Ivy Anderson

CIS110

9.4.2014

While reading the book A Long Way Gone, I noticed many forms of
communication amongst Ishmael, his friends, family, and even strangers from his
town. Most of the communication along the beginning of the book is unethical
behavior because times were extremely hard for the young men in the book. One
example of this unethical communication is when the boys are stealing food from
other people in the villages, there was no peaceful negotiation there. Even though the
boys were hungry and had a very hard time getting nourished in this life or death
situation, stealing is wrong and is a huge example of unethical behavior, chasing
down children to steal food is a form of communication in itself. Although Ishmael
and his friends were hungry and in a life or death situation, it is still unethical to steal
no matter the situation. This kind of behavior is unethical because we as a society
have declared so, as following the 7th commandment from the Bible; Thou shalt not
steal. Taking things that belong to someone else is wrong, and chasing someone to
give them something you want, out of fear is also wrong.
While I just identified an example of unethical communication behavior from
A Long Way Gone, I noticed that there are many ethical behaviors and
communication between Ishmael and others. I read about how the boys try to keep
each other safe by taking turns watching and sleeping. They tried protecting each
other and stick together because they cared about the lives of each other. This is
ethical because the boys are thinking of each other and not only for themselves, even
when the times are rough.