Fight Club- Rebellion in Society Essay

In the novel Fight Club, Chuck Palahniuk uses the Fight Club, Project Mayhem, and its members to illustrate their need to rebel against the aspects of society they deem flawed. One of the main characters, Tyler Durden, acts as the protagonist and the antagonist in many different ways. Tyler, along with the narrator of the book start up a fight club so that they could let their frustrations at their lives and society out in a fist fight. The main thing about this is that its not about the fighting to them, its about the release and the freedom. It allows them to rebel against what society regards as normal and perfect. Most guys are at fight club because of something theyre too scared to fight. After a few fights, youre afraid a lot less (54). The men are at fight club because of something in their life thats not going the way they feel it should, or rather how society says it should. Fight club lets them realize that its ok because life isnt all that great anyhow. Tyler preaches that they will all die one day so they might as well accept that, because once they can accept their fate, they would be free to do anything. Until they could do that, they were useless to him because Tyler needed people who hit rock bottom. Palahniuk emphasizes that society has grown increasingly materialistic and that all people do are work at jobs they hate to buy things they dont need. Project Mayhem was started in the novel to be the buffer, a sort of socio-terrorist movement to rebel against society and bring it down to how they feel it should be. Tylers philosophy was that if everyone went back to zero and had to start all over, then things would be better. Attempting to give people what they thought were better lives were their acts of rebellion against society. Works Cited Fight Club, Chuck Palahniuk