Shirley
Jackson’s “The Lottery” deals with man’s ability to rationalize generally
unacceptable actions. Old man Warner makes the comment on page 294 “Lottery in
June, corn be heavy soon.” He is rationalizing the action by there being plenty
of food for the year. In his mind, if this were to stop, the town’s people
would have terrible crops. He also talks about how the younger people who are
questioning this tradition will want to just stop working. He thinks the
younger people have no sense of tradition, and have no right to question it. If
it was really that bad of a thing, it would have been changed years ago.
In
my small home town, there was just an incident with the girls’ basketball team.
Two of the star players were caught by another student drinking on the bus. The
student went to the coach, and the coach swept it under the rug because they
were on their way to districts. Winning was more important than disciplining
these girls. Eventually the episode was exposed, weeks after the incident, so
the coach was fired, and the two girls were kicked of the team for the
remainder of the season. The towns people were upset that this girl had taken
away two of the players, and possibly a shot at state. She was shunned by everyone,
instead of being praised for doing the right thing. To this small town, the
state trophy was more important, and would bring better publicity than doing
what was right.
