Superstitions And Taboos In Cando

“The most dangerous man to any government is the man who is able to think things out for himself, without regard to the prevailing superstitions and taboos” (Henry Louis ‘H.L.’ Mencken). When someone starts to questions things about the government or about what they say they start to think more and more for themselves. Once someone starts thinking for themselves the government losses the control they have on them. The government is able to get people think they are thinking for themselves or that the government doesn’t do things the people won’t like. However the government has more control over people than people like to think/ or know. In the novel Cando Oscar’s father decides to create his very own town with him in charge and so he …show more content…
The thing that is different about this town, Cando, than most towns is he is able to create Messages that play with music that are able to control what people think with controls their actions. Oscar Banks isn’t supposed to know about the Messages; however, he does and he has learned to control the Messages and he spends his time help kids escape and a has to learn about how to help her without getting caught and sent to the Listening Room. Where he would be brainwashed into forgetting everything about who he is and having to do exactly want the Messages tell him to. Pam Bachorz warms society about the government controlling the thoughts on its people in Cando. Based on Zoe Trodd’s article “Am I Still Not a Man and a Brother? Protest Memory in Contemporary Antislavery Visual Culture” and Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia’ article “Police Power”, society may truly have something to fear in the form of dehumanization and …show more content…
Oscar Banks is explaining about how the Messages work and what effect they have on one's thoughts and actions, “The Messages stay filed away until you’re about to do something interesting. Your brain knows what to feed you: a Message rushes into your head. Covers everything else. No desire. No fear. No hunger, even” (Bachorz 1-2). Having emotions is one of the most human things. The Messages, created by Oscar’s father the man in charge of the whole town, don’t give the citizens any freedom whatsoever. They can’t control what their emotions are. In since the Messages, or the government, it taking away a person's control of their emotions which is a type of dehumanization. The government doesn’t want people to control their actions and the only way they know who to control someone’s actions is through dehumanizing them by controlling their emotions at all times. Even though in today's modern life, we don’t have to government controlling our emotions through messages in our head, we still have different types of dehumanization towards other people, “Police power, in law, right of a government to make laws necessary for the health, morals, and welfare of the populace. . . [The Supreme Court has] the power of the states to enact laws of that type even where, under ordinary circumstances, Constitutional law or