joke, like Marco who cracked a joke in order to enlighten the team’s mood when they are pitted against a deadly situation, thus boosting his and his teammates’
confidence.
3. Rachel’s Defense Mechanism
Based on Rachel’s characteristic in which she is described by other character as the bravest, the most reckless of the team. Rachel adopts a defense
mechanism known as courage, a level 4 defense mechanism according to George Valliant. Courage is a mechanism which involves
the mental ability and willingness to confront conflicts, fear, pain, danger, uncertainty, despair,
obstacles, vicissitudes or intimidation. Rachel’s choice of defense mechanism seems to be natural based on her
characteristic, perhaps it will be strange if Rachel who is a tomboyish girl with a fierce attitude to employ a defense mechanism which is contrast to her brave
attitude. Rachel also seems to use another defense mechanism called acting out, although Rachel is brave and reckless, she is also the kind of person who tends to
express her inner feeling whenever she get distressed. This is proven in book seventh when she fall into despair because she believes that it is impossible for
them to win the war against Yeerks. Her belief causes her act to be driven by her despair, for example she decided to skip school because she believes that it is
useless for her to go to school because the Yeerks will win. Another example of her usage of acting out is shown how she is fine with murdering someone
whenever she is angered. PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI
4. Tobias’s Defense Mechanism
Learning from his nature Tobias seems to adopt a defense mechanism known as withdrawal, a defense mechanism in which the user tend to separate
himself from other people to relief his own feeling from all trouble. Some people believe that removing themselves from the society will help
them relieve their mind or feeling from the terror or trauma in their mind. By secluding oneself from the society, free from other people, they believe that their
condition of being alone will help them heal their mental condition. People like this often believe that the more they socialize with other
people the more their mind will be hurt. Meeting with certain people will trigger a pain in their mind because it may remind them to the terror. They also believe that
by distancing themselves from the others it will make their condition better, as if it is better if heshe disappear from their life, as hisher existence will only bring
pain to others. Tobias tends to secludes himself from the others whenever his mind is
terrorized. In book three when he was overwhelmed by his new hawk instinct, he was terrified to the point he believed that his humanity completely gone. Because
of this he believes that it will be better if he disappear away from his human friend. His mind believes that he does not belong to live among his friend who is
fully human while he is a hawk with a human mind. PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI
Despite Tobias’ tendency to dissociate himself from his friend, he has good deal of self esteem when it comes to fighting the Yeerks. Tobias rarely
shows his fear when it comes to fighting the yeerks. He always ready to help whenever he is needed without any second thought or fear in his mind.
Tobias found meaning in the war, he felt like he was a part of something. As explained before, Tobias had a quite miserable life before he become
Animorphs and involved in the war. His parents already passed away before the story began and he only lives with relatives who do not really care about his
wellbeing. Furthermore he is often bullied by other students at school. Therefore it can be stated that Tobias’ courage and willingness to fight against the yeerks is
caused by his belief that he is happier in his new life as part of the Animorphs compared to his previous life. Therefore because he belief that his current life is
more meaningful than his previous one, it become his motivation to always fight against the terror.
5. Cassie’s Defense Mechanism
Cas sie’s kind and caring nature often struggle with her condition of
fighting the Yeerks, in book nineteenth, she decided to quit the Animorphs because she cannot tolerate the violence of the war any longer. In that book, she
decided to quit the Animorphs and stop to be involved in the war against the Yeerks after she murder another alien creature
