Atticus Courage

Atticus is a strong-willed man who believes in raising his kids to their full potentials. He wants them to learn right from wrong and be willing to fight for their beliefs. He wants them to understand the world in ways that others simply do not seem to get. Everybody in Maycomb views courage as purely a thing found in big, strong men who have the power to kill. Atticus, however, understands that this is far from the definition of courage. To be courageous is to fight strongly and passionately for the things you believe in no matter what the obstacles are, despite having absolutely no chance of winning. At the end of chapter ten, Scout and Jem have both decided that they are proud of their father’s courage. Scout is proud of her father …show more content…
He uses Mrs. Dubose as an example of true courage. At the end of Mrs. Dubose’s life he makes sure Scout and Jem really get to know her before she passes away so that they truly understand what real courage is. After she passes, he tells them Mrs. Dubose was fighting a morphine addiction for the last years of her life. Her final goal in life was to “leave this world beholden to nothing and nobody” (111). She had no way of winning the battle against death, but she fought with every last ounce of her tiny, fragile, 98-pound body to fight that morphine addiction. In the end, she came out a winner by staying strong. That is what Atticus wants his kids to view as true courage. Courage is the willingness to fight despite having no chance of winning. Atticus is a very courageous man, but not because he is talented with a gun. He is instead courageous because of his unwillingness to back down, as he displayed when he did not back down with Tom Robinson’s case. He has no chance of winning the case and does not have much to gain from it himself, but he still perseveres and continues fighting for Tom and for his own conscience. Atticus may be the “deadest shot in Maycomb County”, but he does not use that against anybody. He chooses to stick to his morals and stand up to the town without a gun. That is true courage. Courage is not a show of force, but rather a show of …show more content…
It is too often that a big, strong man with a gun is mistaken as courageous, while those who complete real acts of courage are overlooked. It is easy to shoot a gun once one learns how, but often it takes more courage to not pick up the gun. A true act of courage is one of the most difficult tasks to accomplish. The sacrifice required to stand up for one’s beliefs is difficult and scary, but it is too often overlooked. Throughout history, there have been many grand acts of courage that may seem small, but truly made a difference, unlike a man shooting a gun. Rosa Parks was a powerless African American woman. She could have followed the rules and given up her seat, but she refused. She had no way of winning that fight as an African American woman and was immediately thrown in jail, but she still stood, or rather sat, for what she believed in. She, as “the first lady of civil rights,” stood against the crowd and inspired several other acts of courage that led to the country of equality that we live in today. Not all acts of courage, however, are this big. The small act of a child standing up to a bully is a huge act of courage. It may seem easy to an adult to stand up to that eight year old in the park that teases the other children, but it is an extremely difficult task to a child who has been repeatedly hurt by this kid. Despite the risk of being bullied even more for standing up, a truly