Literary Analysis On Harrison Bergeron

Harrison Bergeron, a story written by Kurt Vonnegut Jr, shows a society where everyone is the same, no one is- or allowed to be, better than anyone else.
The story takes place in a futuristic society during 2081. The main two people in this story are Hazel and George Bergeron. George, along with most people, has sacks filled with birdshot, and a handicap radio. It’s to keep him from using his intelligence. There’s rules in the society, and everyone has gotten used to them. Harrison Bergeron, their son, on the other hand, doesn’t respect the norms, and has been placed in jail for committing crimes.This story shows the struggle of society and how it tries to prevent people from standing apart from the crowd.

The author shows this when he wrote

Once a person is introduced into different ways of thinking, they feel that they are restricted to think in other ways. This restriction, is the handicap. The handicap prevents George from thinking too much. From using his ability to think in a different way. In this society, many people appear that they are not open minded. It’s not entirely their fault, they are influenced by their childhood and their friends. Throughout their life, they are taught to think a certain way. Even with social norms, not everyone follows them. Most people who do this, mainly in their childhood or adolescent years, tend to get pushed around. Their personalities are not common like others, so others immediately assume that they are weird. This then spreads amongst other people. This forces other personalities to die out. There is a large variety of people who are open minded. This is primarily achieved once they grow older, though. There is still struggles people have to face through their school

They act differently, and can probably change their styling of clothes or form of communication. It no longer bothers them that they are being told what to be and what to do. Eventually they will accept that. George also says that he no longer notices it anymore. It is difficult for a person to reassure themselves every day that they are being influenced by friends, technology, trends, etc. to change. Mainly because it doesn’t seem worth the time or important, even when it is. For example, when schools discuss about bullying, and then proceed to say quotes like “Stand up for someone.” or “Don’t be a bystander.” most of the students don’t care. That’s because they’ve been influenced to not care, most likely by friends. As much as they can not care about a topic, they can also bring attention to it in a rather different way. Jokes are usually made about topics that shouldn’t be jokes about. Even if it is wrong, no one tries to stop it. No student would want to stand up and give a speech about why that is wrong to say.That’s because no one would want to be seen as a social threat. The threat the son of George and Hazel, Harrison showed. To overthrow the government, the society, the rules society has made, and trying to do the right