Euthanasia In John Steinbeck's Of Mice And Men

The idea of a friendship can go a long way. Friends go through multiple adventures together good and bad but the main thing about friends in a good friendship is the fact that they always care and want the best for one another. Shown in The Story Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck, George was put in a very difficult and perplex situation with regards to Lennie killing Curley's wife. George really understood that Lennie got himself in a complex situation he couldn't fix, as someone who might not show his care towards Lennie he really did think of Lennie as his best friend. The decision he made of him killing Lennie before the ranch hands got to him could indeed be a better deal than it seems, within thought of the time period the story was based

Lennie was still a human being and murder was and always will be a serious crime but there are large amounts of evidence that will take euthanasia into the situation. “Euthanasia occurs when one person ends the life of another person for the purpose of ending the killed person's pain or suffering."Involuntary or nonvoluntary euthanasia" is the mercy killing of a medically or legally incompetent person, such as a child or a demented elderly patient, at the request of, or by, a caregiver or family member.” (Encyclopedia.com) This really relates to George and Lennie because there is an obvious problem with Lennie, and George had known this for a long time as he is kind of playing the role of Lennie's guardian. George is not necessarily eligible to be an incompetent person but could have possibly testified if it was taken to that level. Even though Lennie might not know there is something wrong he definitely can have some type of medical issue that no one knows about. George wasn't going to let Lennie go through something so harsh when he barely understands anything that is clearly being seen , this is only one of many reasons why George felt he was doing the right

Lennie's big size and small brain was not a good mix when it came down to him trying to be gentle with small animals or even human beings, in this case Curley's wife. Lennie also tended to get George into some type of trouble, for instance the main reason they were running to new work was because of the incident in Weed where Lennie wouldn't stop touching a girl's dress and she had a lynching mob sent out to find them. As George always tried preaching to Lennie that it wasn't good to kill anything in this world or do something that another person may not feel is right he simply just wasn't changing his actions. When Lennie killed Curley's wife he instantly thought of George and was upset that he knew George was going to be very mad at him as he said "I done a real bad thing," he said. "I shouldn't of did that. George'll be mad. An'... he said... an' hide in the brush till he come. He's gonna be mad.”(Steinbeck 45) Lennie's intentions were in the right path of changing but no matter how hard he tried he would repeat the same idea George wanted him to stop. This was another prime example of why George killed Lennie and why it was the best solution for both Lennie and George, if Lennie couldn’t stop when he was being told