Alienation in American Society
I agree that man’s alienation from himself, alienation from fellow man and alienation from the world in which he lives exist in the world today.
“He is alienated from the situation in which he is involved and, at the same time, alienated from himself,” the article says, because “when he witnesses the agony of a dying man, can only think of taking a picture, it shows the cleavage between prize-seeking photographer and the human being in him.” Taking a photograph doesn’t mean he is alienated from the situation. If he were a doctor and could have helped the man but he stopped just to take a photo then I think there would be a problem there. However, since he had no medical training to help the dying man, he used his skill in photography to capture the moment.
The article says how the examples illustrate how far indifference toward others has gone and how alienated the man of our time is. The examples about the segregated church and the attack in Kew Gardens show that people would rather have other people act first than to act themselves. I’m sure everyone who overheard the screams of the victim thought that someone else would call the police, therefore they didn’t have to. Is this alienation or just plain laziness or lack of initiative?
