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The Scarlet Letter is a story of hypocrisy and punishment. The strict Puritan laws made adultery a sin punishable by death or a life of misery. Although being an unwed mother or an illegitimate child is no longer a crime leading to capitol punishment, the treatment of welfare mothers and their children is similar to the treatment Hester an Pearl received in Hawthorne’s novel. Hester and Pearl are prime examples of the negative attitude society, both Puritan and current, has toward single mothers and their “bastard” children.
Hester and Pearl are the atypical example of illegitimate child and unwed mother. The consequence of the relationship between Hester and Dimmesdale is a child out of wedlock. Hester is forced to stand with her child on a scaffold which according to Hawthorne is “invested with almost as stern a dignity as the punishment of death itself.” Pearl is forced to grow up without a father and Hester is left to make a life for herself and her child with no social succor.
The puritans favored laws that would force society to hear their preaching (2.Gatis, 5). To the Puritan community Hester’s “A” is a mark of just punishment. Acco
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Today, as in Puritan days, stigmas remain on unwed mothers and their illigitimate children. Children like Pearl are no longer linked to the devil, but instead to crime and drug use. Hester Prynne and Pearl are made to suffer because of such a mentality. An imp of evil, emblem and product of sin, she had no right among christened infants. Unwed mothers are branded as immoral welfare recipients who are too lazy to work. According to Physiology Today 25% of fathers are believed to pay no child support (3. Even if the fathers were found and forced to pay, financial support is only part of what makes a father.
Much of society has not change their views since the Puritan days. Fatherless children would not fall into the category of a family unit, therefore Pearl, not having a proper family, is chastised and branded a child of the devil. Family in the Puritan society was a means for carrying out civil purposes (5.
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