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If you were the narrator in "Shooting an Elephant," would you quit your job? Why?
Quick answer:
If I were the narrator, I would consider quitting due to the moral conflict and ethical dilemmas posed by his role as an imperial policeman. Despite potential financial or personal constraints, the job's alignment with imperialism, which he despises, and its negative impact on his conscience would drive this decision. The narrator's realization of the empire's corruption and his opposition to its oppressive practices would compel him to leave for ethical reasons.
It certainly doesn't sound like a job anyone would enjoy and I would definitely consider packing it in. The problem is we don't know the narrator's motivation for taking the job in the first place. Does he need the money? Is he using the job as a step to get somewhere else? It may be that at the moment he has no choice but to work there. For example, he may be on some kind of military service and in that case could suffer if he just decided to quit.
The other problem he has is where would he go if did decide to give up his job? He is in a foreign country where people seem to hate foreigners, particularly Europeans. Without any money behind him or any security, he could find himself homeless. If he just quit before the end of his contract, the British may not be...
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willing to help him get home.
At the end of the essay, the narrator says of shooting the elephant, "I often wondered whether any of the others grasped that I had done it solely to avoid looking a fool." In other words, he is motivated to kill the elephant only because he fears appearing cowardly in front of the local people. He does not really believe in what he is doing and thinks it is wrong for him to shoot the elephant.
Working as an imperial policeman in Burma, the narrator (who is Orwell) realizes that most of the people in Burma hate him simply because he is a symbol of the imperial regime. He despises the way he is treated, but he understands it because he, like the local people in Burma at the time, realizes that imperialism is corrupt. He says, "imperialism was an evil thing," and he supports the Burmese and is opposed to the British colonialists. Working in his position makes him bitter because he detests the way in which the British treat the local people; for example, he loathes the treatment of the prisoners in the British jails. He also senses that the British empire is dying a slow death. For these reasons, quitting his job would be the ethical step to take. His moral compass has directed him to believe that the job he is doing is wrong and that the system he is supporting is amoral; for him to continue in this job would therefore be unethical.