The Giver Entry #5

In the book I am rereading Jonas finds himself at war with himself  because of his community. I was reading through my notes to see what annotation I wanted to write on when I noticed one, small discrete note scribbled  quite messily in the corner. once I had deciphered my handwriting I saw that it said, "Jonas along with the community is stripped of his emotions," (pg. 39). In this chapter, Jonas gets his first "stirring" which is really just a sexual feeling, his mother and father quickly give him a pill to make this go away. The first thought that hit me was  that they took away his own thoughts, his free will to be as perverted as he wanted to be.

This made me wonder what happens when you have a strait up private thought snatched from. Your inner self raided, and your will to make that thought or recall the old one. what do you really have left then? I believe all you have are raw simple feelings, and isn't that what they have, they never yell, the most that they ever do is they "feel" it and then they talk it over at dinner.

They don't have emotions! Sure they have feelings, but emotions are different, they are the feeling when you are angry that makes you want to punch. They make you want to cry. And when you are happy they are that surge, that rush that makes you want to smile and laugh. The community takes away the action, the follow up feeling that makes you want to curse or jump.

The people that live in Jonas's world never truly live, the joys of life are gone. There is no true learning done because they are not able to make mistakes. Everything they touch is padded and approved, and everything they do is planned. nothing and no one is special. there identity, the things that made them different, an individual, is taken from. They are just copies that are afraid to be different, afraid of change. Afraid to lead any other life then the one that has been carefully mapped out, all the way to their deaths.

When your world is Grey, and their is nothing to look forward to, no excitement, or even the ability to have excitement, what do you think? You can't ask questions, rules restrict you until you can't breathe. what must one think of this society. Living a loveless life, knowing whats around each bend. I think the true problem is the fact that they have no meaning of life, while ours is there, we just don't know or understand it. they don't even have any one to ponder it. They don't have anyone to question, they don't have anyone to argue. The real thing that was stolen was their voice, their say, and with it their hearts.