The Giver Research Paper

A utopia is almost always created to try and fix an issue happening in modern society; the creators of that utopia never intend to hurt anyone, but once a utopia is formed, a dystopia is created just as quickly. The novel, The Giver, by Lois Lowry is Lowry’s attempt to address the issue of the creation of modern-day utopias’ and dystopias’ by placing a relatable protagonist in the same world the people in modern society live in, but set in a futuristic timeline; she wanted to show that, although the modern-day society and the novel’s society’s rules and regulations contrast sharply, there some similarities that people cannot ignore. In addition, rules and laws the novel’s society has implemented, like precision of language and the prohibition

The novel’s society has a rule on the citizen’s precision of language, because the society’s creators believed exaggerating and small fibs could harm people in deception through speech. In the novel, the main character Jonas is at the Ceremony of Twelves, where the leaders of his community are talking about Jonas’s best friend Asher, and how Asher had, at three years old, broken the rule that enforced precise language when he had, in trying to ask if he could have a snack, slipped up and, as Jonas explains “...and precision of language was one of the most important tasks of small children. Asher had asked for a smack” after which, Asher was soon thereafter given what he had accidentally asked for; Asher was given a smack (Lowry, ). In other words, to instill in Asher’s and every other child’s mind that they could not make such a mistake in their speech, the community uses physical punishment; the community used abusive behavior on toddlers to force them into their society’s mindset. On the other hand, modern society allows slip-ups like Asher’s and lies as well, without extreme punishment, although in many places around the world people are considering slightly restricting that right. In the case of modern society today, the right to free speech is one of the biggest freedoms people have, for the leaders of modern society

The society in the book has only one citizen who is allowed to know of and feel things like love and hate, whereas the rest of the community is prohibited from knowing such things, because the creators of that community believed that the people would kill each other if they did not all act and have opinions that were the same. In the book, the protagonist Jonas is telling his family about a dream he had had the night before, in which he envisioned his friend Fiona, and tried to get her to come into a bathtub with him, and, after telling his parents about the dream, per the rules of the society, he had to start taking pills that would subdue these and all other emotions. To be put another way, the community ruled that once a child has a dream as such, they must take daily pills to ensure any and all emotions are weakened, if not terminated, which, in doing so, ensures no one could ever truly love somebody. Contrarily, modern society has no rules on feelings; you can feel whatever you want to feel. For instance, in modern society, the only time you can subdue any feelings in general is if it may be dangerous you your health, like a severe depressive disorder, or pain. In other words, the majority of people in modern day society believe that it isn’t fair to take away people’s