn’t talk to someone without the shooting being mentioned. At the time I was only in 6th grade starting high school. I did not know anyone directly related to Oscar Grant, however during this tragedy everyone felt connected to him personally. His case is what sparked many protests in the Bay Area and moved the topic of police brutality into discussion. I thought I had known the entire story based on news reports but seeing this movie really made him seem as more than just a struggling black...
Words: 270 - Pages: 2
...Jenny Charoenchitmun Explication Essay Final Draft October 23, 2008 The Depravity of British Imperialism In 1886, Burma lost its independence and sovereignty to Great Britain in the “Third Anglo-Burmese” War. At that time, Great Britain had one of its colonies in the sub-continental region of India which was known as “British India.” Eventually, Burma was annexed into British India and was oppressed under British imperialism. Imperialism is “a policy of extending a country's power and influence through diplomacy or military force” (Oxford Dictionary). In the essay “Shooting An Elephant” by George Orwell, imperialism is portrayed as a corrupt act in which the British Empire imposes itself on Burma. Orwell use rhetorical techniques to describe how imperialism can create grotesque effects on both the British and Burmese. In Orwell’s essay, characters such as the police officer, the local Burmese people and the elephant display the brutal reality British imperialism. The British police officer serves his country in Burma and is constantly mocked by the local Burmese. But, one day they praise him when he kills the outrageous elephant that is let loose in the neighborhood. George Orwell effectively depicts the theme of imperialistic depravity through the use of symbolism, irony and visual imagery in “Shooting An Elephant.” George Orwell exemplifies the immorality of British imperialism through the use of symbolism. In “Shooting An Elephant,” the elephant becomes wild and...
Words: 885 - Pages: 4
...Shooting an elephant - By George Orwell Imperialism is the appellation for a policy, where a ruler in a country attempts to oppress another country. This is mainly the theme and point in the essay “Shooting an elephant” The story is written by the author George Orwell, and centers about this problem which was going on between the British and the Burmese. The essay is written as a metaphor describing the British imperialism, and gives the readers an insight in how George's opposition against the imperialism is expressed. Another theme in the story is the meeting between two cultures – in where it describes the burmese, that despise the British. Apart from that, George himself is going though a process of self-deception, which is showed clearly in this story. George Orwell was born on 25th June 1903, and was a well known English novelist, essayist, journalist and critic. George Orwell was one of the most influential English writers in the 20th century, and is mostly known for the novel “Nineteen Eighty-Four” and the novella “Animal Farm”. George Orwell was working in The British Imperial Police from 1922-1927, where he wrote the essay “Shooting an elephant” as a reflection about the British imperialism in India. The setting is in Moulmein in Lower Burma in the 1920's, and is taking place in a poor city. “It was a very poor quarter, a labyrinth of squalid bamboo huts, thatched with palm-leaf, winding all over a steep hillside.” (Page 112, line 12-14) The society...
Words: 989 - Pages: 4
...each action.Like in the essay “Shooting an Elephant,” George Orwell finds himself in a moral dilemma. Our main character a police officer in the British Raj, and he writes about his experience or moral dilemma in his short story, 'Shooting an Elephant. To save face, he shrugged it off as his desire to 'avoid looking the fool'; (George Orwell, 283). In truth, the atmosphere of fear and pressure overwhelmed him. His inner struggle over the guilt of being involved in the subjugation of a people added to this strain, and he made a decision he would...
Words: 788 - Pages: 4
...Shooting an Elephant: The Death of Free Will George Orwell’s essay, Shooting an Elephant, was first published in 1936 in the autumn issue of New Writing, a London periodical. According to Adrian De Lange, Shooting an Elephant is one of Orwell’s most famous essays (Bloom 9). It cannot be established whether or not it was an actual account of something that Orwell experienced, something he witnessed or if it is solely fictitious, but is accepted that this essay was written out of Orwell’s experiences while he was a member of the Imperial India Police Force in Burma, described by Orwell as, “five boring years” (Abrahams 194). There are many apparent and some not so apparent themes in this work. The harmful results of Imperialism, prejudice, and living by your own conscience are all valid and thought provoking themes. A theme that is also valid and beneficial to examine is the dangers of isolation and alienation and how those states can manifest in dangerous, even deadly ways. Isolation and alienation can be very damaging on the human spirit. That damage can lead to actions that do irreparable harm to an individual as well as a community. In Shooting an Elephant the narrator finds himself isolated because of his role as policeman in a foreign country and by the hostility and mistrust of the Burmese citizens he must police. This isolation leads to vulnerability and weakness when faced with mob pressure. When given into, peer pressure leads to death:...
Words: 1580 - Pages: 7
...Argument Essay By Joseph Peterson Ivy Tech Community College Argument Essay Guns or no guns? That seems to be a big question these days. A lot of the reason behind the discussion is mass shootings that occur so often now days. Other forms of violence with guns happen, but the most controversy over guns usually occurs after a mass shooting. The reason for that is that mass shootings tend to be more mindless and more innocent people are hurt or killed in mass shootings. The thought of what if I or one of my families was in one of these mass shootings always hit home afterwards, and so we think of ways to prevent them from happening again. I have a question though is guns really the issue or is it really another issue? I think that the anti-gun activists use every shooting as just another door to support their views against guns. I can see why they do since guns are used to the shootings, but taking away a normal citizens right to own a gun and defend themselves against crimes is not smart. These shootings are not done by normal citizens and could still occur even if they took away guns from the normal citizens who just want protection. Police are not always there when you need them and sometimes you need to protect yourself first as we can see from different crimes that take place today. What would stop a mass shooter from buying guns illegally? Do they not think that they could? Drugs are illegal but still sold and used everywhere every minute. One argument...
Words: 1807 - Pages: 8
...George Peshkov Professor Carra Glatt 10/28/2015 Shooting an Elephant Essay Whether it be financial decisions, how much time to spend on studies, or whether or not to go out for a run, there are always conflicts through an average person’s days. These conflicts are usually met through an understanding of morals(both internal and external), the outcomes of the decision, and how much effort is required. In George Orwell’s Shooting an Elephant there are constant showings of conflictions in the narrator’s morals. These conflicts include, the narrator’s social status and powerful authority, how he views the other officers, and whether or not to shoot the elephant. These conflictions in morals leads to a lot of misunderstanding, which is the main...
Words: 1465 - Pages: 6
...Shooting an Elephant is a short story by George Orwell that details an English police officer’s experience with a disturbance in his town. Commotion is caused by an elephant rampaging through the town. As expected, this event causes great conflict for both the citizens of the town, as well as the police officer. Besides the obvious conflict of physical danger, internal conflicts arise as well. The main external conflict is the fact that a giant elephant is on the loose. Although it is supposed that the elephant is domesticated, it is still large and afraid. Describing the chaos caused by the elephant, the narrator states, “It had already destroyed somebody's bamboo hut, killed a cow and raided some fruit-stalls and devoured the stock; also it had met the municipal rubbish van and, when the driver jumped out and took to his heels, had turned the van over and inflicted violences upon it” (Orwell). Shortly after this explanation is made, it is discovered by the police officer that the giant animal has also killed an Indian by crushing him into the ground. The elephant’s presence threatens the lives of...
Words: 719 - Pages: 3
...The Summary of "Shooting an Elephant" George Orwell, in the essay, narrated the whole process of killing an outrageous elephant when he was in the post of a police officer in Burma. (One kernel that I have to mention, because it is important for proper understanding of the essay, is that he held the ambivalent feeling for the Burmese. For one thing, he extremely hated the Thyestean imperialism. Second, he was furious about the yellow-faced, evil-spirited Burmese.) One day, he was informed that an elephant which had obviously lost control under the attack of "must" was ravaging a bazaar, and there was only one felicitous thing to do--stop it at once lest more damage or injury occur. He sent for a rifle, rode on a pony and was on the way to have the elephant that had done great crabbing to public properties, even revitalization. Without much effort, George, along with a big crowd of people, found the elephant, which was peacefully eating like a cow, showing no signs or symptoms of "must." It was clear that George ought not to shoot the elephant. Instead, the mahout should be called for to take it back to the chain it was behooved to belong to. But the crowd behind just would not agree. They were gleeful and anxious to see the elephant having committed felonies get shot. If the gunshot was not fired, it would be jeering and sneering, which would definitely produce more execution than the trample of the prodigious foot...
Words: 1138 - Pages: 5
...March 20, 2012 Shooting an Elephant and Decolonising the Mind In life, we as humans often make decisions that we would not have made on our own if we would not of had influence by someone else. In both “Shooting an Elephant,” by George Orwell and “Decolonising the Mind,” by Ngugi Wa Thiong’o both Orwell and Thiong’o received the British colonial education. As humans, others' opinions mean a great deal to us, and in "Shooting an Elephant", and “Decolonising the Mind,” they both have one thing in common: English. "Shooting an Elephant" is the story of a British policeman in Moulmein, a city in Burma, that is torn between shooting or not shooting an elephant that has gone ramped. Many people may misinterpret George Orwell's tone in the essay "Shooting an Elephant." People often construe that the story is about Orwell's decision to either shoot the elephant, or to just peacefully observe it until the mahout came to tame the animal. The story is actually about the struggles Orwell faces because of his position "in between" the Burmese and the imperialistic system. Orwell portrays a distinctive amount of irony in this piece of writing because after he reviewed the situation and started this essay, he spotted a lot of irony in the actions between himself, the people of Burma, and the British Empire. Thiong’o gives a powerful image of how British government tries to control the culture of Kenya. In “Decolonising the Mind”, Thiong’o illustrates his childhood: “All the...
Words: 1135 - Pages: 5
...The D.C Sniper attacks After the shooting of 15 different people in Maryland and Virginia in October, 2002, this country would never be the same. One of the most challenging cases in history would draw the attention of not only police forces, but also the FBI, the US Marshalls and the Secret Service. In this essay, I will analyze the background information on the murderers, followed by the crime development, and finally police intervention and resolution, linked to the assailants John Allen Muhammad, and Lee Boyd Malvo. On the one hand, perpetrator John Muhammad, 41 at the time of the attacks, had served in the US Military for 17 years, and earned medals for his actions during the Gulf War of 1991. After being discharged in 1994 as a Sargeant, his wife, Mildred Muhammad claimed that he had returned...
Words: 651 - Pages: 3
...“Conflict of Convictions” E. Marshall October 16, 2012 English Composition 1102 Table of Contents Section 1: Introduction page 3 Section 2: Historical Context page 4 Section 3: Common Theme in other literature page 5 Section 4: Analysis page 7 Section 5: Conclusion page 9 Section 6: Works Cited page page 10 Introduction The literary piece “Shooting an Elephant” by George Orwell, highlights the apprehensions of a colonial officer's obligation to shoot a rogue elephant. The author does not want to shoot the elephant, but feels pressured by a crowd of indigenous residents, before whom he does not wish to appear indecisive or cowardly. “Shooting an Elephant”, by George Orwell, utilizes characterization, point of view, and plot to illustrate the moral conflict between one’s beliefs and duties. George Orwell worked as a sub-divisional police officer in Moulmein, Burma, back in the days of the British Empire. Burma was just one of many unsatisfied colonies. Orwell, and his famous social conscience, is a target for the hatred of the natives, who sneer at him and insult him, whenever they can. Although, in principle, he sides with the natives, his position and their anger weakens his compassion, to some degree. One day, George Orwell is told that an elephant is destroying the bazaar and he is asked to take care of this potential threat. Although basically tame, an elephant may still rampage occasionally due to...
Words: 1683 - Pages: 7
...there stress level is going to soar and they won’t be able to continue highly as they did prior. Jennings gives good points throughout her opinion essay but there is a couple flaws such as saying “don’t arm the teachers, but instead go on social media, arm them with resources to be more mindful, compassionate and responsive in the classroom so they know what to look for if there is a shooter approaching”. Instead of just going on twitter or instagram, we can look into more effective things such as for example, a security guard l or a police officer at the school because both of these occupations are highly skilled in using a service weapon and there number one priority is to protect....
Words: 809 - Pages: 4
