'Juan And Carmen's Duty In Ashes For The Wind'

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In the short story, “Ashes for the Wind,” the main characters, Juan and Carmen, are faced with having their home, along with their community destroyed. The son of Simon Arevalo is confronted with the choice to burn down his community or to do his job, commissioned by the mayor. By staying in the burning house Juan and Carmen do their duty of protecting their child by giving them a quick death. Arevalo does his duty by allowing the burning of the houses by the police. Doing their duties, however, result in many wrongs done, the destruction of a community, and the deaths of an entire family. Juan and Carmen, as parents, had the duty of protecting and raising their child, when they were faced with their lives at stake, they took up this duty and gave their child …show more content…

Allowing their child to die doesn’t seem like good parenting at all, however with no where for the family to go it was their duty to minimize the child’s suffering. “They’ll have to kill us,” represents the moment Carmen and Juan decided that it was their duty and right to stay in the house. This act of defiance defined the story and was extremely powerful in the context of the story. Their duty was to protect their child and in the adversary they had to redefine their duty, and make a tough choice. However, this wasn’t a bad decision. They had no better options. Living on the streets of Colombia with a very young child and no money would only prolong their suffering and wouldn’t fulfill their duty of caring for their child. In a fire the child would die without much suffering. Juan and Carmen did their duty, they protected their child from further suffering, however what they did wasn’t right. Their actions were the best possible decision but it was a choice between two evils. Some may argue that it wasn’t wrong what they did because it

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