<p>"Are widely held views often wrong or are such views more likely to be correct?"</p>
<p>In most cases widely held views prove to be wrong at last, despite their apparent and superficial meaningfulness and significance. The mere concept of something "widely held" implies all what we need to support this thesis: how can something like this be true for everyone, how can it prove to be correct in all circumstances?
Life provides us with thousands of different backgrounds and daily happenings and, consequently, there's absolutely nothing able to adjust itself to all these cases. </p>
<p>"Widely held views" mostly turn out to be just the easiest and most common models to follow and this is clearly shown by Ray Bradbury's dystopian novel "Fahrenheit 451".
Captain Beatty and his firemen are in charge of a peculiar way of censorship: the burning of books. In this sort of anti-intellectual and oppressive dictatorship people are persuaded and talked into burning books and rejecting their knowledge, seen as threatening weapons. In fact books can impart knowledge and give people awareness of themselves. Ray Bradbury shows us how we have to fight (like the main character Guy Montag) against prejudice and commonly held views, which are often a cloak under which ignorance lurks.
In fact Guy Montag fights his way and is aware of his own ideas, inspired by another free thinker, Clarisse McClellan. These characters try to question their lifes and not to accept everything as dogmatically true, and they represent a bright symbol of cleverness and intellectual independence.
Bradbury tries to warn us not to take anything for granted and to prompt us to differ from the mainstream view whenever we think it right. </p>
<p>This theme is also dealt with in the comedy "The Merchant of Venice" by Shakespeare.
Shylock is commonly seen as the wicked character par excellence, because of his seemingly unquenchable thirst for money. Shylock is considered as a greedy moneylender by each of the characters in the comedy, but we may also take the hint that he's loathed because of his Jewish descent.
If we examine the plot of the comedy carefully, we can see that Shylock only wants what has been promised to him.
Shakespeare himself gives him one of his most eloquent speeches, in which Shylock claims that men are fundamentally the same, despite of their different beliefs and ideas. He discusses a very delicate issue in this comedy, but he's certainly confident when he declares that widely held views, evein if predominant and in most cases "victorious", are not always right. On the contrary, Shakespeare wants men to "do it their own way", to think carefully before giving one's consent and to abhor prejudices. </p>
<p>This thesis is also supported through Julia's actions in the novel 1984 by George Orwell.
In Orwel's dreadful and futuristic society, the world has been taken over by three super-states. In one of them, Oceania, the power is held by The Party, ruled by Big Brother, who imposes his authority and opinions on the people, unable to revolt against him.
The common view of people is not the correct one, since it's been imposed by Big Brother as means to gradually erode their ability to think for themselves. Julia pretends to obey the orders of the Party but actually she still has the strength to distinguish between good and evil, between what she thinks and what she's compelled to think.
So Orwell, through Julia, stirs us to action, encourages us to reject undiscerning orders and to figth for our freedom of thought. </p>
<p>After a careful analysis of these characters' behaviors, widely held views do prove to be wrong as a logical consequence of the inevitable generality of the principles they preach. Each human being is unique and must behave as such and assert his right to say what he thinks; and since there are nearly 7 billion different opinions on earth, no wonder that widely held views turn out to be just an alluring chimera. </p>
<p>Is it that bad?
Thanks in advance</p>
but I’ve been practicing for a long time on determined issues (yeah I learnt a set of good examples and I can always fit them in almost any essay, even if I have to “adapt” them a bit too much imo lol). In this case 25 minutes are enough! :)</p>