Entitlement In The Lie By Kurt Vonnegut Jr.

“Entitlement is simply the belief that you deserve something. Which is great. The hard part is, you’d better make sure you deserve it.” - Mindy Kaling. This basically means that entitlement is only justified when the thing that you think you are entitled to is deserved. In “The Lie” by Kurt Vonnegut Jr, Eli tries to get into Whitehill ; a school that his family has gone to for centuries, but isn't accepted. This makes Dr. Remenzel ; his father, l demand Eli get admitted into the school and have a special case because he is a Remenzel. Contradictory to the fact that he had yelled at his wife ; Sylvia, for asking for Eli to have special privileges. In this situation, Dr. Remenzel is willing to break his own rule to get Eli into Whitehill because

Remenzel doesn’t want to bring the family tradition to ruins by Eli not attending Whitehill. When the family, Eli, Sylvia, and Dr. Remenzel, are talking about Whitehill and how many Remenzels have been there there is a somewhat large number mentioned. On page 96 and 97 it states, “ “I wonder how many Remenzels have gone to Whitehill,” said Sylvia. “That's like asking how many people are dead in a cemetery,” said the doctor. He gave the answer to the old joke, and Sylia’s question too. “All of’em … “Oh-” The doctor shrugged, ratted the plans. “Thirty maybe.” “So Eli is number thirty-one?” “. This conveys to the reader that going to Whitehill is somewhat of a family tradition for the Remenzels. This may have caused Dr. Remenzel to demand Eli get accepted into Whitehill because he didn’t want to ruin the family

Remenzel breaks his own rule because he is close to people with higher power in the school and people that could possibly control the school. When Eli runs away and Dr. Remenzel tries to convince the school that Eli should attend Whitehill, he mentions his connections to the people in the school. On page 109 it states, “”No ‘but’ about it,” said Doctor Remenzel. “There's a majority of the Board of Overseers in this room at this very moment. Every one of them is a close friend of mine, or a close friend of my father. If they tell Doctor Warren Eli’s in, that’s it-Eli’s in. If there’s room for these people,” he said “there’s damn well room for Eli too.” This shows that Dr. Remenzel has close connections to the people in the school and people that can basically control what the school does. He feels entitled because of this and therefore, tries to use his power to make sure that Eli gets into Whitehill even if it breaks his own