After reading...

“Shooting an Elephant” by George Orwell

Elaborating on all the processes before and after the author got to shoot
the elephant he proposed a completely different view of the nature of
imperialism. He was forced to shoot the elephant, which was so raving to
trample down a Burman led to death but soon after turned into like a
gentle cow just tearing up bunches of grass, by the multitude surrounding
him and clamoring to make the elephant dead. And for not being laughed
at by the native crowd he eventually and unwillingly kill the naive animal.
In sum, the nature of imperialism he had experienced was that the
colonizer is rather controlled and pressured by a feeling of having to
impress on the colonist of strong and bold image, in other words, a
colonizer’s personal belief and willingness is neglected, and invaded by a
pressure of imperialism. It is so much different from the images we have
usually conceived about imperialism: a tyrant’s maniacal control and
suppression of the poor crowd. Some people would criticize that this
author’s view of imperialism can minimize the brutality perpetrated by a lot
of imperialists but rather lead readers to feel hatred against the massive
colonist that forced their ruler to make the involuntary choice of killing
the elephant. Of course, at first glance, this kind of criticism may be
plausible because while reading this essay I was also captivated by a feeling
against the crowd of madness that led to the death of the elephant.
However, the kind of expressions used to describe imperialism seems to
have more impact to accuse both of external and internal contradictions of
imperialism. Not only the visible cruelty of the colonizer’s violence and
oppression to the colonist, which is well known to us but the invisible
brutality of suppressing a colonizer to perpetrate merciless acts for being
shown like a conqueror by the native colonist are all revealing the hideous
properties of it: not concerning of personal life, values, or beliefs but
obsessing with exploiting a colony only for their interest. And all these
properties are covered up beneath the ridiculous shallow ideology of “by
superiorities governing inferiorities to enlighten them and make their lives
much better.” Therefore, this essay leads us to reconsider the nature of
imperialism and alerts us not to make the same mistakes of past
imperialists.