Reading Jane Eyre (and hearing about Tess/reading certain parts of Tess) has really gotten me thinking again about equality. Throughout the beginning of the book, Jane is treated as unequal because she is not the specific kind of person that people want her to be. She is punished harshly, she is put into a horrible school (at least, horrible in the beginning) and then treated poorly there. She is treated unequally for being younger, for being female, for being poor, for being an orphan. She isn't given things which we as people now deem basic human rights and necessities. She later thinks of herself as unequal, she refuses to act like she is on the same playing field as the Eshtons or Mr. Rochester.
It's a bit sad, honestly, how people used to be treated. What's sadder is that it's still not entirely fixed. We still have a lot of societal mindsets that lead to discrimination. Many rich look down upon the poor, many races look down upon others. Many women are chastised for questioning their positions in society. I like to believe that mankind is inherently good and just misguided. Maybe over time, we will solve the whole problem. But nothing will ever be perfectly equal. There will always be rich and there will always be poor. There will always be young and old and black and white. There will always be people who believe God created the woman from the man and thus women must conform. However, I think that realization of the world's imperfections should lead us to further understanding the problem. It's about changing one person's opinion at a time, because swaying a whole society is impossible.
Equality is fundamental to society. We have universalizable statements such as "murder is wrong" because we believe all people equally deserve the right to life. When we fail to believe in the equality of all people, statements like this are false, because it then becomes okay to kill certain groups and people. We say that slavery is bad because we believe all people have the right to liberty. When some people are not equal, this statement doesn't matter because it is okay to enslave certain people who lack equality. Thus, equality is essential to morality and is necessary for laws to be fair and therefore necessary for society to function.
People should question more, like Jane does. People should talk more, and understand more. The very standards we base our lives off of do not matter when we discriminate against anyone or anything.
Melanie, I totally agree with you. (Of course, we already went over this last week when we did our charts in our composition books!) As I've read further into the book, I've also noticed inequalities in Jane Eyre based on intelligence as well (i.e. St. John and why he refuses to marry Miss Oliver). And we're on the same page as far as equality for women/men and adults/children go in today's society. As I said earlier, we already had an intellectual discussion about it. :)
ReplyDeleteAwesome post, Melanie. I completely agree with your point of view. People should question more, and obtain more information to cut down on the amount of ignorant people there are in the world, as well as those who tend to be hypocritical in their responses. Questioning is one of the best ways to learn, to expose yourself to new ideas and get the answers one's brain yearns for. Having read Tess, your response to inequalities rings true in this text. Much of the time, Tess is treated in a very unfair and biased way. As you have stated, I'm sure there were many instances when Jane is treated in a similiar way.
ReplyDeleteMelanie! I could talk about feminism with you all day. Everything sucks and is very unfair. As a person who doesn't believe in any region (or identify herself as a atheist) I love what you said about woman being created from the ribs of man. This kind of ani-feminist dogmatic rhetoric allows men to use the bible to justify objectifying women. Also, very good conclusion. The only way for our society to move forward is for use to ask questions and find the root of our problems.
ReplyDeleteThis is a very good post, I liked what you said about the woman being created from that man and universally accepted statements such as murder is wrong and slavery is too but society is still so hypocritical. Obviously, it would be best for society to actually practice what it preaches and genuinely promote real equality. In the novel, Jane seeks for equality more than anything and finds in Mr. Rochester but along the way she stays true to herself and does not compromise her integrity by succumbing to temptation which is an inspiring message to people like us who want to further fight for equality.
ReplyDeleteLike everyone else, I also agree with everything you said in your blog post. Sometimes our society's mindset makes me mad because some people are just too ignorant to see that everyone is equal, and that just because something is a tradition doesn't always mean its right. We definitely need to question things if they don't feel right, and not be afraid to be judged for being "different" or even "daring".
ReplyDeleteI'm glad you all agree. I'm pretty passionate about this whole ethical philosophy/morality thing :) And that is what caused me to be so drawn into Jane and what I read/heard of Tess. Even though both books are centered around violations of principles I like to think society should hold itself to, both books have made me realize that my standards and morals don't always matter and that we should just strive for what we can get as much as possible.
ReplyDelete-Melanie N.
In addition to the other bloggers, I agree with your blog post as well. We will never be able to create anything that is perfect. We must accept that we have imperfect people, imperfect creations, and an imperfect society. But just because we have "accepted" this doesn't mean we shouldn't strive to improve it. There is always room for improvement, and that's something I learned from Jane. She faced difficult situations, yet still made an effort to improve her circumstances. This was a very well written blog post. Great job
ReplyDeleteDefinately agree with your insight Melanie, but keep in mind back then, status and wealth was a big issue. Jane was mainly treated badly by the Reeds because her late parents were lower class. Whereas now a days, there isnt much discrimination against a person of low-income.
ReplyDeleteJessica Danial
I also agree with you that we humans should all be treated equal. One of the main reason is that when god created us he created us all equal. It's us humans that have led to corruption in our society, by discriminating due to color, gender, or values. I believe that both of the novels, have proven the fact that we need to rise above these values, and achieve what we want.
ReplyDeleteI couldn't agree more with your entire blog (and I very well know that most of our opinions are very much alike :]). It reminds me tremendously of a disagreement I got into with someone just last week regarding the issue of equality and tolerance. She was convinced that our world can't be changed and thus there is no reason to try to change people. However I told her that not only must we respect the opinions of everyone regardless of their differences, wealso have a great chance to make some change. Although our world is certainly not perfect and the ghastly way that groups of people in sociwety are being treated will never go away completely, we still must do SOMETHING to make our world a bit brighter and provide equality for all. Now I'm just getting off onto a tangent. I really like your spirit, and your optimism that we can make a change for the better if we TRY.
ReplyDeletep.s. that last comment from the thought foxes was written by Katie M.
ReplyDelete