Prejudice in Maycomb

             Prejudice affects not only the prejudged, but also the prejudging person. In her novel, To Kill A Mockingbird, Harper Lee displays many of the unfortunate consequences of both the people who are prejudged as well as of the people who are prejudging. Prejudice blinds the prejudger and hurts the innocent prejudged. Thus prejudice affects all people involved.
             The prejudged are not the only victims; the pre-judgers are also injured by their own actions. Because the pre-judgers form an opinion so quickly, they don't discover the talents of the person they are prejudging. A misguided notion is often very hard to get rid of, and blinds the pre-judger so that he cannot see the truth. Once the cloud of prejudgment is out of their eyes, the pre-judger can have a newfound respect for the person they had once prejudged. Lee portrays this when she shows that Scout and her brother, Jem, think their father "[is] feeble ... [and doesn't] do anything" (89) worth bragging about. Their paternal shame is turned to awe when Atticus, "the deadest shot in Maycomb," (98) kills a mad dog from a distance with one shot. Because Scout and Jem do not look past Atticus's exterior, they cannot imagine their father's real abilities. Sometimes the prejudger does not change his thoughts, as in the case of Tom Robinson's jury. The views of the jury, a product of Maycomb, are colored by the fact that he is black. Although Atticus, Tom's lawyer, presents clear evidence displaying that Tom Robinson is not the man who abuses Mayella, the jury convicts Tom because they are blinded by "the evil assumption that all Negroes lie, all Negroes are basically immoral beings, [and] all Negroes shouldn't be trusted around our [white] women" (240). Another consequence of a prejudging is that one forgoes wonderful qualities that a prejudged person may have. Inferring from the town's rumors of Boo Radley being a bit strange because he never comes outside, Scout, Jem, and Dill be...

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Prejudice in Maycomb. (1969, December 31). In MegaEssays.com. Retrieved 01:55, March 29, 2024, from https://www.megaessays.com/viewpaper/73262.html