Lather and Nothing Else by Hernando Tellez is a short story written about two men on opposite sides of the political spectrum. Torres, the tough Dictator comes into get a shave from the Barber, a shy Revolutionary.
For my piece of media I found an article that has a thematic connection to the story in a sense that people care too much about what others think. It talks about how people crave approval from others. People generally think in terms if others will accept the choices they make. That is exactly what the barber did. He seemed to base most of his decision on the people in his town, and how they would react to the decision to kill.
Here is a section from the article:
Who’s in control of your life? Who’s pulling your strings? For the majority of us, it’s other people – society, colleagues, friends, family or our religious community. We learned this way of operating when we were very young, of course. We were brainwashed. We discovered that feeling important and feeling accepted was a nice experience and so we learned to do everything we could to make other people like us. We didn’t want to be singled out by the crowd for being different because this wasn’t such a nice feeling. We learned this way of being so well that, as adults, we continue – mostly through mutual peer pressure – to keep each other in check. Like sheep without any need for a sheepdog, we keep each other in line.
Torres has killed a lot of people on the Revolutionary side and the Barber decides it'd be better for society if he did apply that little bit of pressure with his razor, and slit Torres's throat. Why wouldn't he do it? What stops him? The answer... Society.
The Barber cares too much what people think of him. He wants to be known as a good man, and he doesn't want this to ruin is reputation and his life. In the story, the barber thinks to himself, "'The murderer of Captain Torres. He slit his throat while he was shaving him. What a cowardly thing to do.’" People don’t want to do thing they know they will be scolded for. They want to do whatever they can do to stay at a certain status level.
Peer pressure is a very difficult thing to overcome. No matter what you do, you are always being judged in one way or another. This is an unfortunate thing, but it's true. The barber knew this and thought the people would think he's a coward for slitting his throat. He wanted to be a hero and kill this awful man, but he was too scared.
The barber clearly expresses that he is considering killing Torres, “I can turn my wrist slightly, put a bit more pressure on the blade, let it sink in.” Although he could easily kill Torres, he chooses not to. He prides himself on being a consciences barber. He will not do anything to risk that - “The pores might open, minutely, in this area and let out a tiny drop of blood. A good barber like myself stakes his reputation on not permitting that to happen to any of his customers.” The barber doesn’t want people to look at him differently. Everyone wants to be praised and accepted. The article states that “We discovered that feeling important and feeling accepted was a nice experience and so we learned to do everything we could to make other people like us.”
In conclusion, the thematic connection between Lather and Nothing Else and the article I have selected is people want to be accepted, peer pressure, and the fact that people make decisions based on what others would want. Everyone considers what others think and base their chooses on that. People care what others think, and that will probably never change.
