Survival and Seclusion

            Today in class we touched more on the Underground Man’s views on living past forty. In the context of the book, the man is saying that if one is to live past forty, he or she is a burden on society.  The man wants to live past forty solely to be a burden to his society. He wants his society to suffer as much as he has the majority of hi life. When we compared our society today to animals and to the Native Americans, it was strange to think that we have detached ourselves from natural selection and survival of the fittest. As Mr. Shapiro said, we fight against ourselves to protect ourselves. Even though we want world peace we still have wars. These wars are due to our faith in religion. After our discussion in class, I realized that religion is just our way of having an excuse not to do something. When doctors and health care professionals state the oath at graduation, they are promising not to take away the life of someone even if they themselves want to die since we perceive it as inhuman.  In way, it makes the human race seem cowardly and selfish. We do want anyone to die at our hands but if they themselves want take their own lives, and we as group contribute to their self hatred and loneliness, we do not want to say we were involved with that situation because we do not want to believe that we could be that cruel.

            We also touched on the fact that the man views himself as higher than everyone else but yet views himself as a mouse, which is lower than a human. He compares himself to a mouse because, like a mouse, he was ridiculed by others, taunted, and forced to live by himself. He does not have anyone to comfort him. He lives on his own and cares for only himself. The man listens but does not utter a word out of fear, the same way a mouse only leaves his hole at night and avoids any direct contact with any other living thing.