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Perceptions In Shirley Jackson's The Lottery

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People’s perceptions are generally based on their personal experiences and opinions that they gain throughout their life due to comfort and predictability. Many people feel grounded in their opinions. Perhaps their opinions change from hearing someone else’s perspective or being called out on their naivety, but most have decided they are right. The world has hundreds of religions, cultures, lifestyles, beliefs, and political debates. All of this plays a part in the way people go through life and approach situations. Most tend to be closed-minded and naive when it comes to certain things. This can make it harder for people to communicate and for these people to gain ideas opposite to theirs. People can’t grow if they’re stuck and unwilling to even consider others’ opinions or perceptions. When people open their world view they can feel more empathy for others’ situations and what they’re going through. This can be seen in two examples throughout the world. Firstly, people are more judgemental and rude to others who are different from them. One of the huge problems in our society is that we aren’t open to new concepts. We can mask our judgment with lies of …show more content…

Shirley Jackson demonstrates that perspectives on the outside are different from the inside. Being in a situation is different from looking into a situation. A character in the story, Old Man Warner, is an old man who lived in this town forever and didn’t see what was wrong with twisted “tradition”, or their version of the lottery. When Mr. Adams tells Old Man Warner that the north village is planning to give up the lottery, his response is, “Old Man Warner snorted, ‘Pack of crazy fools,’ he said…’ There’s always been a lottery,’ he added petulantly.” Old Man Warner is a perfect example of being blinded by our past. He doesn’t see the wrong because he hasn’t been shown the right, so instead of changing he stubbornly continues to believe what he

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