The real Lord of the Flies: what happened
when six boys were shipwrecked for 15 months
Guardian,
by
Rutger Bregman
Original Article
Posted By: StormCnter,
5/10/2020 5:33:26 AM
For centuries western culture has been permeated by the idea that humans are selfish creatures. That cynical image of humanity has been proclaimed in films and novels, history books and scientific research. But in the last 20 years, something extraordinary has happened. Scientists from all over the world have switched to a more hopeful view of mankind. This development is still so young that researchers in different fields often don’t even know about each other.
When I started writing a book about this more hopeful view, I knew there was one story I would have to address. It takes place on a deserted island somewhere in the Pacific.
Reply 1 - Posted by:
tyshab 5/10/2020 6:40:43 AM (No. 406707)
It’s the guardian....with a definite bias. Denigrates lord of flies author, presents his opposing view of human nature. Hard to believe the guardian now, given previous work. Difficult to agree with his extrapolation that humans really good, given history of world. At end of story is hit at US administration....followed by an appeal—-‘support us’ we are the keepers and speakers of ‘truth.’
12 people like this.
Reply 2 - Posted by:
LadyHen 5/10/2020 6:56:53 AM (No. 406725)
An uplifting real life story. I especially like the captain and his parting thoughts.
18 people like this.
Reply 3 - Posted by:
jeffkinnh 5/10/2020 7:09:50 AM (No. 406736)
I find the narrative uplifting and the book intriguing. I will be looking out for it in June.
19 people like this.
Reply 4 - Posted by:
TruthFetish 5/10/2020 7:11:41 AM (No. 406737)
These boys had attended a strict religious school. While shipwrecked, they began each day with prayer and singing. 50 years later, one survivor recalls this as the happiest time of his life.
31 people like this.
Reply 5 - Posted by:
StormCnter 5/10/2020 7:35:46 AM (No. 406760)
Golding's book is a novel written in 1954 #1. It was never intended to be a real-life documentary in book form of the boys rescued in 1966.
7 people like this.
Reply 6 - Posted by:
philsner 5/10/2020 8:32:00 AM (No. 406822)
It's a free country. Read what ever you want. Personally, I have no interest in this.
2 people like this.
Reply 7 - Posted by:
JackBurton 5/10/2020 8:44:21 AM (No. 406832)
What a fantastic story. And how it puts the lie to Golding's tale (which I had read so many years ago.) It might make a dull movie, a bit moralistic. But it is what any of us could aspire to achieve if we were in the same straits.
13 people like this.
Reply 8 - Posted by:
ilovedogs 5/10/2020 10:44:21 AM (No. 406960)
I have always been heartened by the real stories of human kindness and 911 showed me I’m right to believe in the kindness of people. Prayer made the difference. Can’t wait to read this book.
6 people like this.
Reply 9 - Posted by:
MindMadeUp 5/10/2020 10:56:53 AM (No. 406973)
I've always thought Lord of the Flies was a load of BS. I suspect Golding was actually most influenced by the environment of an English "public school", which, by all accounts I've read, seems a horribly unnatural place for a boy to grow up. The opposite of a deserted island.
10 people like this.
Reply 10 - Posted by:
kono 5/10/2020 11:18:42 AM (No. 406985)
Human nature good.
Human nature bad.
Either, or?
Or and, both?
The millennia of human history contains abundant evidence that people are capable of the the entire spectrum of morality, from the depths of evil to the heights of virtue. Where a person lives on that spectrum can vary a bit, depending on present circumstances; but each person's heart/soul has a more steady quality that serves as a center of gravity - always drawing the current condition back towards that place. Many of us got to glimpse that best/worst duality at work through the events of 9/11 and their aftermath.
Wherever we are presently located on that spectrum of human potential, there is one view that is hammered into our minds every single day by our Liberal media, and that's Orange Man Bad.
9 people like this.
Reply 11 - Posted by:
kono 5/10/2020 11:38:33 AM (No. 407006)
This article does a compelling job of persuading the reader that despite what you've learned in your life, people are basically good at heart. Now please confirm this view by supporting us out of the goodness of your heart.
As cynical as that seems, how else should somebody ask for help... by telling us, "you suck, dammit, give us money"? I've no way of knowing how much the kids' story might have been massaged to form the moral inverse of Golding's classic; but as with the duality visible between Left and Right in our own world, I've a hunch the reality is somewhere in between the extremes.
3 people like this.
Reply 12 - Posted by:
Rumblehog 5/10/2020 12:03:44 PM (No. 407038)
What an absolutely amazing story! Thanks for posting!
9 people like this.
Reply 13 - Posted by:
BarryNo 5/10/2020 12:28:32 PM (No. 407072)
Excellent Story. Note the Author of Lord of the Flies made his story up out of whole cloth, pure fiction pushed on helpless school children, year after year as 'meaningful'.
Guardian or not as the source, I HATED 'Lord of the Flies'. It was a book that left me with the feeling of, "They deserved what happened to them." and "If it was real, I wouldn't trust any of these boys at my back on a sunny day in the park, much less if something seriously went wrong." Which is what I related to my teacher, who immediately fed me the pap of, "Until you've walked a mile in their shoes..."
LOTF is communist propaganda pushing why our 'Fearless Leaders" need to ride herd on the masses. Elitist propaganda by a miserable psychotic blowhard!
5 people like this.
Reply 14 - Posted by:
FLCracker 5/10/2020 12:33:42 PM (No. 407076)
#1, it's called "enlightened self-interest", the belief that: ".. persons who act to further the interests of others (or the interests of the group or groups to which they belong), ultimately serve their own self-interest."
In other words, co-operation. I may spend extra time and energy helping you, but then you owe me some time and energy in return, and we both benefit from results of both our efforts.
This has been observed in various ethnic groups and studies around the world and does seem to be a better explanation of human development than "Lord of the Flies."
Of course, the boys from Tonga were apparently not British school-boys.
3 people like this.
Reply 15 - Posted by:
DVC 5/10/2020 12:37:16 PM (No. 407083)
The Gurardian is a Communist paper, first off.
Second, note that these boys PRAYED every day. They were raised Christians, and THAT is crucial. IME, working with people outside the USA who are NOT Christians, not raised in a Judeo-Christian ethics system from birth is that they are superficially like Americans, Brits, etc in the European Christian world, but deep down, you have to watch out. They are DIFFERENT. If you wonder how so many in the former Soviet states can be so evil and cruel, well I have seen a slight bit of that over my decade of working with them. Lots of them retain their Christian roots, are fine, wonderful people. But some are very much NOT.
During the protests on the Maidan in Kiev, the dead and wounded, shot by Ukrainian and Russian snipers, were brought to the very nearby Hotel Ukraine, where we always stayed, and laid out in the lobby that I passed through many, many times over the years. This happened less than one year after my last visit to Kiev.
Christianity, even a Christian culture, changes people for the better. People who have never heard and do not believe simple things like "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you" can be very frightening, dangerous people. And much of the world is so. And that doesn't even mention the 7th century barbarians who rule billions with their evil death cult.
11 people like this.
Reply 16 - Posted by:
DVC 5/10/2020 12:45:51 PM (No. 407095)
It took me the better part of a decade of visiting and working in the former Soviet states to actually begin to grasp what I was seeing, living. Americans are absolutely blinded by their upbringing in a fundamentally Christian environment their whole lives. Huge numbers of Americans absolutely cannot grasp, even REFUSE to believe, that that person in front of them, two eyes, two ears, two arms, two legs can be so fundamentally different deep inside than they are. It took me a long time to understand why SOME, definitely not all, are veyr different when raised in the atheist Soviet system. Some learned their Christianity at home, others never learned it. They are the dangerous ones, the ones with NO ethics, and yet they look and talk just like everyone else. But they are different inside.
Clearly the REAL marooned boys were Christians and had been raised that way, and acted that way. It is not always like that. China, for example, has both Christians and what are pretty much anti-Christians, in word and deed. Beware your American Christian upbringing blinding you to these kind of people. They ARE real, and pretending that they are not is not a useful plan.
7 people like this.
Reply 17 - Posted by:
Readaholic 5/10/2020 1:00:37 PM (No. 407120)
Excellent read, thanks for posting.
I'll never know why some people feel the need to weigh in just to say they're not interested in reading the article. Narcissism, I suppose.
6 people like this.
Reply 18 - Posted by:
KanCreeper 5/10/2020 2:10:09 PM (No. 407193)
Interesting tale. It seems the unanswered question is: If one took six of the Posters from this site: Put them on a deserted island. Is the result, another Ata Island 'success story'(?) Or is it just another tale of life spinning into the abyss, envisioned in 1934 by Golding ?
3 people like this.
Reply 19 - Posted by:
Timber Queen 5/10/2020 3:23:45 PM (No. 407265)
FTA: "It’s time we told a different kind of story. The real Lord of the Flies is a tale of friendship and loyalty; one that illustrates how much stronger we are if we can lean on each other."
I beg to differ a bit with the author. At the foundation of the friendship and loyalty was daily prayer and song. I admit to having parochial pride that the boys of 'Ata were students at a Catholic boarding school. "Lord of the Flies" was written by a man with a dark soul, but just a few years later a real-world experience showed the power of faith, hope and love offered to us by Jesus Christ.
4 people like this.
Reply 20 - Posted by:
caljeepgirl 5/10/2020 4:59:18 PM (No. 407339)
LOL, #18! Actually, I'm with #11 on this one.
Golding's book, to this day, remains one of my all-time favorites! I also read it in my mid-teens; it was a bit of a turning-point in my understanding of human nature and definitely opened my eyes....in a good way. Nevertheless, we never lost sight of the fact that it was, after all, fiction.
2 people like this.
Reply 21 - Posted by:
FLCracker 5/10/2020 6:26:08 PM (No. 407370)
You know, #18, they have a whole television series to test this out: "Survivor."
0 people like this.
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