Wartime Propaganda: World War I :: World War I History

Wartime Propaganda: World War I The Drift Towards War "Lead this people into war, and they'll forget there was ever such a thing as tolerance. To fight, you must be brutal and ruthless, and the spirit of ruthless brutality will enter into the very fiber of national life, infecting the Congress, the courts, the policeman on the beat, the man in the street." It is one of history's great ironies that Woodrow Wilson, who was re- elected as a peace candidate in 1916, led America into the first world war. With the help of a propaganda apparatus that was unparalleled in world history, Wilson forged a nation of immigrants into a fighting whole. An examination of public opinion before the war, propaganda efforts during the war, and the endurance of propaganda in peacetime raises significant questions about the viability of democracy as a governing principle. Like an undertow, America's drift toward war was subtle and forceful. According to the outspoken pacifist Randolph Bourne, war sentiment spread gradually among various intellectual groups. "With the aid of Roosevelt," wrote Bourne, "the murmurs became a monotonous chant, and finally a chorus so mighty that to be out of it was at first to be disreputable, and finally almost obscene." Once the war was underway, dissent was practically impossible. "If you believed our going into this war was a mistake," wrote The Nation in a post-war editorial, "if you held, as President Wilson did early in 1917, that the ideal outcome would be 'peace without victory,' you were a traitor." Forced to stand quietly on the sidelines while their neighbors stampeded towards war, many pacifists would have agreed with Bertrand Russell that "the greatest difficulty was the purely psychological one of resisting mass suggestion, of which the force becomes terrific when the whole nation is in a state of violent co llective excitement." This frenzied support for the war was particularly remarkable in light of the fact that Wilson's re-election had been widely interpreted as a vote for peace. After all, in January of 1916, Wilson stated that "so far as I can remember, this is a government of the people, and this people is not going to choose war." In retrospect, it is apparent that the vote for Wilson cloaked profound cleavages in public opinion. At the time of his inauguration, immigrants constituted one third of the population. Allied and German propaganda revived old-world loyalties among "hyphenated" European- Americans, and opinions about US intervention were sharply polarized.

Hickey Fate Versus Free Will Oedipus Rex

The downfall of Oedipus was due to free will rather than fate shown in his De minding of information and his immediate, irrational actions. Oedipus being the arrogant king he is, was constantly looking for information when others had informed him that it would not be useful, even damaging to Oedipal use's current life and well being. In an exchange between Oedipus and Tires, Oedipus had deem need Tires to him palace to tell him his prophecy and who was the one who had killed Alias and plagued the and.Tires responded to these demands with â€Å"l will cause neither me nor y o distress. Why do you vainly question me like this? You will not learn a thing from me,†. Tires clearly tells Oedipus there is no benefit to this knowledge giving Oedipus the opportunity to stop questioning the blind prophet but it was Oedipus choice to continue to pester the old ma n until the devastating truth was revealed to him and in his ignorance questioned â€Å"Who t old you to say this? Rather tha n face the truth he had demanded.Oedipus later seeded inform nation to whether e killed his father and who his birth father truly was. His wife, and later to be discovered mother, stated â€Å"In the name of the gods, no! If you have some concern for you our own life, then stop! Do not keep investigating this. I will suffer that will be enough†. Though J coasts begs him, he continues to freely search for information that would bring him no be unfit when he could have ended his search right then. Due to his choosing, Oedipus looked for info urination when he could have listened to those around him and lived out a nice, yet ignorant life to the truth.Though Oedipus could defeat the sphinx with his intelligence, intelligence coo old not stop him from the irrational actions he chose. Once the pieces of information had finally matched up and he revealed the truth he had searched for, Oedipus and his mother took t heir fates into their own hands. Oedipus found his mother hung in th eir bedroom, dead and then decided to take her jewelry and stabbed his own eyes out. Though the news was devastating, these e actions were overly dramatic, considering both beings had known their prophecy but it was their choice to sake such harsh actions.Though it was fate who had propelled Oedipus to sat b his eyes out, it was Oedipus choice to do so rather than think rationally about how to go ABA out such a horrid situation. Oedipus had known his fate from the beginning but it was his choice to contain u to look for the information he had been warned not to find and stab out the eyes that t had blinded him from the truth all along. Fate is something that is inevitable but it is the choice of the one whose fate is determined to how they go about the destined events that will occur.

Analysis Of Death Of A Salesman And Fences

Legacy in ‘Death of a Salesman’ and ‘Fences’ I am convinced that the greatest legacy we can leave our children are happy memories: those precious moments so much like pebbles on the beach that are plucked from the white sand and placed in tiny boxes that lay undisturbed on tall shelves until one day they spill out and time repeats itself, with joy and sweet sadness, in the child now an adult. Parents play an enormous role on teaching their children different virtues and teaching them right from wrong. Whenever you have a bad parent that passes along some less desirable traits is when you see the troublesome children. Throughout Miller’s ‘Death of a Salesman’ and Wilson’s ‘Fences’, the legacy flowing through the generations shows through the characteristics on the sons of Willy Loman and Troy Maxson. In Wilson’s ‘Fences’, you can see some of the virtues that Troy’s father passed on to him. Tro y’s father was a worker and provider which shines in Troy’s characteristics. He has a job and is capable of providing for his family. Troy’s father was also abusive which was passed to Troy who was abusive towards his children. Wessling states, â€Å"moreover, August Wilson presents us with a multigenerational vision in which our sense of waste is more than balanced by an infusion of hope. Troy s father was less of a true man than Troy, but he was a worker and a provider. Troy, even as a runaway, carried with him his father s virtues along with a considerable lessening of the father sShow MoreRelatedAnalysis Of Fences By August Wilson And Death Of A Salesman870 Words   |  4 PagesFences by August Wilson and Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller are two plays that are very similar to each other. They are different in terms of plot, but they are both stories about family conflicts and relationships between family members. In both plays, sport plays a big role i n the life of the characters as both sons of the main characters wish to play sports in school. 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