Pros And Cons Of Being Mildred

Improved Essays
In a world where people get what they want, when wanted, seems impeccable. However, psychologically, The Harvard Study of Adult Development states, “That loneliness kills, and being social makes us happier, the quality of your relationships matter and relationships don't just protect our bodies, they protect our brains” (Waldinger). Proverbs 14:18 GNT “Ignorant people get what their foolishness deserves, but the clever are rewarded with knowledge” (“BibleGateway”). Mildred believes that complacency is better than knowledge, because she would rather be with her “family” which are the people in the parlor walls (Bradbury 69). Rather than reading books about people she can not see (Bradbury 69). Today the world views knowledge as a quick fix for …show more content…
In Mildred’s case she does not worry about happiness, instead, she walks through life and is consumed by the mundane. She allows herself to be engulfed in technology; she fills her days with watching the TV clown that is gruesome, which leads her to try to commit suicide. Mildred lives in the parlor walls, which “is an environment as real as the world. It becomes and is the truth” (Bradbury 84). Mildred cannot escape her virtual world, instead she conforms to what the parlor says. She spends her days in front of the parlor walls, even wanting a fourth wall, which would cost two thousand dollars. When Montag tells Mildred, that he is not going to get the fourth wall, she claims that Montag is selfish. Montag then explained that they haven't had the third parlor wall for more than two months, but she believes that they have the money to get the fourth wall. Mildred claims that they can go without some things, but Montag clarifies that they have already gone without a few things in order to have the third wall. Mildred wants to believe and is led to believe that books, are not the truth. “Books aren’t real” (Bradbury 84). Mildred believes that the knowledge that books contain is frightening and dangerous, because they destroy her perfect idealized world. At the end of the novel, Montag asks her to change her ways, he begs her to listen to him and read a book. However, Mildred …show more content…
Obtaining information isn't easy, because information requires time and effort. Smaller goals will require less information, therefore, less time and effort. However, our largest life goals require a lot of experience and a lot of time and knowledge. The present society has evolved in knowledge, but on terms of communication, the society has devolved. Mildred was ignorant about the meaning of knowledge, so she focused on what made her happy, which as humans is what we do today. Phones, laptops, and television, consume our lives by absorbing free time. The U.S. National Library of Medicine and Health states, ”The average time spent watching TV, and other technological devices are 4.5 hours more than double the healthy amount of time to spend on it.” People fixate on making communication important, but by doing so, have become less interactive. Technology is not controlling people, but people are controlling technology. Chatterjee, a Milken Institute Fellow, didn’t want to lay all the blame at the feet of technology. “I feel that actually, we should rather say humans are using technology in such a way that it’s affecting their health,” she said. “Humans are making the choice to be so obsessed with technology” (Cook 2016). Cyberchondriacs, is an anxiety disorder people can develope by searching the web too often. When one constantly scrolls through social networks, he or she becomes susceptible to anxiety. The

Related Documents

  • Superior Essays

    Character Identification Protagonist: Francis, a poor young girl in Brooklyn. Neely, her younger brother. Katie her mother, Her dad johnny.…

    • 980 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    When the fire happens at Montag’s house Mildred says “‘Poor family, poor family, oh everything gone, everything gone now….(Bradbury 108).” Mildred only cares about what she calls her “family” on the tv parlor wall when her and Montag’s house burns down. Mildred then has a bag packed and leaves Montag behind as there is no reason to stay anymore because she only cared about tv. Many people in society rely on technology and do not know what to do without it.…

    • 877 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Its a well known fact that technology is becoming more embodied in our lives. The Pew Internet and American Life Project released a study stating the number of adults that own cellphones, laptops or tablets is rising. This increase in ownership of technology has revolutionized access to information through the internet. One notable case is O’Grady v. Superior Court of Santa Clara County (2006). Apple filed a case against an unnamed individual who allegedly leaked information on several online sites regarding new Apple products.…

    • 315 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Nicholas Carr’s nonfiction book The Shallows: What The Internet is Doing to Our Brains is about how the internet is changing the way society thinks. As more technology is developed, the faster the way that thinking is altered. Carr provides multiple sources to credit his basis of the findings and gives multiple examples of the effects of the increase in internet usage. The advancements in technologies not only affect the speed of getting information, but also the manner in which the information can be seen. This affects humans’ abilities to multitask, read, and comprehend.…

    • 507 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    Set in the 24th century, Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury unravels with the story of a protagonist, Guy Montag. At first, Montag takes pleasure in his job as a fireman, burning illegally owned books and the homes of their owners. Montag soon begins to question the value of his profession and in turn his life. The Road, a novel by American writer Cormac McCarthy, is a post-apocalyptic tale of a journey of a father and his young son over a period of several months. They walk across a landscape blasted by an unspecified cataclysm that has destroyed most of civilization and, in the intervening years, almost all life on Earth.…

    • 1311 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Superior Essays

    In the book’s reality, she’s more in denial, and she doesn’t want to care or fix anything. She seems like someone who has given in to her depression. If you think about Mildred in the book, you can see she has a lot of things that could be symptoms of mental disorders. There’s a part in the book where she even talks about hitting rabbits and dogs with her car to feel better. If you look on WebMD at common symptoms of clinical depression, the list includes difficulty concentrating and remembering details, thoughts or attempts of suicide, trouble sleeping, feelings of emptiness, and violent thoughts or actions, like what Mildred did with hitting animals with her car.…

    • 1529 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    For example, there are not parlor walls that people treat as family as shown in the book when Mildred states “‘The uncles, the aunts, the cousins, the nieces, the nephews, that lived in those walls.”’ (41). Also, people today do not play roles in programs on the television. Mildred spends her time being in programs. For example, when the novel states, “‘Now, don’t get angry!’’…

    • 1152 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    An example of Mildred 's conformity is. when Montag was curious about who turned him and in reply Beatty “‘nodded. ‘But her friends turned in an alarm earlier, that I let ride. ’”(111). This shows how conformed Mildred is, because even though Montag is her husband, she still turned him in because she was scared of the truths he was uncovering.…

    • 1110 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In the New York Times article, “ Stop Googling. Let’s Talk,” the author, Sherry Turkle, uses her chance to show parents and young adults how having access to internet all the time is hurting the world today. She informs the audience with specific statistics to show how technology is not only taking over how we find new information, but changing how we communicate. In addition, it shows that not only teenagers are being affected but adults also. Devices are not just changing what we do but changing who we are as people.…

    • 800 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    The internet has become one of life’s necessities in the United States. From shopping at Wal-Mart to high school testing, the digital world has replaced paper and pencil in America. Those who don’t have access to computers and the internet are being left behind and are at a great disadvantage. The author Nicholas Carr sees the dangers of what our world has become. His book The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to Our Brains describes the negative effects of continuous clicking, online reading, and much, much more.…

    • 1823 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Superior Essays

    As a result, the citizens believe the books are both useless and problematic. For instance, after Montag burned down Mrs. Blake’s home and returned to Mildred, he says, “There must be something in books, things we can’t imagine, to make a woman stay in a burning house; there must be something there. You don’t stay for nothing” (51). This implies that the public thinks there is nothing in books and thus do not care about them, yet the people that read books and appreciate them are able to see their importance. The distinct differences in the way knowledge is portrayed greatly impact the reaction society has to it and the events that occur in the…

    • 1293 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    As technology develops, some people worry about the effects of those changes upon our society. Mr. Nicholas Carr, the author of “Is the Internet Making Us Dumber?” (Wall Street Journal) claims that the internet as a medium for information is having a detrimental effect upon the human brain and changing the way we think in a negative way. He claims that the internet has an excess of information and distractors that detract from our ability to focus, concentrate, and consolidate memory properly.…

    • 1055 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    She lets technology run her life which is leaving her thoughtless. Giving the thought that mildred is emotionally dead, she tries to kill herself, then does not remember a thing. Maybe you took two pills and forgot and took two more, and forgot again and took two more, and were so dopey you kept right on until you had thirty or forty of them in you(Bradbury 17).…

    • 480 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Great Essays

    After Mildred remembers to tell Montag about Clarisse’s disappearance, Montag pays closer attention to Mildred which shows her bland life style, “her hair burnt by chemicals to a brittle straw, her eyes with a kind of cataract unseen but suspect far behind the pupils, the reddened pouting lips, the body as thin as a praying mantis from dieting, and her flesh like white bacon” (45). The words used paints an unpleasant image as Mildred is described as a corpse with her “flesh like white bacon”. Montag’s description of Mildred shows society’s demand for artificially beautiful women which can be achieved through dying one’s hair with “chemicals” and “dieting”. With Mildred following society’s orders it highlights her adherence to rules even though it is molding her into the ideology of their society … Clarisse and Mildred’s differences are highlighted through the way they spend their time alone which influences Montag. While Clarisse refuses to comply with the ideologies forced upon her, contrastingly, Mildred lives a monotonous lifestyle, adhering to the standard of society.…

    • 1561 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Internet and Intelligence As it seems in our society, technology continues to become an ever increasing part of one 's daily life. Whether one is being glued to a cell phone screen, scanning articles on a computer, or sitting on the couch becoming immersed in a television show, it is hard to deny the affects of technology on humans. With this seemingly endless expansion, it is evident that some have formed different opinions on just how this can affect a human brain. While some believe it broadens the variety of human thought as ideas are shared and collaborated on across the worldwide web, others fear it can have devastating effects. Everyone seems to agree, however, that it is changing our minds in some way.…

    • 1552 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Improved Essays