Choices In The Giver

“If work and leisure are soon to be subordinated to this one utopian principle- absolute busyness- then utopia and melancholy will coincide: an age without conflict will dawn, perpetually busy- and without consciousness.”-Gunter Grass. Living in a perfect world is not worth giving up your choices. Without our choices, there would be several necessities missing from our human lives. Having a perfect world would eliminate a true family unit, a graduation, and a job. I don’t think living in a perfect world is worth giving up choices because you would have to give up your true family and parents. In The Giver, everyone has an assigned family unit. “Like the Matching of Spouses and the Naming and Placement of newchildren, the Assignments were scrupulously thought
“Though he had been reassured by the talk with his parents, he hadn't the slightest idea what Assignment the Elders would be selecting for his future, or how he might feel about it the day it came.” ( Lowry 24 ). This quote shows that in the ‘perfect’ utopia, the community can't even pick what they want their Assignment or occupancy to be, as it is instead being chosen by the Committee of Elders. Humans cannot pick their jobs, decide whether or not they want to quit and move on to a new job, or get fired. Without having these privileges we can't challenge ourselves to do better in our daily work. Sometimes there are pros and sometimes there are cons of living in a perfect world. The pros are that you're guaranteed to be safe and you don't have to worry about your life or money. The cons are that you don't have a strong family, you are assigned your jobs, and your graduation and education is poor. This applys to the audience because a utopia isn't always necessarily perfect, even though most would think it is. Everyone has their own utopia, but with every utopia there comes a