The Sniper Thesis

RWW Essay The theme that I observed which is that it is dangerous to bindy follow people. This is apparent by negatively changing communities, tearing families apart, and hurting people. In the story “The Sniper”, by Liam O’Flaherty, a republican sniper in the Irish civil war seen by another sniper and an old woman. He killed the old woman and a man in a turret. He eventually tricks the enemy sniper and kills him, then he finds out that the enemy sniper was his brother. In “The Lottery”, by Shirley Jackson, a small town has an annual lottery, and the winner is stoned to death. The one thing that both of these stories have in common is that the main theme is that it is dangerous to blindly follow people. Blindly following people can negatively change communities. An example of this is from “The

The character’s evil, immoral, and despicable behavior is caused by the way that they consistently put little to no thought to their actions. In “The Lottery”, the people of the village are killing other townspeople without even thinking that it might be a bad idea. In “The Sniper” The main character kills some people for no reason and kills his brother. This isn’t just a recurring theme in the two short stories that I chose to write about, it is a very common thing throughout history and still happens to this day. An example of this are the many religious extremists oppressing minorities because it was how they were raised. If a person was told repeatedly that woman, certain races, etc. they are likely to develop a long lasting hate. A very commonly looked at example of this is the way women are severely oppressed by many people today and especially in the past. In the US it wasn’t until 1918 that woman could vote, and African Americans couldn't vote until 1965. It is only because that is the culture and very few are willing to go against the majority and create opinions, not have