After reading “Those Who Walk Away from Omelas” by Ursula K. Le Guin, a question that caught my attention was: what does the story about our happiness as a society? To answer this question we must first understand what constitutes the society we live in today. This story tells the life of Omelas, the happiest and most beautiful city in the world, but the reason why this city makes people happy is to imprison an innocent child. Then, in the last part of the story, people choose to leave the city. In a distant country, there is a place like Tao Yuanming's peach garden; It's called Omelas. There are beautiful mountains and fresh air. There is no government, no army, no war, no crime. No judges and no police. Just like the world of utopia in our text. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay However, the city has an open secret: there is a basement under the castle in the center of the city. The door to the room was locked and there were no windows. There was a child inside and no one knew him. However, no one did anything for him. Because the child's suffering made the city happy, the people knew that once he was released, fed and warmed, the city's splendor would go up in smoke. Many adults know the child but do not look at him, instead using him as a creative motivator or reminder of their own conscience. Many children from the city visited him in the basement. They were very excited and angry. However, if they had shown sympathy for the child, the city would have been destroyed. Many children grow up and behave like other adults. However, a group of people went to see the child, saw the horror and left. Instead of returning home to Omelas, they went to a place we couldn't imagine. No one knew where he was, not even them. They just walked through the beautiful city gate of Omelas and started to walk out of Omelas. The story has been treated as a classic critical examination of the philosophical thought experiment of utilitarianism. If you support the imprisonment of this child, then you are a utilitarian. This interpretation, like many other stories, is oversimplified and embedded in realistic philosophical thinking. It is absurd to apply a philosophical theory derived from a virtual history to reality. This story can be told without explanation. It can never be right. Of course, it can be said that the elements of this story symbolize real society. However, this is more of a literary association than a grim analogy. For example, some people understand that the children in this story represent the sweatshops of third world countries and that the citizens represent developed countries. The two analogies sound similar, but they don't apply to each other at all. Because of the opposition to child detention, the analogy is against sweatshops. It is not rigorous, especially now that we know that there are still many people who want to bring these factories back to their homeland. There are other stories like you can kill one person and save nineteen others. There is no difference between building a theory from these fictional stories and thinking that killing someone in a game is murder. Besides these overinterpreted fictions, there are also good philosophical allegories such as Plato's cave, John Locke's primitive society, and so on. . There are two essential differences between these appropriated fairy tales and the fictional stories that precede them. The first is that these specific allegories are all so abstract that they can be accepted as real, similar to mathematics. Those virtual stories do it allto make them concrete to appear real, but they increasingly make them false and particular cases. However detailed these stories are, however precise the characteristics, it is impossible to think about them seriously. “It will never happen to me anyway,” they saythink. Instead, no one thinks, "what's the problem?" I will never be in that cave.' Another is the allegory of the figurative exposition of the theory that philosophers have constructed starting from reality. Just as Plato's cave was based on a more realistic ideal world, John Locke's primitive society was based on people born with these rights. If you don't agree with the premises, the allegory is invalid. However, in these fictional stories there are no such premises, or they no longer make sense. These stories go in the opposite direction, creating a story and then building a theory based on that story. Also, judging people for and against the story. The best choice for philosophical thinking is not to use these fables, but real cases and events. When people treat Omelas as a philosophical fable, they ignore their literary value. Le Guin uses unique storytelling to create this story. He is neither a spectator with subjective and objective colors, nor a character in the story, but the creator of the city directly explains and presents the city to readers, just as he sells a product. So he would directly defend the authenticity of the city, as in the story that says, Omelas has a subway? If it makes the citizens happy, of course, it does. The best quote from this story would be this: 'The problem is that we have a bad habit. Encouraged by peat and sophisticates to regard happiness as something rather stupid, only pain is intellectual, only evil is interesting etc.' This is now for many literary works perfect irony; an evil character is the brilliant one, a good character is the naive and false one. Le Guin already knew that readers would use this tone to question the truth of the story, so she answered those questions directly in the story. Sometimes the answer can come before the question. Another exciting aspect of this story is that the citizens of Omelas are aware of the existence of this imprisoned child and his relationship with himself. As Le Guin explains, these are not people who have been brainwashed into naivety, but people who know these things wisely. Furthermore, they still feel sorry for the child, which seems to contradict the story. Shouldn't the people of Omelas be happy? Why are you so sad now? However, if they were happy with the imprisoned child, they would hardly be called kind and happy, more like a gang of bandits dividing the loot. This is very similar to the fact that people in heaven will be sad to see hell, but this means that they are happy in heaven. This kind of sympathy and sadness for the child is probably an essential part of the well-being of these citizens. Since they realize that their happiness has a price, not in vain was the child's pain. Therefore, they will appreciate the happiness they have now, instead of being greedy and indulgent. The same goes for many things in life. When people know the struggles behind many accomplishments, they will respect and appreciate the people who work hard to achieve them. Looking at the secondary source "The Talking Porcupine Liberates Utopia: Le Guin's 'Omelas' as Pretext to the Dance" by Kenneth Roemer. There was a fascinating quote regarding the interpreter problem: “Of course, there are compelling alternative readings to the narrator's invitation strategy. She could be accused of a blatant cop-out, of an unwillingness to work out the details of Utopia; or it could be accused of cleverly involving us in the2)