Kill or Survive: Mindy Saw LoTF Essay

Kill or Survive

What does survival mean to you? In some cases people turn against each other, no matter how little or large they have of each other. There are many ways one can survive, but there are often situations where one doesn’t try and takes the easy way out. How does one survive with a group of people? Given a moment in certain situations, some may act civilized while others may not. Some may think about themselves only. While others who often has interactions with other people such as family, have a habit of caring for and thinking of others as well. Just like in the novel Lord of The Flies, many scenarios are given when the boys have choices among survival. Even so, when it comes down to survival in any case, the killings of other living things do not really come to mind because of the crave that they have for their own survival.  

Survival being a huge deal to many people, people often do anything humanly possible for survival, even if it means killing other living things. In China, the Chinese people engage in killing and eating dogs. These dogs are either kept as pets that are torn apart from their owners or they are strays that roam around the streets. They call this tradition. They beat the dogs, they let it bleed out, and they use the blood for meat. “Dog meat is considered a delicacy in China, and traders deliberately kill them in the most painful ways possibly so the animals die filled with adrenaline; the Mirror noted”. They cage up the dogs allowing it to lack dehydration and exposure which led to kill hundreds of them at each killings. Although some may buy dogs not to eat but to keep as pets to campaign the cruelty towards animals, they are often taken from owners when food becomes desperate. After the death of the dogs, they are slaughtered, some even boiled alive, and then taken to markets to be sold. Some markets would take them alive and kill them in front of the people at the market when the buyers come to buy them. At first they claimed that the dogs were “emergency food” for when food becomes scarce, but over time this tradition of killing and eating dogs got out of control. Calling these happenings a tradition, they enjoy the flesh, bones, and blood of dogs. They believe it is a tradition for the survival of their lives dated back from years ago when food was actually scarce. But now they enjoy the killing and slaughterings of the dogs to soon eat for their survival. It turned into such a common thing that the majority of the Chinese people no longer cared about the lives of the poor living things.  

This same action is done in the scene where the boys kill the pig and felt the proudness and excitement from doing so, especially Jack. He took the the twins with him to go kill the pig and led them back as they carry the pig that has been killed to eat. As he explains to Ralph how intense when the boys begin to chant “Kill the pig. Cut her throat. Spill her blood.” In moments of this scene when Jack and the twins brought the pig to Ralph’s presence, Jack grows in excitement for his achievement, in a constant matter. Quoted in this moment of the scene, “Jack checked, vaguely irritated by this irrelevance but too happy to let it worry him.”We can light the fire again. You should have been with us Ralph. We had a smashing time. The twins got knocked over-” I cut the pig’s throat,” said Jack, proudly, and yet twitched as he said it” (69). From this quote, the cause of excitement that falls on Jack in this moment comes from his desire of being “big and proud.” He felt irritated when Ralph commented on his success and instead of giving any mind to it, he continued to brag upon his success of killing the pig for food. As British schoolboys, they do not ideally kill animals on the daily as a necessity. In this situation, Jack believes that he has the ability to do so with no adults to take matter into their hands. Given the fact that he brags about the killing in excitement makes him think that it was okay to kill a living animal since it was for their survival’s sake. He no longer gave any care to the animal. He describes how the killing went down to Ralph and for a moment he seemed to be uncomfortable being a British schoolboy, “I cut the pig’s throat,” said Jack, proudly, yet twitched as he said it.” This specific line from the previous quote expresses how he may have been uncomfortable killing the pig when he twitched as he spoke, yet still proud for the actions he’s done.

In China there are annual festivals to celebrate “dog meat”. At this festival, they kill over about 10,000 dogs, slaughtered, boiled, beaten, and bled out. This is no longer the fight for scarce food. It is now profound as enjoyment. To declare a whole festival where dogs are killed in front of cheering crowds is no longer a fight for survival. It is seen more as just enjoyment for the celebration they are not being stopped from. To the Chinese people the killings of dogs are found normal, but in certain scenes of the novel, killing pigs or attempting to are not normal nor realistic to happen for British schoolboys. Jack mentions how the pig squealed as the the boys crept up on her to then kill her. The chant that they made “Kill the pig. Cut her throat. Spill her blood.” This chant brought the most similarity to the wrongdoings of the Chinese dog killing traditions. “Kill the pig.” They wanted the pig dead under any circumstances. “Cut her throat.” They wanted the pig killed in a humanly way. “Spill her blood.” They wanted the pig to suffer and bleed out to watch it be tortured. Relating back to the Chinese people standing in crowds to watch the dogs being killed and tortured so that they would soon be able to eat them in celebration. The inhumanly cruelty that both the characters in the book and the Chinese people have are because of their carelessness towards the living animals. They believe it is more important for them to survive. The only difference falls upon them when the the characters of Lord of The Flies had no choice, but to kill and eat the pig whereas the Chinese people had choices not to do so.

Survival. To survive is to do what it takes to keep living even if it means killing other living things. In Lord of The Flies, Jack and the boys kill the pig in excitement having done that, as in killing a live animal, for the first time. In real life, people in China kill, torture, slaughter, and boil dogs almost on the daily. Both scenarios started out as the fight for survival, then it turned into advantages, advantages for an easier life, for an enjoyable life. After the death of the pig, their characters become more fierce throughout the book in having to kill other living things. Also after the killings of the dogs, the Chinese took advantage of not being stopped to do so and started up a whole tradition and festival like celebration for the killing and eating of dog meat. In doing so, these people did not have empathy for the living animals anymore.

Works Cited

Golding, William. Lord of The Flies. New York: Penguin, 2006.

Francis, Nathan. "Dog Boiled Alive: Shocking Video From China Shows Greyhound Being Slaughtered Before Cheering Crowd At Public Market." The Inquisitr News. The Inquisitr News, 07 Sept. 2016. Web. 31 Mar. 2017. http://www.inquisitr.com/3491289/dog-boiled-alive-shocking-video-from-china-shows-greyhound-being-slaughtered-before-cheering-crowd-at-public-market/

Cooper, Rob. "Dogs Destined for the Table: Horrific Images Show Animals Being Killed, Cooked and Served up as a Meal in Chinese Tradition." Daily Mail Online. Associated Newspapers, 25 June 2012. Web. 31 Mar. 2017. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2164353/Horrific-images-dogs-killed-cooked-served-meal-sick-Chinese-tradition.html