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The Role Of Mistreatment In To Kill A Mockingbird By Harper Lee

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Mistreatment is a problem that can change and affect the way people present themselves, and can affect the whole social ladder of society. The novel To Kill a Mockingbird, written by Harper Lee, shows the importance of both learning and demonstrating empathy through events experienced by Jem, Scout, Atticus, and Tom Robinson. To Kill a Mockingbird is both a young girl’s coming of age story and a drama about the roots and consequences of racism and prejudice, probing how good and evil can coexist within a single community or individual. It is about Scout and her brother Jem trying to understand and relate to their father, Atticus, who is a lawyer charged with defending a black man falsely accused of raping a white woman. Harper Lee shows acceptance to all types of people in a couple of ways, including Atticus defending a black man, Scout not being afraid of Boo Radley, and Scout accepting the fact that Walter Cunningham is poor. …show more content…

In the novel Atticus says “The main one is, if I didn’t I couldn’t hold up my head in town, I couldn't represent this county in the legislature, I couldn’t even tell you or Jem not to do something again” (Lee pg 100). Atticus knows that he will lose this case, but still takes it due to the fact that he doesn’t care what race anyone is, nor what anyone else thinks, and that he will defend anyone as much as he is capable of out of pure respect. Atticus faces a mob of angry men to defend Tom, but most white people in Maycomb would not protect a black person if it meant life or death. Lee pg

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Prejudice In To Kill A Mockingbird By Harper Lee

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To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee tells a story of racial prejudice during the Depression and how it is combated. The main development in the novel is that a Atticus, the father of Scout and Jem, has been appointed to defend Tom Robinson, a black man accused of raping a young white woman named Mayella. Many people in the town of Maycomb, particularly people involved with the case of Tom, have a negative attitude towards African Americans. Prejudice was a terrible issue in the South during the Depression, but Atticus Finch shows that racial injustice can be combated in two main ways, each having different levels of effectiveness.

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