Shooting An Elephant: Influences

Influences

In Shooting an elephant, there are hard decisions to be made, and many influences on what to do. In (Shooting an Elephant) the main themes include, standing up for yourself, you may not always be in charge, and don't let people control you. As said by (Plato) “A good decision is based on knowledge and not on numbers”. The first theme from (Shooting An Elephant) includes standing up for yourself. “"The insults hooted after me when I was of a safe distance” they picked at him and he needs to stand up for himself. The police officer is a good example of about every person in the world. In your life you need to stand up for yourself. In the story the police officer didn't, he did what he thought would make himself look good. As said by (Rabindranath Tagore) “You can't cross the sea merely by standing and staring at the water”. Meaning you have to make your own decisions and go with them. The next message presented in (Shooting An Elephant) includes you not always being in charge. “crowd that had followed me”, and he had to please them."This is not only true about the police officer but almost everyone everywhere. People always have someone over them. ”Even when you think you are at the top, someone will try to tell you what to do”. As said by (Shari L. Ballard) “When people try to tell

“Whole population of the quarter flocked out of their houses" they wanted him to make the right decision. He let them control him because if he did the wrong thing they would make fun of him. Even though everyone has outside influences, you don't have to follow them. You don't have to follow someone's ideas just to look cool. Be yourself and do what you think is right. As said by (Bruce Lee) Always be yourself, express yourself, have faith in yourself, do not go out and look for a successful personality and duplicate it. You will just make bad decisions by following somebody else's