Oscar Racism

Race was never the main theme in the story, but it helped move the story along and added greatly to some of the characters development. The main person who was overtly racist was Tracey. The way she would talk to Oscar as if he was not on the same level as her just because her family has lived in the same town for the past three generations. In Jason and Chris their racism came from anger and frustration they were both experiencing because they of recently losing their jobs. Stan is the everyman and felt like everyone works for what they get in life and nothing is ever handed to you. He was the only one to treat Oscar as an equal.
Nobody will ever say that they are racist they will just say that they are entitled to their own opinions and that if other people do not agree with then than that is okay. The group is quick to turn on Oscar, even though he was born in the United States that he represents the changing times in America and they are not ready for that kind of change. If it were their choice they would work at the mill the rest of their lives because that is the only way of life that they know. They were not ready to accept that the world is advancing all around them and since they continued to live in the past they got left behind.

He was getting his way of life taken away and was looking for someone to blame and Oscar was in the wrong place at the wrong time. He views towards him were most likely instilled in him while he was growing up by his mother because people are taught to be racist and by the way his mother speaks he had to have language like that in his house. Tracey also taught him to blame others when things go bad and that nothing is ever their faults because their ancestors built Reading. She feels attached to the city in a way that none of the others will ever