Innocence
The cost of pursuing a dream
Harm and Foul
Daisy dreamt of wealth and success her whole life and did whatever it took to get it and maintain it. When Myrtle entered Tom's life and became his mistress, Daisy obviously felt threatened due to the fact that she had to share the attention and luxuries provided by her husband with another woman. When Daisy saw the opportunity to end the competition between the two of them by killing Myrtle with her car, she took full advantage of it. Daisy "turned away from [Myrtle] toward the other car [passing by], and then she lost her nerve and turned back," (Fitzgerald 143). While it all happened in an instance, after going back and analyzing, it is highly probable that Daisy knew exactly who the woman was in front of the car, and in those few seconds, she probably thought that she could end it with just one hit and get off clean because she knew Gatsby would take the blame.
It is much the same with former Olympic ice skater, Tonya Harding. In 1992, Harding told her boyfriend and bodyguard to hire "Shane Stant to break, [oponent] Kerrigan's right leg so that she would be unable to skate." The blow to the skater's knee caused significant damage and harm to her skating career.
Both situations involve the loss of innocence through causing physical harm to someone else, all to eventually achieve their desired goal. What both women wanted in their specific situations was worth far more to them than maintaining their innocence.
Scandal after Scandal
Former Disney Channel sensation, Miley Cyrus, has been all the buzz in the media. Being known as Hannah Montana for a few years took its toll on Cyrus until she eventually decided it was time to move on, out from "under the Disney contract" and "do [her] own thing." However in the process of being who she wanted to be and achieve the success and title she'd always dreamed of having, she lost her innocence. Her name is hardly ever mentioned without the words "twerk" and "sexual dancing" soon to follow. For months, she has been telling women to embrace their bodies and not be afraid of nudity. Seeing that the majority of her audience is young teenge girls, she is giving off the impression that nudity is self respectful, all to gain a following. For Cyrus, in order to achieve what she wanted, she lost every contact with the Hannah Montana version of herself and became a star who's videos, songs, and language had to be censored.
This type of lost innocence can also be found in the article "Capitalism Saved the Miners." In this captivating piece, the author addresses the fact that every nation needs each other in order to survive and function effectively. The Obama administration is mentioned to be refusing the "complete free trade agreement with Columbia, South Korea and Panama," and claim that it is "no big deal. It's only politics." The author then goes on to say that the country "has a government led by a mindset obsessed with 250K-a-year 'millionaires'" who simply do not care about the good of the nation and it's people, as long as they are financially secure. Innocence is lost in this situation through greed. Many members of the US government will do whatever it takes to get their money, even if it means not doing what is best for the country.
The documentary, Inside Job, is much like the article. The movie explains how people are getting taken advantage of by many Wall Streeters who let American people invest in a stock that they knew was rapidly approaching bankruptcy. However, it did not matter to them, because they were getting paid "very well", enabling them to afford multiple luxuries. Wall Streeters lose all innocence when taking advantage of American Citizens in order to make the income that they do, making their own life better.
All three scenarios have one thing in common: Someone lost their innocence by being greedy and manipulative in order to get what they wanted.