Prompt:
Think carefully about the issue presented in the following excerpt and the assignment below.
Society places great value on being well-informed. People who keep up with current events in their communities and the world at large are generally proud of their knowledge. But often the news is bad, and, worse still, we usually cannot do anything to change the situations or circumstances we learn about. In that case, isn’t it better not to know what’s going on?
Assignment:
Is it better not to know what is going on if we cannot do anything about it? Plan and write an essay in which you develop your point of view on this issue. Support your position with reasoning and examples taken from your reading, studies, experience, or observations.
Response:
Ignorance is not bliss. In fact, being oblivious to what is going on elsewhere can be highly detrimental to one’s growth as a person and is equivalent to having a very narrow outlook on things. Instances from literature and history demonstrate that it is better to know of the happenings in the world even if one’s hands are tied.
In the novel 1984 by George Orwell, the citizens of Oceania are completely misinformed about the events in the outside world. On some days their government is at war with Eastasia and on other days with Eurasia. However, the people limit themselves into being concerned only about their own lives as they are afraid to rebel against a seemingly omnipotent government. They cannot do anything about this oppressive government simply because they do not know how to go about it. However, when Winston, a party worker, finds access to information about real events in the real world, he proceeds to covertly share it with the rest of the people. A revolution starts and the party is overthrown. This goes to show that although Winston could not have done anything with this information on his own, collectively the people were able to redeem themselves as a nation. Clearly, it was better to know what was going on than to remain in oblivion.
As evinced by the uprising in Belgium in 1857, what could have turned out to be a massive civil war was prevented as Belgian leaders had learnt crucial lessons from the Irish civil war of 1849—a war that arose due to very similar reasons—a clash between Catholics and Protestants. Although the Belgians did not hold any stakes in the Irish civil war, they learnt many vital things from it and were able to restore harmony in their country as a result. Simply knowing about occurrences outside their nation, the Belgians were able to prevent such a devastating fate from befalling their own nation.
Recently, when Edward Snowden blew the whistle on America’s government when they were spying on American citizens, he let Americans know what was going on in their own country. Americans had no idea of the government’s breach of their privacy as officials went through their e-mails, personal messages and social media accounts. Although Snowden could not have done anything with his knowledge by himself, he let others know about it so that they could.
After analyzing these examples, it is safe to conclude that it is much better to know what is going on even if we cannot directly do anything about it.