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Total Violence In Harrison Bergeron, By Kurt Vonnegut

Decent Essays

The story “Harrison Bergeron”, written by Kurt Vonnegut, is a scientific fiction story that is set in 2081. Within this setting, the United States had added 213 amendments, some making the total population completely equal. This equality was not just in a sense of the legality and government, but every person was also physically and mentally equal as well. This total equality was established through things like weight bags, that go around one’s neck to weigh down the physically strong, a mask to cover the faces of those who are naturally good looking, or earphones that go inside the ears of those that are intelligent to emit thought disrupting noises so they would not be any smarter. These items were considered handicaps and were used to …show more content…

The author, Kurt Vonnegut, uses this radical example of government control to show his belief of the government and what would happen if they were to gain this much control over the citizens. As Benjamin Reed of Texas State University states, “Vonnegut's nightmarish system of American government in 2081 is a parody of what Americans feared might be wrought by losing military and ideological conflicts with Sino-Soviet socialists” (Reed 50). This explanation shows that Vonnegut and the American public were both worried about government control, and through the extreme measures used in the short story, Vonnegut exploits those worries and makes them more predominant. Another aspect that Kurt Vonnegut uses extremism and radicalism within the story of “Harrison Bergeron” is the idea of conformism. This idea is expressed in a radical manner to inform the reader that conformism is not always a good quality to have. Within the story, the two parents of Harrison are conformist and accept their fate. The author uses the normality and the average lives to show that conformism is holding the society back from everything that could be accomplished. The family is missing so much by conforming to the system and accepting the way they live. Conforming to the system also causes George much pain throughout the story, through the use of the earphone to prevent thoughts. An example of how conformist the family and the

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