Hunger Games Ethics Analysis

Great Essays
How is it that in a society with such wealth, there is such grave poverty? If you were wondering which society the question was referring to, Panem or the U.S., this draws a great point on the status of our own economic system. In the Hunger Games, the stark difference between the poor and the wealthy, along with how the economics of Panem operate, creates a great divide between the Capitol and the districts; through ethical analysis, we will examine the divide and what it is included. Using Immanuel Kant’s ethics, we see that everything the Capitol does to the districts is wrong, and provides a small piece of the wedge between the districts and the Capitol. Going by Kant’s idea that if a person is not okay with the rest of the world doing …show more content…
Multiple times throughout the Hunger Games and Catching Fire, Katniss talks about how lavish their food is compared to her home food. She’s mapped out how to replicate the meals, and often she would have to find alternatives for basic meats like chicken, or vegetables. She even mentions that the meals would take days to prepare for if she were to make it in District 12 (HG pg 55) But the drastic difference is apparent when Katniss and Peeta go to the Capitol ball. Seeing all the food there urged Katniss to eat until she was absolutely, happily stuffed, but seeing how the Capitol wasted food by having the citizens forcibly throw it up in order to eat more made Katniss ashamed of herself and the people around her (CF pg 37). There are districts starving, but the Capitol is wasting food for their own benefit, without thinking of anyone else that could benefit from …show more content…
There has to be a resistance, one force that opposes the Capitol. Just like Gale urged in Mockingjay, there is a good side and a bad side, and no turning back; this is evident even in our own world (Mockingjay, pg185).
In the Hunger Games, there is such a drastic gap between the wealthy and the poor, and it serves as a mirror to the gap that exists in the U.S.
Knowing that humans have a habit of putting themselves in the best position of possible, we know that everyone would pick being wealthy over being poor. But this situation would give the opportunity to put the wealthy people into the poor’s shoes, and hopefully once they step out of the situation, they can see that the wealth is not as equally distributed as they may have thought. It is difficult to see things that are wrong in the world when you are focused on your own gain.
In Roger Thurow’s article “Enough,” even just the first chapter’s title, “Good for the Goose, Band for the Gander,” displays the exact problem that plagues both Panem and the U.S. (Thurow). Everything that the districts work for directly benefits the Capitol, but none of the districts benefit from the Capitol in the same way. The goose is the Capitol, the gander being the

Related Documents

  • Improved Essays

    Every rules they have, everything is an oblige to all the districts. In the novel we can see how the President Snow take a control and make an obligation so all the districts must have followed it and by taking this action, the districts people feel more suffered, depressed and more fear to face everyday. One of the obligation that people in districts should follow is giving the capitol a power to control their lives by doing all the things that the govern told them to do. Such as sacrificing their children to be a tributes and let them go to kill one to another in the Hunger games. For the capitol is the highest power, so that the districts must have followed the obligation that already settled by the capitol.…

    • 745 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins takes place in a post apocalyptic society where the only way to keep the “districts” in check is by hosting an annual program, known as a celebration, called The Hunger Games. During The Hunger Games one male and one female between the ages of 12-17 are chosen from each district. They are forced to fight to the death until only one remains as the victor. This year Katniss Everdeen, a poor girl from district 12, volunteers to take her sister’s place in the games. Katniss uses her wit and survival skills to conquer the games along with her new love interest, Peeta.…

    • 750 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Neither Tocqueville nor the authors of the Federalist Papers view an enlightened and virtuous citizenry as wholly essential to the Constitutional system, but while the federalists build institutions to defend the government against the self-interested passions of the people, Tocqueville sees the greatest benefits of the American political system where the government and the people meet: in the township and in political associations. The Federalists believe that the core of the Constitution system’s success lies in its institutions rather than the people. Their writings repeatedly show doubt in the abilities of the public to govern, construct institutions to defend against their involvement, limiting their civic duties to elections. Tocqueville,…

    • 1325 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Panem Case Study

    • 1187 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Welcome to Panem! A command economy controlled by the political elite located in the capital. President Snow and his cronies are in charge of the resources and dictate how and how much of each good is produced in the districts. Panem is made up of twelve districts that contribute to luxurious life in the capital. Because Panem has a large economy and it is controlled by a board of political elite in the capital there is coordination problem.…

    • 1187 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The wealth inequality in the U.S. has been growing gradually for decades and still, showing no signs of resolving it from any political candidates. It has been a vicious cycle that delivers detrimental outcomes to everyone. The rich people are getting richer due to the wealth they already have or inherited and resources that are ready to invest in lucrative activities or trades that are able to accumulate and could produce more rapidly new wealth. Additionally, children that were born or grown up in a rich family are more likely to attend college due to their tremendous influence and economic advantage, which may increase their chances to earn higher wages than any other social class. Whereas poor people are getting poorer due to individualism…

    • 396 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Jammy Loeur 10/14/2014 MW 12-1:15pm PHIL 103 Capitalism Is Morally Unjustified in Today’s World A woman in Cambodia, working long hours whilst earning only $1 a day, manufactures apparel that will be sold to consumers in the United States for a price of $50 each. A man is paralyzed from the neck down in a car accident as a result of the car manufacturer neglecting to disclose a malfunction in its seatbelts, just so that they may save money by not issuing a complete recall. And lastly, an elder man from a working-class family, who has worked exceptionally hard his entire life still remains impoverished.…

    • 1164 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Sociology is the study of social aspects that regard human groups; relationships, structure and function. Movies, music, television shows and the internet, among many other sources are forms of media that most people use in their every day routine in one form or another. Although we may not always be aware, sociology is tied closely to every type of media we interact with. Movies often reflect social reality, but are not always a perfect mirror. In the film, The Hunger Games, the society is very different than our own.…

    • 1528 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The Brother Grimm’s version of Cinderella has hidden meanings in the stories that teach us about how the story resembles or symbolize our society. The first symbol in the story that stood out to me the most is the stepsisters representing society 's cruelness and greed. The second symbol was the stepmother’s envy of Cinderella 's beauty, because Cinderella was more beautiful than her daughter 's. The stepmother thought that her daughter’s were not as beautiful as Cinderella and as a result she was envious of Cinderella, this represent a society dominated by envy and hate. The third symbol is the hazel tree that provided Cinderella with the wisdom and inspiration to overcome the abuse she was going through, this represents how society rewards…

    • 710 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    The Income and Wealth Inequality of America As a capitalist nation, the United State of America is facing a serious problem, which is the inequality of wealth and income. In pace with the growth of the economy, the rich people are getting richer and the poor people are getting poorer. The gap between the rich and poor is widening unprecedentedly fast. Why is that happening?…

    • 1247 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Gilded Age Inequality

    • 1011 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Robert Reich, former Secretary of Labor and presenter of the documentary Inequality for All, once said “The faith that anyone could move from rags to riches - with enough guts and gumption, hard work and nose to the grindstone - was once at the core of the American Dream. Unfortunately today we know that this is no longer the case in the United States. The gap between the rich and the poor continues to increase as the rich get richer and the poor can’t get out of poverty. Contrary to popular belief this is not due to lack of hard work but due to a lack of opportunity and this has become a huge problem for the United States. Although we can’t have every person in this country be wealthy due to the system of capitalism, it is possible to decrease…

    • 1011 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Census data show the gap between the rich and poor to be the widest since the government began collecting information in 1947 and that this gap is continuing to grow” (Mantsios 150). Kim Kardashian, Oprah, Stephan Curry, Denzel Washington all of which who makes ten times more than an ‘average’ adult salary wise. All of which superstars don’t need to give out money left and right, but just those alone set the precedent that the rich will continue to get rich while the poor will stay poor. Americans are going through a drought that needs enviorments are angered and frustrated. America needs change, if that means taxing the rich, donating money to help to the aid of the poor creating a ripple effect to to the region and being the starting point of…

    • 822 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    The difference between “The Hunger Games” and “Lord of the Flies” is that Katniss uses her archery, climbing and trapping skills to survive, whereas Ralph, Piggy and Simon in “Lord of the Flies” lack survival skills. While Katniss is alone in the woods, she she uses her survival skills to ensure that she has food for nourishment: “Before settling down, I take my wire and set two twitch-up snares in the brush. I know it’s risky to be setting traps, but food will go so fast out here”…

    • 2099 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    As Katniss Everdeen and Preeta Mellark journey their lives from the reaping day till the end of games, they realizes that what the people of Capitol enjoyes as food in one meal can sustain her family or any families of 13 districts for a week or two. Throughout the series of “The Hunger Games”, Collins portrays the hunger and struggling of the people in the districts while the Capitols dictates and enjoy. The games area known as areana also becomes a historical sites after games for the Capitol residents to visit for vacation to “rewatch the games, tour the catacombs and visit the sites where the deaths took place” (Collins,…

    • 1013 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Marxism in The Hunger Games If there is any perfect representation of Marxism in film it is in The Hunger Games. For this case study, I will be focusing on the first movie of the trilogy. This paper will overview the way Marxism is shown in The Hunger Games using a few examples from the movie. In this paper, I argue that The Hunger Games’ plot line has Marxism theories extremely exposed and almost blatantly exposed. Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels developed Marxism in the early 1900s.…

    • 753 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Poverty is an issue that people face in every country of the world. Many people are living in poverty today and unable to live within the same standards as others members of their same society, simply due to differences in their financial capabilities. This is an issue for individuals, as well as an issue between countries, having some countries striving with wealth, while other countries struggle to feed and house their people. A social problem is defined as “a social condition or pattern of behavior that has negative consequences for individuals, our social world, or our physical world” (Guerrero, 2005. 4). This paper was written about the issue poverty because it is an important social problem that affects such a large number of Americans…

    • 1805 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Superior Essays