'Ain't hateful, just persuades him - 's not like you'd chunk him in the fire,' Jem growled.
'How do you know a match don't hurt him?'
'Turtles can't feel, stupid,' said Jem.
'Were you ever a turtle, huh?'"(Lee, 18)
In this quote, we see that Jem and Dill are arguing over whether or not hurting the turtle is wrong. This can be compared to the roly-poly incident later in the book, where the author compares Helen Robinson to being squished similarly to the bug.
Now, back to the poor turtle.
Obviously, Dill has a better moral thought in this situation than Jem does. Dill thinks that, even though the turtle is not human, he (or she) should be treated with the same respect. On the other hand, Jem, not seeing past anything other than the turtle's shell, cannot take hold of the concept that this turtle has a life also. Basically, Jem tortures turtles for fun. That's wrong. (HELLO??)
Expanding on this idea, we can compare this to how people interact with each other. Often, people come across others who are very different than them. They might speak a different language, moved from a different state, or enjoy different things than you do. Although, if you really get to know that person, you could discover that you both have a lot in common. However, there's always that one kid that just has to make fun of that person. They can't see past the differences, so they choose not to put up with it. This is morally wrong, but some people do not realize that.
So, the next time you meet a new person, will you be a Dill? Or will you be a Jem?
I really like how you gave the evidence from the book and related it to life today. I personally want to be doing the right things. Sometimes, though, we are faced with decisions of humbling ourselves to do the right thing, or not. Because we as humans want others to like us, we refuse to condescend to do the dirty work. I wonder if that is related to how the minorities always have so much trouble (because they have to do dirty work)?
ReplyDeleteI like your idea of comparing the turtle scene with how we interact with people. Another comparison with turtles is sometimes people, especially teenagers, try to act all hard or look hard on the outside but they are really soft on the inside. You know the people who always talk loud, seem aggressive and try to act "bad" or the ones who might dress like the goths or gangsters? I bet a lot of them are just turtles too; they are hard on the outside and soft in the inside; so we should be kind to everyone since we are all soft in the inside!
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