As of recent, I have come to the conclusion that Mr Golding was not far off with his novel of a dystopian society run by children. As a matter of fact, I believe we are on our way to achieving this. When you explain this novel to someone who hasn’t read it yet, their first impressions of it are shock and disbelieve, a disregard for the nature and moral message of this fantastic novel. To them, the idea of a child committing acts of such savagery is incomprehensible, let alone an adult. Yet I am one of the very few who actually agree with Golding’s notion that savagery is within us all; all it takes is the right (or wrong) environment to trigger our inhumane, cannibalistic savagery. It may seem like a far stretch to compare the savagery that took place within the novel, to the current affairs in places such as the Middle East, but children are being forced to grow up in an environment where all they know is how to protect themselves from the frequent onslaught. As a result, the abused becomes the abuser, the hunted become the hunters, and thus a vicious cycle emerges. A child’s innocence is so easily snatched from them today.

“Maybe there is a beast… maybe it’s only us.”