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Ayn Rand's Anthem: Living Life Through A Mask

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Recommended: Conformity and social institutions essay

Aaditt Rishi
Landers 3A
English 1 Advanced
28 February 2023
Living Life Through a Mask Conformity is a padlock to an individual's freedom due to the restrictions it sets by imposing societal expectations that may not be aligned with the goals or values of a person. In the short novel by Ayn Rand, Anthem, Equality 7-2521 has many restrictions placed on his freedom, and is forced to conform to society’s beliefs and feelings without being able to use his special abilities or talents that he possesses. In Anthem, Equality 7-2521’s society was alienated from being individualistic and forced to conform, revealing how Equality wants to find individuality and uniqueness, and how when we lose freedom, then individualistic thoughts are lost and we become …show more content…

At the beginning, he reveals the unique features that make him an outlier in society and how these features and thoughts are not accepted. Equality 7-2521 begins by talking about how in his society, “it is a sin to think words no others think,” in addition to how it is not allowed to “put them down upon a paper no others are to see” (Rand 2). Equality 7-2521 reveals how the society he is living in has no freedom or individualism for people, and they must abide by society’s rules, or otherwise, they are punished. Equality also shows how society believes in conformity rather than individuality, and has taken freedom away from the individuals living in society, brainwashing them into society’s values. Later on, in Anthem, Equality brings a new concept to the World Council of Scholars, which is against the law but uses society’s ideas to brainwash them into listening to him plead for acceptance. Equality talks about how the invention is only for “our brothers” and how “it is only our brother men who matter” (Rand 25). Also, he expresses that “we matter not, nor our transgression” to persuade the leaders of their society (Rand 25). Equality’s use of words to

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