Fight Club Conformity Analysis Essay

Conformity is a major theme in Fight Club, and there are a number of particular proposition scenes that pomp the rejection of it and characters f all tolding victim to it, some beats unbeknownst to them. The vote counter, our main character, is a k nonty individual. He fits into almost every textbook example of social psychology. He is a complete nut shimmy. In fact, he is so incredibly insane, that he creates an imaginary superstar with whom he transforms himself into a different person, bare(a) from the bonds of rescript, free from conformity, free to change the way he lives. Or does he?The contain starts off with the bank clerk losing sleep, for what reason we arent sure. He then subject to tell us how he lived his life. He works a 9 to 5 job in a cubicle with people that trick up business casual. He owns a small apartment filled with furniture, appliances, and hitherto up dishware that he felt defined him best as a person. His Strinne green striped sofa. Rislampa wire lamps do out of environmentally-friendly unbl distributivelyed paper. The Hovvetrekke inhabitation Exerbike. He is obsessed with creating a self-image that is socially acceptable to otherwises in his life.The storyteller starts breaking out of this normative mold when he meets Tyler Durden. He yet proposes during a montage of his daily routine on the job, If you raise up up in a different time, in a different place, could you wake up as a different person? Tyler is his fellow plotter in his personal resistance, his partner in crime. He needed psyche else to resist the social norms with, so he took the easy way out, and made superstar up.After the tellers apartment blows up, he grabs a couple drinks with his new imaginary friend, and then shacks up with him. They start conflict nights in the parking lot behind Lous tavern. As their host grows larger, they move it to Lous basement. The more Tyler and the gang meet at their controvert club, the little the narrator cares nearly his job and life, and the more anti-conformist he becomes. He strolls into work disheveled and with dried blood on his shirt. Hes missing some teeth. He smokes indoors. He in force(p) doesnt arrest a shit.At bingle point our two main characters consider on a bus. The Narrator glances up at a Gucci ad and says, I felt sorry for guys packed into gyms trying to look alike(p) how Calvin Klein or Tommy Hilfiger said they should, and remarking to Tyler, Is that what a opus looks like? to which he responds, self-reformation is masturbationnow, self destructionThis particular scene is very ironic, as the Narrator is shunning something that he actually wants to beTyler is a s healthfuling of his ideal self. He even reveals this in the hotel room scene where the Narrator realizes that they are the aforementioned(prenominal)(p) person All the ways you wish you could be, thats me. I look like you wanna look, I fuck like you wanna fuck, I am smart, capable, and most importantly, I am free in all the ways that you are not. Therefore, the Narrator is actually conforming by creating a self that is generally more likeable and accepted in societys eyes. He caves in to normative social influence, and at the same time reckons that he has completely rejected it. There is a divalent meaning to this however, in the one line that starts it off You were looking for a way to change your life. You could not do this on your own.Tyler was the ally the Narrator needed to break the monotony of his daily routine, to break free from normative social influence. We need just one other person to believe in the cause. There can be a leader, but cryptograph will happen just because of one person. If you are starting a movement, or a revolution in this case, at least one other person needs to inwardness your cause, and believe in it. That one appendage needs to privately accept the fact that what you are public lecture about, what you preach, is the actual truth. And, as more p eople join a movement, the less risky it is for others to join. Fight club. This was mine and Tylers gift. Our gift to the world. Tyler gave every mean(prenominal) man the keys to himself, the one everybody wants to be.As their fight club grows progressively larger, it raises the enquire why are so many others conforming to something that they would normally never take part in? Are they rejecting social norms as well? Or has this fight club in turn become the norm, and thence members are joining it to fit in?Perhaps it is a case of minority influence, when a few influence the many.Tyler and the Narrator stick out held the same viewpoint for a while now, months even, that they do not care about clever art or Swedish furniture, and they are comfortable admitting that they involve scars from fighting. With this unwavering view, others start to take notice, and even begin to respect their ideology. They join fight club to become loyal members. After a while, Tyler decides that they have to expand or move out of the basement, and hence creates view massacre. throng do not always cave into peer pressure. If that is true, then when do we break? When do we give in and conform? According to Bibb genus Phallus Latans social impact theory, it all depends on three specific factors strength, how important the throng is to you immediacy, how close the group is to you in space and time and the number of people in the group. The last factor operates differently than you readiness think howeverthe larger a group is, the less each additional person has an influence on others. Ever since starting the graduation exercise fight club, Nortons character has garnered such a reputation that he has gained a following. deal start showing up on his doorstep, delay and waiting until they gain permission to enter the house and start training. A sole applicant dressed in all black waits on their porch, by himself, for what appears to be days on end. Tyler comes out a negotiatio n smack, beats him with a broom, and talks some more smack. But the applicant isnt dismission to give up easy.He wants to be accepted, and is involuntary to put himself through this rigorous test to become Project havocs frontmost member. After Tyler lets him in, he shaves his head, with Tyler remarking that he looks like a monkey ready to dig into space. He has mentioned this earlier in the fool away The first soap was made from the ashes of heroes like the first monkey shot into space Without pain, without sacrifice, we would have nothing. As soon as the first member is in, two more show up on the doorstep. It grows and grows and grows until Project Mayhem is no longer a small group, but an army. The Narrator says during this rank Sooner or later, we all became what Tyler wanted us to be. Which was what? Mindless, obedient robots. And, since the first (and second) rule of Project Mayhem is you do not ask questions, not a single member can question the tasks they are given, a nd and then are forced to conform to Tylers (or for the sake of making sense, the Narrators) wishes.Like the Milgram experimentsand the My Lai massacre, Tylers robots are so obedient, that they wont vacillate and question their actions or accept personal responsibilitythey just do it. Tyler is capitalizing on the fact that they respect him for who he is and what he has done. They believe in Tyler and his decisions (In Tyler we trusted), as he was every members ally when they wanted to break out of their social norms and become the man they have always wanted to be. Obviously everybody thought about it. People do it every day. People talk to themselves, people see themselves as theyd like to be. Their basement get-togethers were right in everyones eccentricTyler just made it visible. It was on the tip of everyones tongue Tyler just gave it a name.Without the ability to question authority, Tylers space monkeys start wreaking havoc all across the city. It started out as homework ass ignments, destroying satellite antennas, magnetizing moving-picture show rentals, and defacing billboards. Then it was amped up trashing franchise coffee bars, serveting buildings on fire, and blowing up pieces of corporate art. Members of Project Mayhem are comfortable with this, because according to their set of rules, they have no names. This is deindividuation at its finest. With such a large group of people, all in this case anonymous, nobody takes any responsibility for their actions. They even wear ski masks on a couple of their assignments, further deindividualizing them. A study done by Robert Watson in 1973 found that warriors who hid their identities before going into battlefor example, by using face and body paintwere importantly more likely to kill, torture or mutilate captive prisoners than warriors who did not hide their identities.Thanks in part to their ski masks, one of the members of Project Mayhem dies on their last assignment his body is brought back to the ho use. here(predicate) conformity is at its most rampant, as members will snap to whatsoever direction is given in a moments notice. Angel Face (Letos character) tells them to bury the body and immediately they start to lift it off the table. The Narrator stops them, shouting that he is a real person, a friend of his, a man with a name. One member instantly takes this study and transforms it to fit within the properties of their group, claiming in death, members of Project Mayhem, have a name. The other space monkeys surrounding the table then immediately start intonation his name, over and over. It is at this point that our main character snaps, and takes offto attend out what kind of monster he created.