After reading the novel, The Outsider by Stephen King, my belief that people are too quick to judge others was greatly reinforced. Naturally, when it comes to judging the choices of others, as well as their physical appearance, most people are too rash in formulating their own, harsh opinions. The plot of the novel begins with Terry Maitland, a teacher and local little league baseball coach, being arrested in front of the entire town during one of his little league games.
The local police department had reason to believe Terry had raped, and kill an eleven-year-old boy in a nearby park. This incident, on its own, affected him for the rest of his life. In today’s society, people are very judgmental on social media and other platforms. They base their judgments on other’s appearances, how many followers they have or how many like the photographs they have posted have gotten, along with the spreading of false rumors.
The Outsider magnifies the notion in the modern day of people being too quick to judge others. In the novel, a young adolescent boy was raped, tragically murdered and dismembered by an unknown suspect in a nearby park. Without coming to a definite conclusion with their investigation, the local police department decided to go through with arresting Terry Maitland, whom they had little evidence on nor information from him directly, in front of the entire town for the murder of this eleven-year-old boy.
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Troy Ramage, a police officer working the case, said “cuff him right there and cuff him in front….I know and I don’t care I want everyone to see him let away in the cuffs got it”(King), because he was personally affected and deemed Terry as the culprit. This caused extreme chaos and mayhem in the entire town, which caused everyone to turn against Terry and his family.
Everyone had thought that Terry had committed this horrendous crime, which completely tarnished his image and his reputation. The police force and the town were extremely too quick to judge that Terry had done this unspeakable action without even questioning him first. They deiced to arrest him in the presence of everyone, just because they felt that he was guilty.
As they went into a further investigation, Terry was later proven innocent. The town convicted Terry as guilty without proven innocent, which is extremely backward. It should be innocent till proven guilty. Later in the book, there is a huge plot twist, which caused the entire town and the police department to rethink they everything. If only they would have not judge Terry, they would have found the real culprit sooner rather than later. In today’s society, people on social media are very judgmental about appearances, how many followers they have or the number of likes the photograph that they have posted acquires, as well as spreading false rumors.
In magazines today, celebrities are constantly fighintg one rumor after another. A magazine company can completely “trash” someone image, by printing false rumors and lies. For instance, there was a terrible rumor that “Khloe Kardashian was OJ Simpson’s daughter” (usweekly), but of course, Kris Jenner squashed that rumor by making Khloe, and the rest of the family, take a paternity test on the show. This shows how one small rumor can gravely affect multiple people lives and reputations, and how fast one false rumor can go around.
I choose to read The Outsider by Stephen King because of the very interesting blurb on the back of the book, as well as the fact that my older cousin, Syndey, was reading it and I was intrigued to hear about the twisting plot. The blurb on the back of the book was so thrilling and enticing that I simply could not put the book down. The intense storyline, along with the development of the characters had me hooked. The novel had so many twists and turns in the plot that it was like I was on a rollercoaster. There were so many ups and downs in Terry’s life that it was as if I was feeling his hardships within my own life.
After reading The Outsider by Stephen King, my views that people are commonly too quick to judge others was maintained. In a personal experience, I was involved in a gossip rumor that spread around the entire school that hurt my appearnace. It had a negative effect on my friendships. Fortunately, I did not let this rumor affect for too long. I let the most important people in my life know that it was false and that was all that mattered. The rumor eventually faded and life was back to normal.
Works Cited
- King, Stephen. The Outsider. Hodder & Stoughton, 2018.
- “O.J. Simpson: I’m Not Khloe Kardashian’s Dad.” Us Weekly, 10 Jan. 2018, www.usmagazine.com/celebrity-news/news/o-j-simpson-im-not-khloe-kardashians-dad/.
