Labels Harmful Impact On Society In Flawed By Cecelia Ahern

Labels’ Harmful Impact on Society When mistakes are made, it is important that they are learned from, because when they are, people are allowed to become better versions of themselves. Mistakes shouldn’t be punished; instead, they should be used as learning opportunities. However, in Cecelia Ahern’s novel, Flawed, this belief is nonexistent. In this society, people who make mistakes are labeled as Flawed by an organization called the Guild. These Flawed citizens then have to live a life permanently branded as outcasts by the rest of society. Shunned out and forced to live with horrible conditions, Flawed citizens’ mental and physical health declines significantly, and this is all because of the large amounts of power the Guild has over the

To begin with, the rise of social media brings along a new concept, cancel culture, which has many parallels to the labeling seen in the novel Flawed. Cancel culture is described as, “a way to take away someone’s power and call out the individual for being problematic” (How Do). This process can happen in less than a minute and these “cancelled” people are marked by this decision forever. People use their power over others to ruin each other’s reputations. This is identical to the Flawed label in Flawed. In Flawed, those who are labeled as Flawed are branded by the Guild, symbolically taking over ownership of the person. This underlying meaning does not go unnoticed by the branded. In fact, as the protagonist, Celestine, stares in the mirror, she states, “They have taken away ownership over myself, and they have made me theirs” (Ahern, 145). The Guild uses its power to effectively turn a person’s complex personality into one word: Flawed. They strip away the Flawed’s identity and make them feel powerless. However,

When a person is described as a felon it “presents a significant barrier to reintegration” (Labels). Labels create harmful stereotypes that place expectations on people that are hard to break. Once labeled, felons are forever regarded as such. This places so much power into one word. This power then denies “people with criminal records jobs, housing, education” and other resources in life (Labels). Therefore, it takes away the ability to live the life they want to work for, even after they have served their time, leaving them helpless, alone, and hated by everyone around them. Moreover, these restrictions felons face are eerily similar to those of the Flawed. Flawed have “job restrictions, curfews, and travel restrictions” (Ahern, 38). Although Flawed aren’t imprisoned, they live with invisible shackles that take away the enjoyment of life. In order to do this, the Guild uses its power and takes control over every aspect of a Flawed’s life. However, not just the Guild has power over the Flawed, non-Flawed individuals in the society do too. Celestine gets kidnapped and is told she is “Flawed scum” and that “no one would ever want [her]” (Ahern, 221). Just because she was Flawed, she was considered unlovable by those around her.