Analyzing Ender's Argumentative Essay

We learn from this scenario that Ender has come to believe that the only rational policy to insure one’s safety in the world is to be ready always to inflict grievous bodily harm on anyone who threatens him. No adult, authority, law, or social institution may be relied upon. “The power to cause pain is the only power that matters, the power to kill and destroy, because if you can’t kill then you are always subject to those who can, and nothing and no one will ever save you.” (p 232) Despite the revelation of this philosophy, after the fight is over the reader is once again reassured that Ender is at heart a pacifist. When another boy justifies the fate of Bonzo, Ender weeps. (3) “I didn’t want to hurt him!” he insists. “Why didn’t he just leave me alone!” (p. 233)

It is also not until this point that the reader learns that Ender also killed Stilson in their schoolyard brawl at the novel’s ouset. The administrators of the Battle School have hidden these facts from Ender, but this has the interesting effect of keeping the killings from the reader too, divorcing the consequences of Ender’s violence from the acts, reducing the likelihood that some readers might make a moral judgement of Ender that conflicts with the