Michael+Esfahani

Life can pose many challenges. One of the greatest challenges an individual may face is figuring out what to do when confronted with injustice. In The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck, the characters in the novel face much injustice. They know the indignity of being homeless and hungry. They know the hurt of being shunned because of their poverty. There is no fairness in how life treats them. An individuals responsibility when confronted with injustice is to be able to recognize the injustice which can only be done if the person has strong moral sense of right and wrong, and to fight against this injustice with the courage that they have which can be to endure the injustice until the right moment when they can take it on. This is explored in the novel as well as in other pieces of literature.

The banks are the injustice that forces the farmers off their land. The people find them to be horrible as they kick the farmers off their land and take what ever the farmers have. “The bank is something more than men, I tell you. It's the monster. Men made it, but they can't control it.”(ch.5). This kind of injustice that comes from the banks leave the farmers in an un even position and makes it hard for them to fight such an injustice.

Injustice follows the farmers of Steinbeck’s novel everywhere they go. In chapter 9 the farmers are forced off their land by tractors that are driven by their once neighboring farmers. "What are you doing this kind of work for - against your own people?" (ch. 5, pg. 45). The farmers find this a sense of betrayal but this is one injustice that can only be resolved by the other individual deciding for themselves. They are being kicked off the land because they cant afford their mortgage payments anymore so the farmers have to sell everything they own to have enough money to buy a car to get to California. "You're not buying only junk, you're buying junked lives. And more - you'll see - you're buying bitterness. Buying a plow to plow your own children under, buying the arms and spirits that might have saved you." (ch.9, pg. 110).The brokers who buy the possessions of the farmers know that the farmers are in no position to bargain so they can just get everything the farmers own for dirt cheap. This injustice is something the farmers must endure to survive.

After the farmers sell all their belongings and finally get enough money to buy a car they come face to face with injustice. The injustice comes from the used car salesmen who sell them horribly conditioned cars for an expensive price. “Well, I don't know- Now, look here. I'm givin' you my shirt, an' you took all this time. I might a made three sales while I been talkin' to you. I'm disgusted. Yeah, sign right there. All right, sir...” How the car sales men treat the farmers make the farmers oppressed and cooperative due to the dire need of a car to get out of the land that they had lost. This injustice is not fought by the farmers because they have no way in fighting this but that would have been the only way to stop it. Without the right situations it makes fighting injustice hard even though that is what is what an individual must do when confronted by it.

The ability to recognize injustice is necessary for an individual when confronted with injustice. In “Civil Disobedience”, the author, Henry Thoreau, depicts how one might recognize right from wrong with their conscience. “Can there not be a government in which majorities do not virtually decide right and wrong, but conscience?”. This quote clearly states Thoreau’s main point that individuals’ conscience is something that should determine what’s right from wrong and not just mob thought.

As we live our lives we come to recognize certain things that we find to be either right or wrong. Being able to determine if something is injustice and being able to confronted it is something that is a necessity of an individual. In The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck, the characters in the novel face much injustice as they strive to survive in their economically stripped society. An individuals responsibility when confronted with injustice is to be able to recognize the injustice which can only be done if the person has strong moral sense of right and wrong, and to fight against this injustice with the courage that they have which can be to endure the injustice until the right moment when they can take it on. With an individual doing his or her part with confronting injustice, it helps rid the world of such atrocities.

Michael Esfahani

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