How Does Steinbeck Use Discrimination In The Novel Of Mice And Men

Discrimination

(A discussion of how the author uses discrimination in the novel Of Mice and Men)

In the novel, Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck, many character experience different challenges throughout the book. One main thing that three characters struggle with is discrimination. People are constantly treat them in an unfair way and always look at them like they are not equal human beings. This does make sense though for the time period in which this novel was wrote, most people had not yet accepted that people were in fact, equal. Even though there is less discrimination today, it has not completely gone away. Things need to change because people are not enforcing consequences when someone is being discriminated against, as well as there are not many good models to show younger generations not to treat others different based on age, gender, race, and so many more. Three characters that face discrimination the most in the novel, Of Mice and Men, are Curley’s wife, Crooks, and Lennie.

Curley’s wife has a huge set up to be discriminated against because she is the only female on the ranch all the time and they do not always think of her as an equal. She faces discrimination for

seeking attention in the other men which makes her seem like a tramp, but that may not be the case. She is treated so poorly by Curley and never has anyone to talk to so she may not be seeking sex so much as she seeks companionship and just a friend that she can talk to because no one deserves to be alone like that. Although she is surrounded by people on the ranch, she seems to be one of the loneliest people that are currently living there. “‘I get lonely,’ she said. ‘You can talk to people, but I can’t talk to nobody but Curley. Else he gets mad. How’d you like not to talk to anybody?’”(Page 87) Curley’s wife states her loneliness to Lennie and looks for sympathy, she wants what everyone else has, to be able to talk to other people. The fact that she is a woman should not limit her to only talking to her husband, but that’s exactly what she deals with up until the day she dies. Curley’s wife is also in an unwanted marriage because of her mom and not being able to become an actress which can be seen as another form of discrimination because he mom did not believe that she could do that and also just wanted her to stay and become a housewife like every other girl at the time. Curley’s wife is a defiant young woman on top of all her other personal issues, so being in a place where she feels alone and where she does not want to be does not help her marriage any.
Crooks has obvious discrimination against him for his skin color and everyone is discriminating him except for Lennie who does not fully understand why they seem him as different. Crooks is the only black person on the ranch and everyone makes sure that he knows he is different. They isolate him in the worst ways because he is the only one who has his own room and it is in the stables because no one wants him in the bunk house. He has got to be a lonely man because everyone knows not to talk to him and he sits in his room all by himself most of the time. When he is not in his room alone, he is being blamed for things by the boss and always has to do the dirty work because he is the black guy. Even though racism is supposedly gone today, you can still find instances where colored people are treated unfairly in the workplace for something that is not even their choice. Crooks knows good and well that he is not wanted, but he needs a source of income so he puts up with all the hatred and snide comments because that is all he knows to do. “‘’Cause I’m black. They play cards in there, but I can’t play because I’m black. They say I stink. Well, I tell you, all of you stink to me.’” (Page 68) Crooks is trying to explain to Lennie why he is different and he refers to smell. When he talks about stinking it is a reference to them not liking him or hatred and he replies with how he hates the white people too. This common hate among different races is sad because no one chose to be the color they were just born that way which is why discrimination against race or anything else is not morally right.
Lennie is, sadly, another person who is constantly put down because of his mental disability, the difference between him and the other two is that Lennie is innocent and does not fully recognise that he is being discriminated against. George repeatedly calls Lennie stupid in front of his face and Lennie just ignores it and keeps on loving George wholeheartedly. Lennie is treated like a young child instead of being helped which is normal for the disabled during this time. He is lucky that he has George because the asylums that they would get sent to back in that day would have turned him into a vegetable and he deserves better than that. The sad thing about the way Lennie is discriminated against is he does not care or is not aware that he is being made fun of when they are talking right in front of him. “‘Sometimes he talks, and you don’t know what the hell hell he’s talking about. Ain’t that so?’” (page 70). Crooks sees that Lennie gets made fun of and even tells Lennie what he does not realize. He tell him how sometimes George talks without Lennie knowing what is being said and Lennie agrees that this does happen. Everyone who reads this story feels a connection to Lennie and it is usually pity for things such as that. Lennie does not deserve to be treated different just because he is not as smart as the others, he is still a human being and he deserves equal treatment. George sells Lennie short whenever they go to a job because he calls Lennie stupid when Lennie is not stupid he is disabled which is a huge difference that George never understood.
The author of the novel, Of Mice and Men, John Steinbeck uses the characters Crooks, Curley’s wife, and Lennie to try and show discrimination in that time period.

He does a phenomenal job because each of them is discriminated in a different way and each of them have their own battles to fight throughout the novel. DIscrimination is something that has gotten better, but has not completely gone away despite how wrong it is. The things people are discriminated for are out of their control and do not make them less of a person than anyone else. Back during the time period of this novel, discrimination was a huge problem for women, the mentally disabled, and the colored people as well as elderly and Steinbeck tries to portray this in a way where people can recognise that it is

inhumane.