Desensitization:
Beah and his friends' daily lives became one large blood bath. They raided camps to collect materials, and killed many people in the process. At an early age, these children were exposed to such extreme violence and eventually became desensitized to it. To Ishmael and his friends, "killing had become as easy as drinking water (Beah 122)." Sometimes, they even made it into a game. Whoever kills the prisoner the fastest wins!
At first Beah and his friends had trouble adjusting to their new violent lifestyles. One says, in the beginning of the book, "I feel like each time I accept death a part of me dies (Beah 70)." However, after "...fighting for over two years... killing had become a daily activity (126)." This illustrates the fact that that during the war, the kids were transformed into killing machines. "Sometimes [they] were asked to leave for war in the middle of a movie. [They] would come back hours later after killing many people and continue the movie as if [they] had just returned from intermission (Beah 124)." To them, going to war was just like going out with friends.
At first Beah and his friends had trouble adjusting to their new violent lifestyles. One says, in the beginning of the book, "I feel like each time I accept death a part of me dies (Beah 70)." However, after "...fighting for over two years... killing had become a daily activity (126)." This illustrates the fact that that during the war, the kids were transformed into killing machines. "Sometimes [they] were asked to leave for war in the middle of a movie. [They] would come back hours later after killing many people and continue the movie as if [they] had just returned from intermission (Beah 124)." To them, going to war was just like going out with friends.