Turning Our Heads - Coursework Example

June 4, Turning Our Heads The allegory of Plato’s cave postulates that most people are like prisoners, who see the shadows on the wall, in front of them, and think that is reality, not shadow. In fact, there are puppeteers on a parapet behind the prisoners. These puppeteers manipulate the puppets, which create shadows on the wall of the cave. The shadows are the result of a fire between the puppeteers and the rear wall. As the prisoners cannot turn their heads, they do not see the puppeteers or the puppets. They see only the shadows (Cohen). So it is the shadows which define their reality. This paper aims to call attention to two types of shadows and two levels of the puppets and puppeteers, in application of Plato’s cave allegory to the recent civil war in Sierra Leone. It does so, based on the book, A Long Way Home: Memoirs of a Child Soldier (Beah), book reviews, and a scholarly analysis of the causes of the war.The purpose of this paper is to ask prisoners to turn their heads. . There are two types of shadows playing on the wall, occupying the attention of the prisoners in the Sierra Leone cave. Although Plato did not refer to two types, they seem obvious in the analysis of the book under consideration. One type of shadow is constructed of the remembered experiences and feelings of the child soldier, Ishmael Beah. The other type of shadow is constructed out of the reactions, alleged correction, arguments, challenges, and historical flag-waving of various people and newspaper critics. Beah’s experiences and feelings, as he recalls them and vouches for their accuracy, is in fact the subject of this book (Beah). He tells what he remembers and what he recalls having felt . He recalls being happy, before he was drawn into the war. The book starts out by recalling how Ishamael and his brother Junior, snuck off with some friends to travel a long ways from their village, to enter a talent show. They had a rap music act and Ishmael apparently had cultivated American rap music expertise (Beah). The approaching war is in sharp contrast. He remembers feeling vaguely confused about the stories he heard about displaced people who lost relatives and property. He could not conceive of this as being altogether real. He is honest about his emotional numbness, his fear and his rage, his worries about family and his unleashed violence. He tells about loss as though it were the most natural situation ever (Beah). One of the reasons these shadows were accepted as real is that other people experienced them also. Loss, murder, violence, fear and chopped-off body parts were common experiences in the lives of the people (Beah), so how could a brainwashed traumatized and well-drugged child see beyond these shapes in the cave? It was the experience of his peers, and not only his own experience. Furthermore, it was the government for whom he committed these atrocities, as he was a child soldier for the Sierra Leone Armed Forces (Beah). It was clearly consensual reality. Although I have serious reservations about marijuana fueling his violence or emotionally numbing his emotional responses, clearly methamphetamines can have that effect, as can cocaine, Probably if the local mythology of marijuana was that it can fuel violence and blunt responsive emotions, then it would perhaps act as a placebo and yield that effect, irrespective of its chemistry. The three drugs in tandem might also have incurred an effect of dissociation that was distinct from taking each alone. I imagine that the most influential drug, however, was the changes to blood sugar and the release of adrenalin with violence and trauma, not only an ingested chemical. So this situation also was a play of shadows. . This first type of shadow is Beah’s story, based on his personal recollected experience. The second type of shadow, dancing on the wall of the cave, is audience reaction to his story. Critics, like The Australian, grab hold of historical precision and try to discredit Beah’s story and experience. They claim that at most, he may have been a soldier for a couple of months, but not for years. They claim that all of these experiences are reputed to be part of war, but they question whether these experiences could all have happened to a single child. The critics claim he could not have been 12 or 13 when he was caught up in this war, but may have been 15 years old or so. His community, in Sierra Leone, has not taken much notice of Beah’s book (Italie). Should these allegations and characterizations of the dancing shadows be given more attention and credibility than Beah’s feelings and remembered experience? Are they somehow more real because they did some research and concluded that Beah’s version was off in chronology and dates? I do not think so because historical data has called into question the existence of Atlantis, the story of Noah’s ark, and extraterrestrial visitors to earth. Yet recent evidence has been found that strongly supports all of these events. They are all shadows with an assumed reality, but we do not turn our heads to see the puppeteers and their puppets behind us. We are prisoners of culture, religious teaching, education, and our own worldview, When faced with the presence of oddity of this former child soldier, Ishmael’s friends see only shadows, in their reactions. "You mean you saw people running around with guns and shooting each other?" "Yes, all the time." "Cool." (McIntyre) Just as there are two types of shadows on the cave wall, there are two levels behind the seated prisoners: the puppets and the puppeteers. In Beah’s story, the puppets are the Revolutionary United Front and the Sierra Leone Armed Forces, and politicians who keep dancing. We could ask who is responsible for the civil war in Sierra Leone, and they look like credible actors to blame. They are corrupt and violent. They care for themselves and not for the people. People whisper about their evil deeds. If a prisoner becomes insightful enough to ask who or what is behind this war and violence and misery, this is what they might conclude, Although they do not live a life in common with these puppets, yet surely they are assumed to be responsible by the most aware among the people. Yet, in truth, they are only puppets and not the puppeteers. So who are the puppeteers? In the case of Sierra Leone, the puppeteers are those scrambling to seize control of the diamond trade, making a huge profit (Jang). They are greedy and so no matter how many millions they grab, they only want more. The diamonds feed their lust for wealth and power, so they branch out to seize control of other resources as well, like oil (Jang). Child soldiers are prisoners. They are given AK-47 guns, rocket-propelled grenades, and ammunition, along with drugs and propaganda (Beah), to keep them from turning their heads. In the name of love and sweet romance, children are abducted and ruined, people have their arms and fingers chopped off, whole villages are massacred, people have their faces blown off/ It is ironic that in order to show off a beautiful diamond engagement ring, symbol of love and a promise, the ugliest evil is perpetrated. But we keep on buying diamonds, sustaining a market in death and mayhem. This paper has considered Beah’s story, and its various levels of meaning, within the application of Plato’s cave allegory. Plato suggested that we are mostly all prisoners, mesmerized by shadows on the wall of a cave. We are fooled into thinking that the shadows are reality. These shadows, in the case of the book’s report of the Sierra Leone civil war, are comprised of Beah’s recalled experience and feelings, and the responses of critics who overlook experience and feeling in favor of logic and historical precision. Without turning out heads, we do not see the fire that engages puppet imagery, nor do we see the puppeteers who manipulate the puppets. We read the horror and later we long for a diamond, not connecting the two. Whether we turn our heads or not, they are connected, and when we buy or accept a diamond, we are contributing to the misery of others. We give power to the puppeteers to continue the macabre dance. We have a strong and urgent responsibility to turn our heads, however much difficulty is faced. If we do not do so, then we are also murderers and child abusers. This is not an extremist position. It is reality, the one prisoners try not to see. Works Cited Beah, Ishmael. A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier. New York: Sarah Crichton Books, 2007. Print, Cohen, S. M. "The Allegory of the Cave." 9 April 2012. Faculty. 3 June 2013, WEb. . Italie, Hillel. "Boy Soldier Defends His Book." 30 January 2008. Huffington Post Media. 4 June 2013, Web. . Jang, Se Yeung. "The Causes of the Sierra Leone Civil War." 25 October 2012. e-ir.info. 4 June 2013, Web. . McIntyre, Douglas. "A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier." 2007. DMPI Books. 4 June 201, Web. . Read More