The Minister's Black Veil Essay

837 Words2 Pages

The Minister’s Black Veil by Nathaniel Hawthorne is a parable regarding human’s cruelty towards differences found in one another. While reading the parable I couldn’t help but to relate the tale of good Mr. Hooper and his black veil to my days in middle school where I too wore a black veil of sorts, which drew similar reactions toward me from my peers as those from the people of Milford towards Mr. Hooper. My black veil of choice was a collection of imaginatively patterned men’s neckties, one for every occasion. Mr. Hooper’s black veil caused “indecorous confusion” among his congregation as described by Hawthorne; my neckties created the same confusion among my peers and teachers. My fellow students rushed into the cafeteria from class and …show more content…

The issue of terrorism has become a hot button topic, even more so in regards to airport safety due to the November eleventh attacks in 2001 by the Muslim extremist group Al Qaeda; which has resulted in increased screenings and security checks at airports. In The Minister’s Black Veil the veil is described as “only a material emblem”. According to dictionary.com the word emblem is defined as: an object symbolizing a class of persons. One religious emblem of modern society is the turban which is a piece of cloth wound about the head commonly worn by people of the Muslim or Sikh faiths. As a result of their emblem these classes of persons are exposed to increased security screenings and are met with fearful glances from fellow travelers. Turbans, like the veil, have caused there wears to become bugbears of society regardless of the fact that they are merely pieces of folded cloth and the cloth themselves nor people of either faith are immediate …show more content…

Hooper by the people of Milford’ as well as how I might have reacted had this happened to my clergyman. I felt that the townspeople acted in a terribly inappropriate manner towards Mr. Hooper’s emblem; regrettably I also realized that I am guilty of acting in the same manner. I travel frequently and I find myself, like the people of Milford, become uneasy when faced with fellow travelers who are wearing turbans or veils. It is amazing how a piece of cloth seems to change fellow humans “into something awful… (this) the effect of a simple piece of cloth” (The Minister’s Black Veil). Mr. Hooper says it best when he cries out on his death bed “What has made this piece of cloth so awful?” (The Minister’s Black Veil). I may brush it up to modern society, but the fact of the matter is that a folded piece of cloth does not change who that person is. As cliché as it is we judge books by their covers, change the cloth and you change the perception of that person to

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