Without parents - or at least good parents - where would you be today? In a gang, in prison, or even dead? This is the lifestyle that too many children and young adults face and it's no different in SE Hinton's The Outsiders, where good parents and a whole family are very rare. Almost everyone in the gang, from Johnny to Bob, knows or has experienced parental issues at some point and it rarely has anything to do with them being in a gang and experiencing mental trauma and /or physical. Hinton skillfully lets readers infer the underlying theme of these common issues between the gang members. By the end of the book, it becomes clear that parenting, and family as a whole, plays an important role in how people develop and live their lives. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get an original essayOne of the first and most striking examples of this in the novel is the horrific case of Johnny's abusive parents. His parents beat him and made him feel unwelcome to the point where he practically lives on the streets. Due to his family's destructive behavior, Johnny joins a gang to get a tiny idea of ​​what it means to have a family. Even when he is in the hospital, weak and vulnerable, his parents' cruelty has never been forgotten. “A nurse appeared at the door. “Johnny,” she said softly, “your mother is here to see you.” Johnny opened his eyes. At first they were wide-eyed with surprise, then they grew somber. “I don’t want to see her.” His parents' abuse of Johnny even causes him to end up on the streets when he gets jumped by Socs and kills one of them, which then leads to his death. Because of his terrible situation, Ponyboy even describes him at the beginning of the novel as "a little brown puppy who has been kicked too many times and gets lost in a crowd of strangers." While this judgment may have seemed harsh at the beginning of the book, that's exactly what Johnny was, and the quote proves that the reason he ended up in a gang was because he was "hit too much » by his parents. . Johnny could have been an extremely different and stronger person without the iron fist of evil that his parents had held him with. Although it's not as obvious in the novel, there are some pretty significant hints that the Curtis boys would have had a much different and much more successful life without the death of their parents and a car accident. It is mostly hinted that Darry would have finished his studies and done something with his life before the need for a parental figure appeared in the Curtis family. Because of this instant succession and the need to play the role of two parents to three children, Ponyboy makes a remark at the beginning of the book that sums up the situation well. “But Darry has been through a lot in his twenties, he grew up too fast. What Ponyboy is saying here is that Darry matured very quickly and he later remarks that he dropped out of school to take care of Sodapop and Ponyboy. "Steve once made the mistake of calling him 'all brawn, no brains,' and Darry almost broke Steve's jaw...Darry never really got over not going to college ." Darry obviously would have become a different person than he was in the book if his parents were still alive due to his feeling of needing to drop out of school and the fact that he was becoming the father figure and maturing very quickly . Parenthood, or lack thereof, has clearly taken a toll on the Curtis family. One last example..