Society And Class In Suzanne Collins's The Hunger Games

Society and Class

America, a place where 90 percent of our country 's income goes to the wealthiest one percent. A place where the middle class is diminishing, leaving only the rich and the poor, the lower class barely making enough to survive. A place where the government states everyone is equal and we have the commandment of free speech, but just how free are we? In Suzanne Collins book, The Hunger Games, she creates Panem. A dystopian world risen from the ashes of what was North America, a place which may not actually be so different. Panem is a region that was separated by thirteen districts that surround one shining and glamorous city, The Capitol. The government of Panem, which resides in the Capitol, is extremely overbearing and cannot

So when the thirteen districts started to rebel against their government, something had to be done. The result was the obliteration of District Thirteen and the introduction of The Hunger Games. The Hunger Games is a recurring event in which every year 24 tributes, a boy and girl from each district, ages 12-18, are chosen to be thrown into an arena to fight to the death of the others. The last tribute to survive is crowned the winner. Panem 's government came up with The Hunger Games to ensure the people of Panem who has all the power by making children fight to their death in an arena to be broadcasted to every resident of Panem. In the novel, The Hunger Games, I believe, Suzanne Collins writes the The Capitol to be depicted like the wealthy upper class Americans with their expensive foods and advanced technology, the districts are written to be compared to the middle and lower class, how many of the District 's people are starving and poverty has struck most of the land, and the government of Panem to resemble our own government we

America 's government allows its people the right to have free speech and we 're practical advertised as “the land of the free”, but besides from that, just how similar are these two governments? The people of District Twelve know how horrible their government is but they do nothing about it because they are afraid of what they can do to them. Katniss tells the reader, “When I was younger, I scared my mother to death, the things I would blurt out about District 12, about the people who rule our country, Panem, from the far-off city called the Capitol. Eventually I understood this would only lead us to more trouble. So I learned to hold my tongue and to turn my features into indifferent mask so that no one could ever read my thoughts. Do my work quietly in school. Make only polite small talk in the public market. Discuss little more than trades in the Hob, which is the black market where I make most of my money. Even at home, where I am less pleasant, I avoid discussing tricky topics. Like the reaping, or food shortages, or the Hunger Games.” (Collins 6). Katniss learned to keep to herself about the wrong doing of the Capitol just like most people in District Twelve. Her silence in a way is her accepting the inequality her government has created. After Katniss and Peeta win the Hunger Games by undermining the rulers of Panem the government is furious. Haymitch, Katniss’s mentor, was able to