The Power Of The Government

How would life be if everyone was the same? If you couldn’t learn, or come to be a better, more successful person. Well  "Harrison Bergeron" and Fahrenheit 451 show very similar plots where this is the center of the characters' worlds, their normal lives. The government is more powerful than anything and everything, and no one could even try and rise above it, no matter how hard they try. In the end everyone is equal, and there is no alternative.

In both stories the characters are to believe that to succeed is a very bad thing. You shouldn't be smarter than anyone else, nor should you try and be better than anyone else. In Fahrenheit 451 if you try to read, the government will have the firefighters come and burn all of the books they can find. When Guy, a firefighter, questions whether he still wants to be a firefighter still, or quit, he feels as if that’s a bad thing, and he shouldn't question authority, but he feels he doesnt have a choice of what to do but because of the controlling government.

One common theme is the government frowning upon one person succeeding more than others. In Fahrenheit 451 the characters are frowned upon succeeding, but they still have the chance to prosper. If they are found reading, the government will burn the books, but they can still learn through other resources, and yet no one has ever tried. In "Harrison Bergeron" they don’t have that choice at all. The government decided that everyone will be exactly the same. All the same rank in beauty, strength, speed, smarts, everything! If you are smarter than everyone else, you don’t have a chance to succeed and become more; you are shrunk to the "normal" standard, and deprived of the successful life you could have.

For me, the main lesson in these two pieces, would be that if our government were to handicap everyone in our society, life would be terribly boring with everyone equal to every single person in society. It taught me that life isn't about being better than everyone else; it's about being the best you can be and to succeed at just that.