Guilt And Shame In The Things They Carried

Guilt is defined as the fact of having committed a specified or implied offense or crime by Merriam-Webster Dictionary. In the same dictionary, shame is defined as a painful feeling of humiliation or distress caused by the consciousness of wrong or foolish behavior. These two feelings go hand-in-hand. It is sometimes good to have guilt and a little shame, because not everyone is perfect. When Guilt and shame takes over, they can make us do things that we think are going to help us not feel guilt or shame anymore, which is not always good because guilt and shame are only felt when we do something bad. In the Alpha Company, which is the platoon where the men in the story The Things They Carried were apart of, the men carry many different things, which includes both items and emotions. Guilt and shame are included in these emotions that they carry. Guilt and shame also had an impact on the things they carried as well. …show more content…
Jimmy was enraptured with her and the things that he had from her, like letters and pictures. He spent all of his time gawking over these things from Martha, and daydreaming about her. When Lavender was shot, Jimmy blamed himself for it because he felt like a terrible platoon leader for being distracted. He felt guilty and shameful for paying so much attention to his love. He felt like it was his fault that Ted Lavender was killed, so he changed his ways and threw out everything that would distract him from being the best platoon leader, and keeping other men from being killed. This included the lucky charm that Martha sent to him, which is what he specifically blamed. It was a pebble from the coast of New Jersey, and he tossed it. This is an action he took out of