What plot element is this reading passage an example of from The Jungle by Upton Sinclair Jr He had lost in the fierce battle of greed and so was doomed to be exterminated?

Answer 1

The full passage is:

He saw the world of civilization then more plainly than ever he had seen it before; a world in which nothing counted but brutal might, and order devised by those who possessed it for the subjugation of those who did not. He was one of the latter; and all outdoors, all life, was to him one colossal prison, which he paced like a pent-up tiger, trying one bar after another, and finding them all beyond his power. He had lost in the fierce battle of greed, and so was doomed to be exterminated; and all society was busied to see that he did not escape that sentence. Everywhere that he turned were prison bars, and hostile eyes following him; the well-fed, sleek policemen, from whose glances he shrank, and who seemed to grip their clubs more tightly when they saw him; the saloon-keepers, who never ceased to watch him while he was in their places, who were jealous of every moment he lingered after he had paid his money; the hurrying throngs upon the streets, who were deaf to his entreaties, oblivious of his very existence-and savage and contemptuous when he forced himself upon them. They had their own affairs, and there was no place for him among them. There was no place for him anywhere-every direction he turned his gaze, the fact was forced upon him. Everything was built to express it to him: the residences, with their heavy walls and bolted doors, and basement windows barred with iron; the great warehouses filled with the products of the whole world, and guarded by iron shutters and heavy gates; the banks with their unthinkable billions of wealth, all buried in safes and vaults of steel.

central conflict

Answer 2

This reading passage from The Jungle is an example of the theme of the corrupting influence of capitalism, where the character's struggle against greed ultimately results in their downfall and destruction.