Harrison Bergeron-Reflective.

I have to be honest, the first time I read Harrison Bergeron I was pretty confused.  After discussing some of the satire and irony throughout the text in class, I understood the meaning more thoroughly, but I still couldn’t help asking myself many questions. 

I truly feel sad for the characters in this story, and if I had to choose a character that I most relate to, it would definitely be Harrison Bergeron.  I’m the type of person that tries to stand up for what I believe to be true as greatly as I can, and I can completely understand Harrison’s behavior.  When reading the story, I felt like it was sort of as if Harrison was the only one who truly saw how much oppression (maybe with the exception of the ballerina too) everyone was under.  Everyone else just seemed to sort of accept it and think it was actually better than what life was before.  Harrison’s father actually said to his wife as they were discussing some of the handicaps they had on them, “…and pretty soon we'd be right back to the dark ages again, with everybody competing against everybody else. You wouldn't like that, would you?" –in reference to if he were to take any of the sand bags off of him.  It’s as if he believes that life was actually WORSE than what it is like now.  They definitely confuse the meanings of freedom and equality.  I thought this to be a little bit of reverse dramatic irony because I felt myself wanting to explain to Harrison’s parents how confused they were, and how they weren’t made “free” because everyone was “equal”, but they were actually under a terrible oppression. 

This story made me think about the possibility of this ever actually happening to society, and while my immediate response would be “of course not, that would be insanity”, there was still a small part of me that thought there was a slight possibility.  I’m reading a book right now that talks about truly loving God with all our minds, and how society today is incredibly intellectually lazy.  Harrison Bergeron’s situation could very well happen to our society if we continue to not logically and intellectually think situations through.  If we are not capable of truly defending what we believe in with more than just sappy feelings and sincerity, then our society could end up like the one in Harrison Bergeron.  My desire as a future teacher is to really teach my students how to reason with not just their emotions but with intellect and absolute truth.  If our society would stop being intellectually lazy, and capable of explaining why they do the things they do and believe the things they believe, hopefully we won’t ever end up like Harrison Bergeron’s society.