Iago In Shakespeare's Othello

In every book, movie, or TV show, the so called “heroes” are typically the people who are the villains. “Heroes” tend to think that a villain is just a crazed lunatic trying to destroy the world, but that isn’t always the case. Every villainous act had some sort of motive that drives the villain to carry out these deeds. Iago is an ideal paragon of this ordeal. Even though Iago does commit some treacherous deeds, he must of had some sort of motive for doing so. Possibly you could call him an antihero then. So what are his motives? Clearly he has some sort of vendetta against Othello, but is that racism, or rather just bitterness? Maybe it’s PTSD. Even though some people think that Iago is a diabolical villain, it’s presumably thought that he may suffer from a psychological disorder that developed during his childhood. “PTSD is an anxiety disorder that can occur following the experience or witnessing a traumatic event” (Source A). This is the definition of PTSD, and many PTSD victims usually are victims because of events that they witnessed

Some people would call that racist though, but when you think about it Iago hates everyone. He even says several times, throughout the play, that he thinks Roderigo is a stupid Venetian fool. Iago also doesn’t like his wife, Desdemona, nor Cassio for that matter. When you think about it, maybe he’s just bitter. In source B the author says, “ baby “racism” isn’t intentional, or even conscious. Scientists have learned that it has a lot to do with the way we learn to visually categorize objects, people, and things in the early days of brain development.” So if that was the case then everyone would be racist wouldn’t they? There's some room for disagreement with this source, though, mainly because even though scientists claim facts such as the one stated above, they seem pretty far