Critical Reflection on Butler’s Dawn — A Focus on Social Justice Themes
Introduction
Social justice remains one of the important issues in contemporary society. This issue is significant in many ways. In the face of the Constitutional stipulation and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights Act that asserts all individuals are born free and subject to equal treatment and dignity, regardless of their background dispositions such as race and gender, social injustice is a violation of the law. Beyond legal violations, social injustice is a threat to sustainable development. For instance, it can be seen as a form of social exclusion that results in some groups of people’s disenfranchisement, denying them opportunities for self-determination. The rest of society stands to lose, too. Since every individual is an integral part of the sustainable development process, the exclusion of a particular group translates to missed opportunities. The society recognizes the criticality of the issue and is focused on addressing it. Literature has also been equally responsive to addressing the issue. Octavia Butler’s Dawn, which tells the story of a disaster that destroys the earth and compels a few survivors to make life on a ship, is a fascinating piece of literature with social justice theme. A reflection on the book invites various interesting questions with critiquing. In particular, does the author succeed in bringing out the themes? What are the outstanding themes? This paper argues that Butler’s Dawn succeeds in mirroring different social justice issues such as racism, post-colonization, gender, and others. Consequently, one can assert that the story is dedicated to contemporaries to encourage them to pursue righteous, as injustice is costly.
Social Injustice Themes
Indeed, social injustice is a violation of the law. As such, it should be condemned at the strongest term possible. Notwithstanding, one of the areas where social injustice is noticeable as far as contemporaries are concerned is racism. In itself, racism involves an act of discriminating against another person or a group of people based on color, ethnicity, or place of originality. More importantly, this theme of racism is brought out in different ways, depending on the author’s literature style utilization. For instance, as inferred by Butler’s exploration of the same, she manages to explore how racism can impede contemporaries from achieving development in various ways. In particular, the most withstanding illustration on racism is when the Author uses one of her protagonists referred to as Lilith Iyapo. In this case, for instance, Lyapo places herself in captivity to feel the experience of racism. While in captivity, “…a small boy with long, straight, black hair …..” is brought in the gage (Butler, 2000, p.5). This boy is referred to as Sharad. In this case, features describing a small boy reveal that his captivity was based on race. This idea of discrimination costs society from attaining sustainable development in various ways. For example, while reflecting on the book, ” …the most frightening the little boy had ever experienced” (Butler, 2000, p.5). In this case, scaring Sharad may develop associated psychological problems such as stress and, if prolonged, may result in depression. A society with a stressed and depressed group is adversely affected as it cannot adequately utilize human resource. Consequently, a country may be forced to expend on treating depressed group, which lags in attaining a sustainable society.
Another area of social injustice is noticeable in the field of post-colonization. Typically, post-colonization refers to exploiting a person or a particular group of people in a society subject to western historical culture. This post-colonial theme is brought out by Butler in various ways. One of the most important ways can be noticed when Sharad is brought in the gage. For example, ” ….he did not speak English, and he was terrified of her” (Butler, 2000,
p.5). At this instance, it is clear that Sharad is not an English native speaker. However, the fact that Lyapo sympathizes with him and teaches him to learn English through singing does not repeat some of Sharad songs even if they are free from the accent. “ He did not understand why she did not do the same when he sang her his songs”(Butler, 200, p.5). This confusion confronting Sharad demonstrates the theme of post-colonization whereby a white man has remained to manipulate decisions made by leaders of developing countries. In most cases, decisions made by leaders of developing countries have been overlooked at the international forum. This ignorance is regardless of their justified positive responsiveness in attaining sustainable development. As a result, developing countries have been compelled to lag in making stringent decisions. These stringent decisions are based on informed consultations. Undoubtedly, informed consulted decisions are vital in moving contemporary societies towards achieving sustainable development.
Gender is also affecting contemporaries from attaining sustainable development. In this case, the nature of work has been at the epicenter in dictating the gender to be assigned a particular task in contemporary societies. Notwithstanding, the nature of work has dictated contemporary populations of developing nations and, in developed countries such as the U.S. For instance, as explored in the book, Lyapo appears to be left behind alone with no work after the death of her husband and son. “Her son and her husband had been her work for few years” (Butler, 2000, p.4). For Lyapo not having some job, it reveals that she largely depended on her husband alongside her son to provide for her. This over-reliance of women to their husbands is depicted in contemporary society attributable to the difference in line to roles and duties perceived to be undertaken by women or men. Longstanding, women’s duties are tied to conceiving and bearing children.
Notwithstanding, women are responsible for executing domestic chores. On the other hand, men are responsible for undertaking challenging tasks, particularly within formal sectors. Most formal sectors compensate workers (men) with hefty salaries. This better compensation empowers men to become more responsible persons in society as opposed to women. This gender bias based situation remains a challenge that contemporaries are still grappling to address. In particular, it lags a society in attaining sustainable development, as revealed in Lyapo, who struggles to make ends meet after the death of husband and son.
However, these challenges can be overcome by contemporaries through the empowering of women. For instance, in the book, “…..she had gone back to college, there to decide what else she might do with her life” (Butler, 2000, p.4). It is indispensable to note that for the attainment of sustainable development, contemporaries should do away with longstanding perception and believe, which draw lines between women and men roles in societies. In particular, in the face of the Constitutional stipulation and even the Universal Declaration of Human Rights Act, all individuals are born free and subject to equal treatment and dignity, regardless of their background dispositions as seen for Lyapo. She decides to go back to school to turn a life around and stay free from exploitation.
Conclusion
Overall, Butler’s Dawn successfully mirrors different social justice issues such as racism, post-colonization, gender, and others. Consequently, one can assert that the story is dedicated to contemporaries to encourage them to pursue righteousness, as injustice is costly. For instance, in the book as far as these three themes covered in this paper are concerned, it is established that contemporaries are affected by social justice issues such as racism, post-colonization, gender, and others. The failure to address these issues confronting contemporaries would mean that contemporaries would be impeded from attaining a sustainable development attached to the case experienced by Lyapo. Indeed, Constitutional stipulation and even the Universal Declaration of Human Rights Act assert that all individuals are born free and subject to equal treatment and dignity. Regardless of their background dispositions such as race and gender, social injustice is a violation of the law. As illustrated in the book by Butler, some of the effects associated with social injustice included causing psychologically related problems such as stress. Stress affects the mental functioning of persons; hence, these people cannot participate adequately in their daily activities resulting in human resource underutilization. Other effects attached to gender can cause women to become less empowered people in society. For example, married women tend to struggle in making ends in a situation when they lose their husbands. However, these challenges can be addressed by reviewing Constitutional stipulation and even the Universal Declaration of Human Rights Act.
Reference
Butler, O, E., (2000). Dawn one of the xenogenesis series