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Cruel Fear Of The Socs In Hinton's The Outsiders

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Jazlyn Ponyboy's opinion highlights the cruel fear the Socs inflict upon the greasers, who are barely making ends meet to survive. As a result, it had set up a biased image of how Ponyboy saw the socs. In the novel The Outsiders, Greasers and the Socs have been through various struggles and rumbles that would always result in the socs being on top, never getting in trouble, while the greasers are on the bottom, always getting in and out of jail. This leads up to the bitter feelings of greasers towards the Socs. At the same time, some believe that Ponyboy never changes his attitude toward the Socs, his interactions with Cherry and Randy and the death of Bob show and help Ponyboy realize that the Socs are also human. The first example of Ponyboy realizing that Socs are human is with his acquaintance, Cherry Valance. “We have troubles you’ve never even heard of". (Hinton, 34) Cherry is trying to explain to Ponyboy that Socs have problems that are entirely different from what the Greasers have. “Things are rough all over” (Hinton, 35) Here, Cherry helps PonyBoy realize that they all, everyone, has problems. Similarly to Ponyboy and Cherry’s incident, another example of Ponyboy realizing that the Socs are human is his encounter with Randy. …show more content…

“I’m sick of all this. Sick and tired. Bob was a good guy. He was the best buddy a guy ever had". (Hinton, 116) While talking to Randy in his car, Ponyboy realizes that Randy was a soc, and he also experienced the pain of loss, he knows what it feels like to lose somebody". He ain't a Soc, I said, “he’s just a guy. He just wanted to talk". (Hinton, 118)After that talk, Ponyboy realizes that Randy is a human and requires people to talk to. Although, some would disagree, and say that Ponyboy doesn’t realize that Socs are

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In the novel The Outsiders by S.E Hinton, the character Ponyboy’s opinion on the Socs changes throughout the book. When Ponyboy's parents passed, his older brother Darry took care of Ponyboy and Sods. They and a few other friends are all in a gang. They are also all greasers, which are like a lower class. The SOCS are the rich upper class.

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This changes Pony’s belief that all socs were evil because”Randy was too cool to feel anything yet there was pain in his eyes. ”(116)Pony continues to hate the socs but this changes his view on the socs and reminds him they're human too. In the end Ponyboy asks cherry,”you see the sunset real good from the west side. ”(130)

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It seems as if the socs are totally desensitized to anything , they do.  When they were taking taking on Pony, the socs weren't even thinking about what they were doing to Pony, they thought it was all one big joke.(cpt 1)   The socs beat up greasers without even thinking or caring what they are doing to the greasers.  

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Ponyboy is only 14 years old in, “The Outsiders,” but has gone through many hardships and struggles most teenagers will never go through. Throughout the story, he has lost others and even himself. The cause of this is the division between Socs and Greasers. Throughout the story, the author builds up the theme that, everyone is human, no matter what social class, race, sex, or age. As readers we see this when Cherry Valance is first introduced, the relationship of the Curtis brothers, and the truth about Bob.

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I’ll tell you something, Ponyboy, and it may come as a surprise. We have trouble you’ve never even heard of. You want to know something? Things are rough all over” (Hinton, pages 34-35). Ponyboy always thinks that the Socs have no problems but actually, they do.

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One of the ways Pony changed was how he thought about the Socs. In the beginning of the book, he hated the Socs and thought they were all the same: rich jerks who had a perfect life and liked to pick on them. He didn’t think about their problems, their own feelings and actions, or any similarities to greasers. He essentially saw them as another species. As the story progressed, he saw Socs each as their own person and judged them as such.

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Ponyboy wants to share his story because he thinks people might have a paradigm shift because they here the other side of the story and think that not all greasers or socs are bad. On page 4 it says There should be some help, someone should tell them before it was too late. Someone should tell their side of the story, and maybe people would understand then and wouldn't be so quick to judge a boy by the amount of hair oil he wore. It was important to me. Ponyboy and Randy believe that socs and greasers are the same because they all have problems.

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What does being an outsider mean? Every character in The Outsiders by SE HInton has felt like they do not belong. The Outsiders is written around 14 year old Ponyboy, Ponyboy lives on the bad side of town and is a member of the gang called greasers. Throughout the story the greasers and Socs,the other gang, are fighting which causes major trouble.

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He’s getting friendly with them, as if they were friends, but not too close like his Greaser family. “‘You might not have. You might have done the same thing.’” He said this after Randy complimented his being heroic on rescuing kids from a burning church. This shows that Ponyboy has loosened up towards the Socs and have nothing against them anymore.

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( S.E. Hinton (pg 37) Ponyboy was able to understand that even if you are a soc you still might be going through something. This connected with Randy and Ponyboy's conversation when they were talking about Bob. “Bob was a good guy”. He was the best buddy a guy ever had. I mean, he was a good fighter and tuff and everything, but he was a real person too.

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In the novel The Outsiders Ponyboy learns many things such as staying gold things are not how they seem and one's decisions can have a drastic affect on one's life. Ponyboy learns that they are alike in many ways and that the greasers and the socs are not that different. For instance when Randy comes up to Ponyboy in his Corvette and he starts talking about running

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(Hinton 116) When Ponyboy and Johnny go to the Park, 5 Socs encounter them, and Ponyboy and Johnny know they are drunk because of how they act. After Johnny kills Bob, one of the Socs, Ponyboy realizes Bob is a normal kid, just like he is. Ponyboy sees Bob as a bully and a mean kid, but that is false. The reason Johnny kills Bob is because Bob and the other Socs are drunk, and they don't know what they are doing. The belief that Ponyboy had on Bob is an example of how labeling people can cause misunderstanding.

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Because of some discussions he had with a few of the Socs, he changes his opinion Recognizing that the Socs are just people after all, Pony’s final opinion is that they have problems too. Pony’s opening opinion of the Socs does not show them in good light. Initially, at the opening of the novel, Ponyboy does not like the Socs. To start, the Socs have everything.

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First, when Pony meets Cherry he realizes that even Socs have problems- that gets reinforced when he has a conversation with Randy. He finally breaks through his bias about the Socs and starts to see that the groups are ridiculous, when he reads Johnny’s letter. No one ever really understands a person until you consider things from where they

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For a brief moment Ponyboy Curtis makes a human connection only to realize it can’t last. In The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton there are two gangs the soc’s, a rich upper class gang too preppy to care, and the greasers a gang that feels too much yet has too little. Ponyboy Curtis, a greaser, convinces himself he is alone except for his gang until he meets Cherry Valance. She is a soc, the group that Ponyboy had always been taught to hate. Like Slim, she is understanding and described as a god in the eyes of Ponyboy.

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