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The Wrong Reasons To Kill In John Steinbeck's Of Mice And Men

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The wrong reasons to kill
Stella Young once said, “The killing of a disabled person is not compassionate. It is not euthanasia. It is murder.” In John Steinbeck’s book Of Mice and Men, there are many reasons to believe that killing is wrong. Lennie, one of the main characters, is a large man, but would be considered mentally handicapped and he loves soft things. When Curley’s wife and him are in the barn alone, he grabs ahold of her hair and she tries to pull away, but his grip on her hair was too strong for her to pull away from, she screams in terror. When she cries out, Lennie slaps his hand over her mouth in hope that nobody would hear her. As she continues to struggle under his firm grasp, Lennie continues to tighten his grip on her hair …show more content…
George and Lennie traveled alongside each other ever since the beginning of their adventure. They have had this crazy beautiful dream of buying their own farm and raising animals. Lennie always got happy when George said, “Someday we’re gonna get the jack together and we’re gonna have a little house and a couple of acres an’ a cow and some pigs” (14). This made Lennie light up because he loved the idea that he could own a farm with his best friend, and he knew it made George happy talking about it. George knew he had this option but, he thought the best thing was to shoot Linnie. Running away to their dream farm could have solved all their problems but George made the wrong the decision and killed Lennie.
In conclusion, John Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men, showed how wrong killing really is, and that there are always better solutions to problems that don’t lead to a death. George could have done many things to avoid killing Lennie, he could have told people that Lennie is a little slow in some aspects of life and show the people on the farm how to avoid fights with Lennie. George should have put less pressure on Lennie. Lastly, George could have ran away with Lennie and went to their beautiful dream farm. People should learn from Georges mistakes and know that there is no such thing as compassionate

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