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The better TKM essay.
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One of the TKM essays, there's a better one, it's linked above. here's the essay. strangely the copy/paste thing messed up the format sorry. The Land of Opportunity and the Land of the Free [To Kill a Mockingbird] Maycomb County, in To Kill a Mockingbird, is a miniature of Southern American, and even to a certain extent the entire American, society at that time. Racism, class struggles and boundaries, injustice and the underground fight against the status quo are all embodied in the individuals of Maycomb County and the actions of the above. Social classes are the inevitable result of any and each society. There will always be the lower class, the middle class and the upper class, in turn each of these can be subdivided into their own lower, middle and upper classes (ex: lower middle class, middle middle class and upper middle class). At any rate, whatever the social distribution a respective society has, the ability of an individual to break free of the boundaries imposed upon him or her by the status quo varies according to how open that society is to change. The southern states, are (perhaps unjustly), and were notorious for their resistance to any and all forms of change. Their extreme despise and distrust of change is represented by Aunt Alexandra’s explanation of people to anyone who is willing to listen: they have it running in their blood, they have a drinking line, an incestuous line, a lying line, a poor line. Everyone is categorized by something that a family member did god know how long ago. No matter how different a new generation is from the others, they will still be referenced to as a ‘whatever their family name is’, from which name it is derived that that individual has certain characteristics inherent to the family. This is also demonstrated in the first-day-of-school scene where the class explains to the teacher that a Cunningham is inherently poor, and an Ewell will be in class only the first day of school every year. In this mini-society the Finches represent the upper class which is inherently respected, the Cunninghams are immediately below them, the Ewells following close behind and then the Robinsons, who are black. Each of these families has a boarder or a guardian who keeps them from ever crossing the line. Between the Finches and the Cunninghams there is a financial disparity and the division is furthered by Aunt Alexandra who won’t let Scout and Jem have anything to do with the Cunninghams- 'because they aren’t our kind'. Although both the Cunninghams and the Ewells are very poor, there is a fine yet clear distinction between them: the Cunninghams are honest and honorable. They have never taken anything from anyone if they couldn’t pay it back, the Ewells weren’t like this: they took anything they could from anyone and they lied and they cheated. This barred them from ever having anything to do with each other. Between the Ewells and the Robinsons a heavy locked and sometimes deadly gate stood: racism. The Ewells needed some way to stand above someone else and say ‘I am better than you.’ And the only way to do this was through racism. In the southern states this was the way things were: social boundaries would not be broken by any member of society, and if they did repercussions were grave. Racism: The belief that race accounts for differences in human character or ability and that a particular race is superior to others. (American Heritage Dictionary, 1995). The Black man will always lie, he will always lust after the white woman, he will plot and he will be evil. The black man is stupid, he is inferior and he is neither truly human and thus he is not a citizen *. These are the beliefs upheld throughout the South by the whites. All of these beliefs serve to oppress and to justify the persecution of blacks in ‘the land of the free’. The jury finds Tom Robinson guilty, not because they believed what Ewell told them, but because the maintenance of the ‘machine’ required that a white man’s word be held above any black’s. This kind of approach can only lead to a possibly violent upheaval against the status quo and the implications of this need not be explained and the loss in foreign influence, for no one will pay attention to a country so full of hypocrisy. In the end Tom realized that whites will never enact justice and through desperation made a kamikaze attempt to break out of jail leading to his shooting. Racism was an established fact in the south, a fact which would take more than just hard work to destroy. It would take an active resistance born in the middle of that hell which would lead a brutal revolution in social beliefs striking at the very jugular of the establishment. And the seeds were beginning to appear. In Maycomb County there were all kinds of resistance-but none of it was black. Blacks were not empowered to resist. The help had to come from outside the black community. Some of those who were white hid it, others helped from within the system (such as the judge) and others fought bravely against a tidal wave of people who grunted pointed fingers and fought back against change. Such was Atticus, he risked his reputation, his profession and his children in order to fight racism. He knew from the begging that he could not win, however, he knew that it was his only real choice and that someone respectable had to throw the first punch against the white wall, he was alone in the open field, but support was hidden beneath some people’s hearts, and sometimes they gave him the right tools to fight with- but that would not be enough, they all knew it; but it had to begin somewhere. Eventually more people would join this small movement to make one big movement, and begin the march along a long spike ridden road to freedom. -------------------------------- *‘Modern’ human rights ideals believe that some people/races are inferior and thus need the guidance and leadership of those who have been enlightened, a belief that justifies European colonialism during the Renaissance, they are strong users (abusers really) of Darwinian social, psychological and economical evolution theories. ‘Contemporary’ human rights ideals sustain that all Homo-sapiens are by definition human and that no other individuals, organizations or governments have the right to oppress any other humans. --------------------------------