Tuesday, February 12, 2008
The Gift of Inequality
The equality that was achieved in "Harrison Bergeron" is terrifying. I would much rather live in “the dark ages, with everybody competing against everybody else.” It is the inequality that makes this world such an interesting place to live in. The diversity of people and personalities keeps our lives spontaneous and random. You never know who you will meet. It is the people that surround us that make our lives worth living. Our dilemmas, challenges, sad and happy moments are all caused by the people around us. Without individuality what else is there? The people in the story did not have much to look forward to. Their minds and bodies were constrained. They did not know what they truly felt because they kept forgetting. They were zombies who lived just to breathe. Harrison Bergeron would rather live a couple of minutes free than spend a whole life manipulated by others. When we ask for equality, we sacrifice individuality. Achieving equality is impossible, even in “Harrison Bergeron” where everything was controlled. Tolerance and equality is a task that can be achieved through a bit of effort and without having to sacrifice the very things that make us unique. Personality is something that never stops developing while a person lives. Every experience we live molds us into the kind of person we will become. It helps each of us grow and mature. This was taken away from the citizens in “Harrison Bergeron.” They are no longer learning, reasoning, thinking, feeling, growing…. These abilities are what make humans the most complex of creatures. Once that is taken away, there is nothing left of the human.
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2 comments:
I agree with you that individuality is vital to our functioning as humans. If we are all coerced to conform to the same ideologies of equality then we lose the motivation to create greatness. When everything is just given to us we become lazy and lose our free will to make decisions. Progress cannot be made when great ideas are suppressed.
I couldn’t agree more with you! Individuality is extremely important and I think that many people take it for granted these days. They want to look and feel a certain way but in the process they loose themselves which is very sad. I think that individuality and inequality make us who we are, and without it we are just like “zombies” as you said. I also liked your point about how tolerance and equality can be achieved without losing our uniqueness. However I think that in order for this to happen there has to be people that are actually willing to put forth effort, instead of trying to make a society full of conformity.
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