I haven't read the book but how did it criticize the colonizer mindset? A cursory look makes it seem like a justification of paternalistic authority, so propaganda for kids to blindly listen to their parents haha.

If anything wouldn't this be justification for colonization, as colonized nations were often infantalized/dehumanized?

If it’s really that eye-opening is debatable I would say. As another user has posted it already, this is a more realistic scenario: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2020/may/09/the-real-lord-of-the-flies-what-happened-when-six-boys-were-shipwrecked-for-15-months

Edit: I am not saying it’s not a good book. I enjoyed reading it myself. I just don’t like the picture it paints of society and the conclusions people draw from it.

Reading it in the early 00s it made me wish I lived somewhere far more interesting with far more wild classmates.

All the rules and restrictions were so internalised, I think if we were abandoned on an island half of them would just sit still and starve.

I can't imagine any of them being interesting enough to try to start their own religious cult or anything.

I hated it because it was totally unbelievable, just a paternalistic rationalization for authority

I was confronted with the knowledge that the adults around me all thought the only thing keeping me from murdering someone was layers of rules and supervision. Like we're all just rabid animals barely held back by a watchful eye

Even then, I knew myself better than that. I knew people better than that

But that's how our society treats people. Like monsters that must be managed

Maybe it was presented to him as required school reading so that's why he hated it 😜