The story is about a British police officer who is constantly ridiculed for being in India and he is not respected. One day word broke out that an elephant was ravaging; the Officer was then asked to come and do something about it. The elephant was on the move but stopped in a village and killed a man. George then sent someone to get a rifle and ammo for protection from the elephant in case it went wild again. Everyone from the village came out of their homes to watch him kill the elephant even though those weren’t his intentions. A crowd of over two thousand people was waiting for him to kill the elephant with the rifle and he did. It took him over 5 shots and still the elephant did not die. The elephant died in a cruel and extended death
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I believe that he was morally wrong for killing the elephant. It shouldn’t matter how much a crowd pressures you, you should be able to stand strong morally and be able to say no. Social pressure is hard but we are all raised to have some sort of morals and those morals can become foggy. They had not shown much interest in the elephant when he was merely ravaging through their homes, but it was different now that he was going to be shot (Orwell). All the crowd cared about was meat and to have some fun and this was exciting to them. This gave him the perfect opportunity to be seen and he couldn’t mess that up. This resulted in the death of the elephant. Here I was, the white man with his gun, standing in front of the unarmed native crowd- seemingly the leading actor of the piece; but in reality, I was only an absurd puppet pushed to and fro by the will of those yellow faces (Orwell). I don’t agree with his feeling this way because no one ever has to feel this way or give into pressure. He may have felt like a puppet, but he was in control of his own life, and his own actions not the crowd around him. Being British may have made him feel like an outsider and insecure but that is no excuse. He was having thoughts of doubt and didn’t want to kill the elephant but felt like he had no choice. When he killed the elephant he felt sorry but
I believe that he was morally wrong for killing the elephant. It shouldn’t matter how much a crowd pressures you, you should be able to stand strong morally and be able to say no. Social pressure is hard but we are all raised to have some sort of morals and those morals can become foggy. They had not shown much interest in the elephant when he was merely ravaging through their homes, but it was different now that he was going to be shot (Orwell). All the crowd cared about was meat and to have some fun and this was exciting to them. This gave him the perfect opportunity to be seen and he couldn’t mess that up. This resulted in the death of the elephant. Here I was, the white man with his gun, standing in front of the unarmed native crowd- seemingly the leading actor of the piece; but in reality, I was only an absurd puppet pushed to and fro by the will of those yellow faces (Orwell). I don’t agree with his feeling this way because no one ever has to feel this way or give into pressure. He may have felt like a puppet, but he was in control of his own life, and his own actions not the crowd around him. Being British may have made him feel like an outsider and insecure but that is no excuse. He was having thoughts of doubt and didn’t want to kill the elephant but felt like he had no choice. When he killed the elephant he felt sorry but