The Importance Of Individuality In Harrison Bergeron

Everyone is different, from looks, attitude, athleticism, and so much more. Each human has their own ups and downs, and each person works to improve themselves. In Kurt Vonnegut’s Harrison Bergeron, individuality is seen as harmful, something that encourages jealousy and low self-worth in others. However, individuality is needed to move society forward: through personal achievements and talent society will improve as a whole. To combat the talents expressed in this story many people are equipped with “handicaps,” objects to lessen them to a “normal” level. They attack intelligence, strength, and other talents. These handicaps are supposed to make all the humans in this story equal, but the underlying meaning is that no one in this universe …show more content…
Jealousy is a strong contender for a reason why this world would be ideal. No talent means no jealousy, correct? However, jealousy can still occur through handicaps. Those who have many handicaps have them for being extremely beautiful or smart, and so people would still be able to be jealous od them. People could also be jealous of the people who have nearly no handicaps, wanting to live the pain-free life they have. In this story, one of the ballerinas talks and George begins to comment on how unfair her voice is, “And she had to apologize at once for her voice, which was a very unfair voice for a woman to use. Her voice was a warm, luminous, timeless melody. "Excuse me-" she said, and she began again, making her voice absolutely uncompetitive,” however, she has no handicap so her voice must not be as amazing as George thinks it is. Yet, he still thinks of how unfair her voice is and is unhappy with it. Jealousy of others happens to be something humans are succumbed to throughout their life no matter what. Jealousy can be harmful but it also can have a good side as well. Jealousy can encourage people to work harder to achieve their goals. In this world of total equality no one can do anything about the jealousy they feel either. They just sit and brood, unable to feel a drive to succeed and become as brilliant as others. This is not the only problem that individuality could bring: self-worth is something …show more content…
Yes, but these expressions invoke a concept of equality The original and traditionally American concept of equality is "equality under the law." That means the same rules apply to all. different from the social justice concept of equal incomes and wealth for all” (1). This type of equality is the equality of equal opportunity. Every human has the ability to become who they want, through hard work and diligence, and not sitting around and doing nothing. This is a society where when jealousy occurs you should take it and turn it into motivation to become better, smarter, stronger. People can make their own rational decisions and strive to become who they want: “Even though nature patently makes each of us different, man, by due diligence, may be able to make us identical” (1). If one works hard, they can do anything they set their mind to. The story does express this, in a bit of fantastical way through Harrison’s dancing with his “Empress”. They begin to dance and proceed to jump and stay far up in the air, almost as if touching the ceiling. If Harrison wanted to take advantage of his talents he could go into a job requiring intelligence, or he could have become an amazing athlete. If he still wanted to become “Emperor” he could have run for