In the 1930’s, Britain’s imperialistic ideals were still making way through the century and Britain had control over India. The English who lived in India often prided off of the thought that they were “better” than the natives in their own country. They refused to be seen as less than superior to the Indian people and would not tolerate being laughed at, by anyone.
Pride, such as the English’s, is such a dangerous thing. Pride has been responsible for many wars and battles in the past, for fights between strangers and between friends, and for the deaths of anyone or anything that threatens ones name. Excessive pride only hurts oneself and those around them. In the short story, Shooting an Elephant, by George Orwell’s, the narrator is a police officer in Moulmein, in lower Burma in 1936. One day on the job, he was called into a town where a tame elephant had gone through a “must” and caused some …show more content…
The moment that he had called for that elephant rifle, even though he only wanted it to protect himself, he signed himself up for being the one to shoot the elephant. The town’s people saw something “worth watching” once he had that rifle in his hands. He was the lead role, they were his audience. He had to do something or else he would be seen as a joke. He realized that coming in with a rifle at hand and two thousand people watching, waiting, wishing for him to do it, but then not follow through; he would surely be laughed at. In the story he states that, “… every white man’s life in the East was one long struggle not to be laughed at.” His pride was too strong, and his shame would wreck him. His pride over powered his morals. He knew that the elephant was fine when he first saw it. He knew that he didn’t have to shoot it. He knew that he didn’t want to shoot it. But yet he still did it. He went against his morals because his pride told him that he would look like a fool and he couldn’t risk