Rules Are Made To Be Broken In The Giver

Jonas trusted his community; that was a mistake. He let them do all the thinking; that was a mistake too. However, the biggest mistake that he and his community made was believing that there was such thing as a perfect society. The ceremonies that happen every year up until the age of 12 make sure that everything is the same, from the clothes, to houses to how they talk, no one is different.

Sameness and difference, is one of the themes Lois Lowry portrays in “The Giver”. The theme of sameness and difference plays a key part in Jonas’s life, and contributes to the people in his community, and their past as well.

With Jonas’s job as being The Giver, truth is a very important aspect. Being The Giver, he learns about the real, and whole truth. The Giver is the one who keeps all of the memories of truth. Without it there would be no reason to have a Giver. Another way that the truth works in the role Jonas was given would be that if Jonas leaves the community, all of the memories that he had received would be then distributed to the people of the community. When The Giver and Jonas come up with the idea that everyone not knowing the truth is wrong, they send Jonas away so that everyone receives the memories. There are many ways in which the truth works in the role that Jonas receives, such as when the Chief Elders ask The Giver for advice when they are in times of trouble. Here is a great example of what I mean, “And when I am called to The Committee of Elders, I appear before them, to give them counsel and advice”(Lowry 130) The truth is used in many other ways in Jonas’s job as well, and these are only a

Measures are always being taken to ensure the safety of the people which makes the society in which Jonas lives very safe. These measures are what makes the community a safe place to live in. In the Giver written by Lois Lowry the society that is being shown is taking safety to another level.

Jonas is feeling things that no one in his community has ever felt before. He is beginning to understand that others are missing out on important emotions. He knows that The Giver has already given away most of the memories, and in order to stop the process, he must make a sacrifice in order for his community to be aware of what they are missing. This proves that he is conscious of the fact that his community is not perfect, and the act of staging an accident is a noble, selfless thing to do; something that his perfect peers would not understand. When talking about the harms of banning books and by quoting Lois Lowry, Jennifer Kendall states, “The world portrayed in The Giver is a world where choice has been taken away. It is a frightening world” (Kendall). Kendall makes the point that the Utopian society is not something that people strive for. As a middle-schooled child, it is easy to see that life is not perfect. I feel as if Lowry does a great job in showing the reader that Jonas does understand that his community is not perfect, and he goes to great links to stop the perfection. While there may seem to

The Giver, a dystopian futuristic novel written by young adult author Lois Lowry won the 1994 Newbery Medal, and sold more than 12 million copies since its publication, according to USA Today, (McClurg). This literary masterpiece presents the reader with an unusual society that has eliminated pain, fear, war, emotion, and diversity. But as Jonas discovers the previous world, and uncovers many shocking secrets of his society, he finds himself living in an environment filled with vile practices that he can no longer tolerate. Jonas emphasizes the importance of reacting to unlawful orders or inhumane practices. "If a law is unjust, a man is not only right to disobey it, he is obligated to do so,” (Thomas Jefferson). We should

Some socio cultural rules that are totally irrelevant must be breached, if not it shall create stymies for people who want to live freely. As our societies are concerned we are barely allowed to do intercaste marriages, polygamy else our fate of living or not is depicted by the society even if our family accepts it. Unjust laws do exist in the society, but that has to be removed slowly rather than protesting and making a mess out of everything. Most of the times breaking the laws becomes a must: when u go impecunious and your wife is dying because u cannot afford the drug to cure her and for that if you steal the drug, such cases can be justified morally. Yes, the person surely has to get punished but the punishment can be reduced to minimum as that ‘stealing’ was for a purpose and such reasons seem clearly justifiable.

In the novel, The Giver, Lois Lowry introduces the topic of conformity. The story takes place in a community based around sameness and uniformity. The main character, Jonas, is being trained for Receiver of Memory, and The Giver is transmitting memories to him. During this process, Jonas realizes how corrupt this community is, and, he comes up with a plan to improve his society. At the end of the story, Jonas travels to Elsewhere in an attempt to restore the town’s memories. In The Giver, Lois Lowry uses characters, dialogue, and actions to develop the theme that conformity is dangerous.

In the novels “The Giver” by Lois Lowry and “Anthem” by Ayn Rand it gives examples of radical Conformity and the results. In The Giver it states “two children - 1 male, one female to each family unit, it is written very clearly in the rules.”. This gives us a basic idea on just how controlling the society is and how the people think of as it normal. In order to lead a joyful and stressless life one must find a balance between individualism and conformity.

This notion is elaborated in the novel, A Clockwork Orange. Alex is a criminal who doesn’t belong anywhere within society. In the novel, the government attempts to suppress his criminality by physically preventing him from thinking of violence—thus making him conform to their standards. This is a prime example of how society attempts to make us conform to what

H- Jonas had conflict with the society he was living in. Jonas had problems when he was going to train to be the new Giver of the communtiy. In the begining, Jonas thought that his community was a safe and good place to be a part of. Jonas had problems with his training because he was learning the trust about the community, and he didn't like it. The main character Jonas was on his way to the Giver when he seen a color he never saw before the color red on a girl named Fiona's hair.

In The Giver, by Lois Lowry, a contrast and contradiction moment appeared when The Giver said that he was in love with Rosemary. This is something that I don’t think he would have done any other time because love isn’t something you feel in this community. In the text it states, “... The Giver explained. ‘ I love her.’” This shows how The Giver did feel strong feelings for her, but because of this it pained him to give her sad memories or painful ones because he didn’t want to hurt her.

Louis Lowry, the author of The Giver, once said “When I wrote The Giver it contained no so-called 'bad words.' It was set, after all, in a mythical, futuristic, and Utopian society. Not only was there no poverty, divorce, racism, sexism, pollution, or violence in the world of 'The Giver'; there was also careful attention paid to language: to its fluency, precision, and power.” The question is, why is this award winning novel controversial and banned in many schools across the country? People complain that it portrays suicide and Euthanasia in a positive light, and has inappropriate sexual content for young readers.

In the recent discussions of laws, an issue has arisen about the correctness of breaking laws. On one hand, some argue that breaking any laws would create a state of anarchy, and as such, needs to be avoided at all cost. On the other hand, there are people who argue that breaking the law is necessary to the improvement of our world. They say that the only way for people to understand the wrongness of a law, the law must be broken. In short, the issue is whether breaking the law should or should not be done. My own view is that non-utilitarian laws must be broken but the consequences of breaking such laws must also be followed.

The Giver is a community based off of many rules. Each rule is made for a reason and has many roles. Just like the community, we have to follow rules to. If there wasn't any rules, the world would be in complete chaos.