Family Structure In To Kill A Mockingbird

Without a good family structure in our lives, what are we? We have no good life structure, bad morals and habits, and no preparation for the future. Family is one of the most vital aspects of living a successful life and we see this being portrayed in the novel To Kill a Mockingbird. With family we gain a valid example of good morals and habits, we model our lives after our parents and how they treat us and others, and we become good providers, protectors, and sacrifice for our own families in the future.

When we are raised with an excellent family or parent figures in our childhood we will model their character to have good morals and habits in the future. Atticus has taken up Tom Robinson’s case and Jem and Scout are curious why people are

Jem has done something wrong and stooped to the level of his aggressor and Atticus must lead him the right way, he guides Jem by saying: “‘Jem, she’s old and ill. You can’t hold her responsible for what she says or does…’” “‘Read to her?’” “‘Then you’ll do it for a month’” (Lee 121). In this section, Mrs. Dubose is treating the Finch family poorly and Jem is fed up, he rips up her flower garden, and as a consequence, he has to read to her for a month. Atticus never treated Mrs. Dubose with disrespect unlike how she treated him, he showed Jem and Scout how to treat people that are rude to them with respect because you don’t know what they have been through. Furthermore, the Finch family is not just Jem, Scout, and Atticus, Calpurnia is part of the family as well and she is always scolding Jem and Scout and giving them lessons, she disciplines Scout by saying: “You folks might be better’n the Cunninghams but it doesn’t count for nothin’ the way you’re disgracin’-’em-if you can’t act fit to eat at the table you can just set here and eat in the kitchen!” (Lee 27). Walter Cunningham is poor and has no lunch so Jem and Scout invite him to eat with them. Scout was openly disapproving of the way Walter is eating so Calpurnia has to teach her a lesson on how not all people are as well off as them so we should not judge others because we do not like the way they do

Calpurnia spots a rabid dog in the street and advises the whole neighborhood to take cover, Atticus comes along and kills the dog showing his kids that he is not as helpless as he looks, Lee describes: “Calpurnia’s message had been received by the neighborhood. Every wood door within our range of vision was closed tight”(Lee 107). “Atticus’s hand yanked a… The rifle cracked. Tim Johnson leaped, flopped over… He didn’t know what hit him”(Lee 110). Calpurnia and Atticus act as guardian angels in this situation, they protect the whole neighborhood and killed the threat very calmly while giving Scout and Jem an image of what it is like to protect people you love with precision. In Addition, as a good parental figure, you make must sacrifices. Atticus is a perfect example of this to his children, although they may not have noticed this when they were so young, Francis explains: “Grandma says it’s bad enough he lets you all run wild, but now he’s turned out an n-lover we’ll never be able to walk the streets of Maycomb again”(Lee 94). Atticus has sacrificed his whole reputation taking up Tom’s case, the whole town of Maycomb, and his own close family have lost respect for him. At the time this story was written, what Atticus did was frowned upon, he was seen as the villain, but now in the current time, we see that what Atticus did was the right