George Orwell drew upon his experience as a British Colonial official stationed in Burma and in India to write his story of “Shooting an Elephant.” He doesn’t personally want to shoot the elephant and cause it to suffer a painful death but because of his position as the representative of British Law he must, and he does after much thought.
After shooting the elephant he is regretting doing the kill at the sight of the elephant laying there suffering. But those feelings aren’t compared to the images of the body that was trampled to death by the elephant that had gone rogue. After seeing all this Orwell has a moment of realization that even when he acts within the law, the law can be conflicting at a time with one’s morals and conscience and in the case of British imperialism, the law does oppose conscience.
In this essay Orwell talks about how the British would laugh at him if he himself were trampled to death by the elephant, so he feels “that would never do” (1258). Therefore, he feels compelled to kill the elephant even though at this time it is not harming anyone or anything. Orwell’s fear of humiliation can represent the motive of the broader British colonial project.
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The imperial police officer who was willing to sacrifice his morals of what is right and wrong in order to save face. Orwell’s fear of humiliation is one of the most important motives in this essay. Orwell has the task of upholding the impenetrable image of the British empire as part of a larger goal. To control the Burmese society. If he is unable to uphold this task, then the Burmese society will see through imperial control and then subsequently cease to respond to the control the police should have over the townspeople. Orwell is the face if you will of the British Empire, making him the subject to the Burmese people’s ridicule or mockery of the empire.
Orwell claims that at the time of the events of the story, he was too young to know how to confront his own personal battles. As we read the story, we see his dilemma become dramatized by the killing of the elephant, we also learn that he has a fear of humiliation and how that motivates him to show the audience that has accumulated for the killing of the elephant that he is a confident and decisive man.
Orwell believes fear of humiliation is what drives the entire British Empire. Being an imperial police officer is an experience of representing the empire as a whole. As the face of the British empire, Orwell is personally subject to the Burmese people’s mockery of the empire. To the Burmese, Orwell is the Empire.
By seeing Orwell’s personal criticisms of that Empire combined with his experience makes him a representative of it, as we read the story, we can reflect on the encountering of the police enforcement, and of representing state power more generally. The personal feelings, faith and fascism of the officer do not matter as long as he is in uniform and thus represents a whole other set of beliefs and feelings.
An officer can not show hesitation when it comes to the shooting of a ravaging elephant. The elephant must die so that Orwell’s pride can live. If he didn’t shoot the elephant then the Burmese would laugh at him and begin to lose respect for the British officers. After considering the effects of the situation he decides shooting the elephant is the best option. He ignores his conscience of right from wrong and shoots the elephant.
Even though he botched the kill he still followed through with this kill to make the Burmese understand who was in charge of the town. A person can decide what to do with a situation by doing something such as killing an elephant to please other people or not kill the elephant and appear to be weak or not good enough to the other people. Either choice is something that a person will have to live with for the rest of their lives.
