Honor: an outdated tool in All Quiet on the Western Front and The Gate to Women's Country Honor system has existed for a long time in human society. Many countries nowadays still use it to praise the people who contribute a lot and encourage people to work hard. In novel The Gate to Women's Country by Sheris Tepper. The women in the society use honor to monopoly warriors' thinking and the warriors do believe it and do everything to achieve it. However, in novel All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque, a Germany veteran from World War I. The protagonist Paul and his comrades behave very dishonorable as a soldier and their ideas are totally against the honor system. Those two attitude demonstrates the honor system is not eligible in the modern warfare anymore because the new weapons kill soldiers rapidly and people are educated.
The novel The Gate to Women's Country describes two separated societies that are formed after a unclear war which destroyed human civilization. One of the society is called the women's country, it is inside the city and formed by women and servitors. The other society is the garrison, it is formed by warriors. The women in women's country are required to give their sons to the garrison when they are five. The kids will get trained and live in the garrison until 15. Then they will get a chance to choose whether they come back to women's country to be servitors or "become a Defender"(Tepper, 4) to stay in the garrison. Most of the young warriors choose to stay in the garrison with their brothers due to the "sweetness of honor." (15) They are "proud to be a warrior"(39) and they "had to do what was honorable."(75) Honor plays an important role in the warrior society because it determines warriors' behaviors. They are willing to do the things they think are honorable and quit behaving dishonorable. Chernon is one of the young warrior, he is ordered by his officer to say bad things to his own mother. He obeyed the order and it hurts her mother. He does that because he thinks it is honorable to "obey orders, and don't ask whether the officer is crazy or not."(75) In fact, he has a choice that pretends he has talked with his mother and lies to his officer. He chooses not to do it because he thinks "warriors don't lie to each other,"(75) and lying is dishonorable for them. In addition, in his mind, "it was honorable to protect women because warriors needed them to breed sons."(142) Warriors think it is honorable to protect the weak people and they will get rewards from those people. They also believes "it was dishonorable to return through the Gate to Women's Country. Only the cowards and physical weaklings"(142) do that. From warrior's point of view, running away from battle and betraying comrades are dishonorable. First, they think they need to be brave and fight in the battle. Fighting is the top priority warriors should do, the men who are not willing to fight are being treated as cowards and sometimes t...
