The books that we have read so far have made us think about different many different themes. Reading books can be a way of thinking about real life problems that you don't realize without the real life examples. After you read a book, you can start to compare things to your own life.
In both the Parable of Sower and Full Body Burdon, the main character is part of a community which ignores the dangers that are present and worsening. Everyone in Laurens community, except Lauren, refuses to except the possibility that the community might be overrun and forced to relocate. Since Lauren is the only person who doesn't ignore the true facts, I think the author used Lauren in order to make this theme more noticeable. In the Parable of the Sower, ignorance got the best of the whole town. Everybody believed the government when they said that Rocky Flats was safe. Scientists and other educated people began to try to educate the public that Rocky Flats was very dangerous to the community. People started to look into it, and knew that it probably wasn't right, but stayed in the town and were too passive about it. In my own life, I can see this theme as relevant. Sometimes when there is something stressing me out that I know I could prepare for, I ignore it and pretend everything is okay because I don't want to deal with it. An example is studying for a huge test. After I do my regular studying, I sometimes feel like I need to do more to be fully prepared, but I ignore the stress and hope that everything will be okay. Sometimes this is a good thing to be able to do because it can allow your anxiety to go down, but other times, such as in the Parable of the Sower, preparing for certain things can make a huge difference.
In addition, Full Body Burdon has a theme of secrecy. The government doesn't tell people what is really going on at Rocky Flats. When people finally begin to learn more about what they're producing, the government lies. They say that the amount of radiation is completely harmless to the community, meanwhile almost every family in Kris's neighborhood had a problem with cancer. When they went to court, the outcome of the trials were very questionable and seemed corrupt. I understand that national security was a problem, but they could have produced the triggers in a better spot and stopped lying about it. I think the author wanted people to realize what the government was doing, and how careless they were with peoples lives. We may think that things like this aren't going on in the world today, but I believe Iverson accounts for that as well. I never heard of the Rocky Flats situation at all before reading this. I think she meant to show people that weren't familiar with the situation that government corruption is happening, and most people don't even hear about it. So many people trust the government and believe that if we were being lied to, it would be a big deal and everybody would hear about it. Iverson does a good job of showing how government secrecy plays a part in our world today and how people react.
No comments:
Post a Comment