Literature A Tool Of Resisting, Harrison Bergeron f Resisting

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Literature-A Tool of Resisting
Writing has in the past and today been used to convey or relay different messages as well as protest the status quo. People have used literature to inform, educate, entertain, and to also satirize the different things happening in the society. In the 60s and 70s, the African American protests became increasingly varied as the people tried to question the social and civil injustice directed at them. While some resorted to violence, others decided to write and use the various forms of literature to voice their displeasure with the status quo. Literary protests are not new, and literature has and is still being used as a tool of resisting. In 2016, during the US presidential elections, an organization of Poets and Writers initiated a project known as “Dear President” which aimed at helping people craft messages to the incoming president. The goal of this project was to gift people a platform through literature where they could air their views and speak their mind. Another example where literature is being used to resist subtly is in Venezuela whose democracy is slowly evolving into authoritarianism. The country’s writers have used their platform to mock, satirize, and to even educate the public of the ramifications of the country’s current trajectory. Literature is indeed a good enough tool for resisting. In the short stories under review, there are different scenes which show how literature can serve as a tool to mock the unusual or popular notions which leaders or governments seem to uphold and sell to their people. By closely analyzing the two stories, this article seeks to showcase how literature can indeed be used as a tool to resist.
The first story, Harrison Bergeron, satirizes the notion of equality. The story starts by stating: “The year was 2081, and everybody was finally equal. They weren’t equal before God and the law. They were equal every which way” (763). It continues to say that, “Nobody was smarter than anybody else” (763). From the above, it is clear that the people had not willingly chosen to be the way it is portrayed. First of all, people can never be equal, and some will always be better at certain things than others. Societies thrive off diversity, but in the society described above, diversity was completely rooted out, and people were stripped of anything that made them stand out. Currently, inequality has been the topic of discussion and pundits have warned that the gap between the rich and the poor is getting bigger as the richer become wealthier as the poor become poorer. As per the story, the cure for this is to make everybody equal and the use of the word “finally” in the introduction shows that somehow people were advocating for such a change. However, making everybody equal is not the same as attaining equality in the society. Equality mainly entails making opportunities and resources easily accessible to everyone in the community. Having a story like Harrison Bergeron can help to explain the difference between various notions while also cautioning people of the dangers of some concepts. No society in the world would want a world where the government forces people to be equal, but on the other hand, equality is indeed a reasonable goal.
Literature can also be used to educate people on some dangers in the society. In both stories, questioning authority has been made to seem like an evil or taboo. In the first story, George asks Hazel the following question: “The minute people start cheating on laws, what do you think happens to society?” (765) In the society they were living, people never questioned the authority of the set laws, and Hazel’s answer showed how misinformed the people were. Hazel answered by saying, “Reckon it’d fall all apart.” By having such ideas ingrained in the minds of the people, the government is hence able to control the people and keep them thinking about the common things while staying detached even to their most prized possessions. In 2BR02B, the danger of conformity is depicted in the conversation that happens between Dr.Hitz and Wehling. At one point, Dr. Hitz asked Wehling the following question: “Would you like to go back to the good old days, when the population of the earth was twenty billion-about to become forty billion, then eighty billion, then one hundred and sixty billion?” (775). While this might seem like a harmless question, it is loaded with a lot of pointers which help to show the dangers of conforming to the set laws. In this society, asking questions or seeking more from life than the society or having a different opinion seems bizarre. Conformity does steal from the society and makes it possible for the few who are powerful to control the will of the masses. In both societies, people are made to accept the status quo and live without questioning the standing orders.
Literature can also be used to educate the masses. Information is continually becoming crucial and expensive by the day. Currently, companies pay millions of dollars for information because of the prospect of it giving them a competitive advantage over their competitors. To resist, people need to, first of all, understand what is wrong and why they need to resist. The above means that people nee...