Where Did The Innocence Go?

Authors Note: In my Language Arts class we are reading a book called The Outsiders. In my essay I will be talking about how the Greasers loss their innocence.

A child running through the park chasing his dog, a toddler giggling as he drops his cheerios on the floor, and a team of pee-wee baseball players cheering when their teammate makes it to first base are all examples of innocence.  Children should be allowed to experience joy and innocence, but too often kids these days have innocence taken from them too early.  An example of this are the Greasers from the book The Outsiders.  The characters in The Outsiders experience the loss of their innocence.

First, Kids look for role models throughout their childhood.  Most often, these role models are their parents.  For the Greasers, this was not the case.  The Curtis brothers lost their parents in a sudden car crash.  Johnny's parents physically and mentally abuse him.  Dally grew up in the rigid streets of New York City and became very violent without the role model of a parent.  All of these boys couldn't rely on their parents and experienced a deep loss of innocence because of this fact.

Society is a part of a community  that is a unit distinguishable by particular aims of standards of living or conduct.  This definition shows that society has standards, which it can impose on those who are not the same.  The Greasers do not live up to the standards of society and are harshly judged.  There was a time when Johnny and Pony Boy walked past a burning church and rescued children from the flames. When they came back home some people thought of them as heroes, but many people had a hard time believing that they actually saved those kids. Also the Socs always bully the Greasers, and are looking to pick a fight because there a tiny bit different. There was a time when Johnny and Pony boy, were just smoking in the park minding their own business. The Socs drive by looking for a fight, and beat them up like their not even human.  These examples of being judged, and bullied in society, helped them loose their innocence, and not trust people.

To add on to that, the Greasers were forced to take adult roles at a veritable young age. Some reasons are, Darry had to let go of his dreams of becoming someone in America and threw that away by dropping out of school, to work two jobs. Why he did this is to provide shelter, clothing, food so he can keep Ponyboy and Sodapop out of adoption centers and foster homes. By growing up very early, The Greasers lost their innocence by not having the innocence of childhood.

These many reasons obviously show that these adolescent  boys experienced loss of innocence at a quite young age. From the boys not being able to find a role model, or not being able to trust people, or even experiencing taking adult roles at a precisely young age. Losing you're innocence in life can easily lead you down the wrong path, and some people can't help losing it, so don't judge wealthy to not wealthy, or good background to not so good background.