The Giver And Harrison Bergeron

John Gray once said, “When men and women are able to respect their differences then love has a chance to blossom.” This is proved in the dystopian texts “Harrison Bergeron,” “Examination Day” and “The Giver” where the government maintains equality and dislikes the idea of being different. Dystopian texts are stories where the characters believe they live in a Utopia, but they are unaware that the societies they are living in are sacrificing important societal values in order to achieve “perfection”. In “Harrison Bergeron” the protagonist, Harrison, did not obey the law by removing his handicaps, so he is taken away by the government in order to keep equality intact. In “Examination Day” everybody is required by law to take an intelligence test

when they turn twelve so that no one individual can be smarter than a certain level. In “The Giver” Jonas, the protagonist, lives in a community that strives for “Sameness” and considers it rude to call attention to anything different about a particular individual. Authors create these dystopian settings to teach readers that the government should not strive too hard for equality, or we will end up losing our sense of individuality.
This theme is shown in the short story, “Examination Day”, where Henry Seslar creates a story that shows we need to accept each other’s strengths and weaknesses. In the story, all children are required by law to take a government intelligence test when they turn twelve. Richard, the main character of this story, takes the test and his intelligence exceeds the government limit (Seslar 4). This scene shows that this government is opposed to people having more intelligence than others. They do not value differences and prefer equality over individuality. After the test, the government informs Richard’s parents that he was killed because he was too smart and he was different. “‘You may specify by telephone,’ the voice droned on, ‘whether you wish his body interred by the Government, or would you prefer a private burial place? The fee for Government burial is ten dollars.’” (Seslar 4). From this readers can learn how this society that Richard lives in takes equality very seriously. The government warps equality into an extreme version of control. The government keeps everyone equal by killing anyone who is different, and in this case, more intelligent. Seslar has created this story to teach us that if the government tries to make everyone too equal we might end up killing everybody different to keep everyone the same.
Secondly, In the text “Harrison Bergeron”, Kurt Vonnegut Jr.

shows this theme by creating a society where extraordinary people are handicapped in order to maintain an extreme version of equality. The setting Vonnegut creates is a place where the government makes the extraordinary people wear physical and mental handicaps in order to keep everyone the same. “They were equal every which way. Nobody was smarter than anybody else. Nobody was better looking than anybody else. Nobody was stronger or quicker than anybody else.” (Vonnegut 1). This shows that in this society, the government eliminates all differences to keep everyone exactly the same. Desperate measures are being taken to make sure that everyone is equal. Later in the text, during a ballet show, the author describes the ballerinas as “... burdened with sashweights and bags of birdshot, and their faces were masked, so that no one, seeing a free and graceful gesture or a pretty face, would feel like something the cat drug in.” (Vonnegut 2). This reveals how the government is stopping them from reaching their full potential and how everyone is becoming identical. This story was created to show how if the people in the society become the same, talent and specialty will meet its

end.
Additionally, Lois Lowry also displays this theme in The Giver, where the community strives for “Sameness” and does not value differences.

In the story, Jonas, the protagonist, is assigned to receive all the memories of the past. In the beginning of the story when Gabriel, a baby from the community, is put into Jonas’ family unit, his sister notices “‘he has funny eyes like yours, Jonas’ ... Almost every citizen in the community had dark eyes… No one mentioned those things… It was considered rude to call attention to things that were unsettling or different about individuals” (Lowry 13). This shows that the community that Jonas lives in strives very hard for “Sameness”. Later in the story, Jonas realizes that differences were “the sort of thing one didn’t ask a friend about because it might have fallen into that uncomfortable category of ‘being different.’ Asher took a pill each morning; Jonas did not. Always better, less rude, to talk about things that were the same.” (Lowry 38). This reveals to readers that the community that Jonas lives in considers it rude to call attention to differences and make someone feel separate. This story warns readers that we could end up in a world where everyone is identical if the government strives too hard for

“Sameness”.
These stories, among others, show that authors write dystopian texts to teach us that no one, not even our government should be able to take away our differences. This theme is shown in the Giver when the Community strives for "Sameness" and takes away emotion and color. In Harrison Bergeron, it is shown through handicapping the extraordinary population which leads to no differences. Finally, in Examination Day, this theme is shown through the killing of the intelligent population. At the end of each story, when their respective characters are either dead or free, readers find out that if differences do not thrive, then neither do talent or love.