To be able to maintain order in a society, there must be a set of rules that everyone must follow. Without rules, destruction and violence may occur. The article, "The Rules are All We’ve Got," by Sidney H. Schanberg found in the New York Times and the novel Lord of the Flies, by William Golding help to prove that rules are important and needed in a society. The article discusses the idea that New York City is turning into a place without rules. The novel is an example of how people in a society become destructive and violent because they break the rules. Both pieces of literature stress the importance of rules and they display and explain how rules maintain order in a society.

"The Rules are All We’ve Got," by Sidney H. Schanberg discusses how too many rules are being broken and as a result evil is being shown in people. The article describes in detail, numerous cases when people have broken the rules and as a result people end up hurt or killed. For example, a person form Connecticut walked into the area of Times Square before dawn half-naked and other human beings ridiculed him to his death on a subway track. One witness stated, "They did it to have fun." Another witness claimed "They had nothing better to do." This shows how low humans may go and to what point they will break the rules. Schanberg said, "the rules are all that stand between us and anti -civilization." This quotation stresses that our society will function in a chaotic and in an unruly way. He also says that the person who turns the other way eventually becomes united with the original lawbreaker. Another vital point that he makes in the article is how young people have no regard for the authority or other people’s rights which is a symbol of the city’s lawlessness. Sgt. William Snyder says how people see something they want, and they will do whatever it takes to get it, despite the fact that they know they will have to serve time for their crime. "The Rules are All We’ve Got," by Sidney H. Schanberg is a perfect example of how people disregard the rules for no apparent reason.

Lord of the Flies, by William Golding is another perfect example of how violence and destruction breaks out when people break the rules. For example, Jack broke the rules and did not care at all. As a result, savagery broke out among the boys. The novel and the article have a variety of things in common. Just like Schanberg said in his article that the people who first turn their heads soon emerge with the evil people, happened in the novel. For example, at first Sam’n’eric stayed with Ralph and Piggy, however they eventually switched to Ralph’s tribes and painted their face like the other boys because they were basically forced to join the tribe and if they did not they were afraid of getting hurt by Jack or Roger. Another example of innocent people becoming involved with the savages is when Piggy and Ralph did not stop the others from murdering Simon. Piggy said to Ralph, "It was an accident…that’s what it was. An accident." (p. 157). This shows how innocent people like Piggy and Ralph get involved with terrible actions and they cannot admit that it was also their fault and they were also apart of this horrific action. One more example of violence that occurs in the novel is a game that the boys play. After a few boys hunted a pig, they came up with the idea to pretend that one of the boys would be a pretend pig and they would try to "kill it." However, the game got to the point where Robert, the one being poked at was getting hurt, he even said, "Ow! Stop it! You’re hurting!" (p. 114). However they still continued on with the game. This shows what a vicious mind young boys have. Golding uses symbolism to prove his idea that rules are needed. For example, the conch represents authority, organization, and respectfulness. This is what kept the boys together. Once the conch shattered into a thousand white pieces, the society broke up and became even more ruined and the boys became more violent. Lord of the Flies, proves that rules are necessary and beneficial especially to maintain civilization.

The article, "The Rules are All We’ve Got," and the novel, Lord of the Flies, both stress the importance of rules and they display and explain how rules maintain order in a society. Sidney Schanberg shows in the article how people in New York disregard the rules to the point where they will do whatever it takes to get what they want. William Golding shows in his novel how rules cannot be broken because if they are, it only leads to trouble. Both the article and the novel discuss and prove why rules are needed and are vital to a society and what happens if the rules are broken.