Boo Radley Discrimination

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To Kill a Mockingbird Even after the thirteenth amendment passed in the constitution of the United States of America, discrimination was still an issue that required contending. The abolishment did very little but put a law to make it illegal to own slaves, but yet the hatred and prejudice still existed in society. This issue is reflected in the literature of the time such as the classical novel written by Harper Lee, To Kill a Mocking Bird. Overall in the novel To Kill a Mocking Bird, the theme of discrimination is developed through the characters of Tom Robinson, Scout Finch, and lastly Arthur “Boo” Radley. One of the characters in the novel that was heavily discriminated by authority was Tom Robinson. Tom was accused of rape and was declared…show more content…
In the novel Boo was never accepted by society for his past actions and for this declared a social outcast to humanity. The reputation the people of Maycomb possessed towards Boo was all negative rumors that people believed such as what he ate “dined on raw squirrels and any cat he could catch” (Lee, 13) which were one of the many rumors. These hurtful rumors made poor Boo a monster in their eyes and created a prejudice against him before knowing who he really is. The outcome of this ruined Boo’s life and disconnected him for the life outside his house. As Boo had made mistakes in his life as any other person in society has, he was never forgiven. His fate, which was decided by his dad, was to have no contact outside of the Radley house. This choice had expelled Boo from ever truly feeling any relationship of what so ever, and was always cut off if he had ever. This was displayed in chapter 7 when Boo had formed some connection between Scout and Jem such as leaving presents from them in the tree knot hole; later then Boo’s brother Nathan poured cement in the hole. This demonstrated that Boo had no connections to anyone outside his house since he was not allowed to have one which made misery rain on him. Lastly Boo was always discriminated and never appreciated for anything he had done to serve society. As the people of Maycomb always on thought of Boo being a bad person, he was shown evidently that he served society as a secret hero such as when he had saved the children from Bob Ewell; “Mr. Ewell was tryin’ to squeeze me to death . . . then somebody yanked Mr. Ewell down”. At that scene, Scout was referring to Boo Radley saving her life when Mr. Ewell was trying to kill her. This showed another side of Boo that society has not once mentioned, meaning they never really knew Boo personally and all the good character he posses to be a hero in his community. These events
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