VII-B English
Mr. Nied
10/5/14
How the Society Influences a Person “Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight” (Proverbs 3:5-6). Ruby Turpin is a pharisaical women. She thanks God for making her who she is, thankful she is not white trash or a black woman. She leans not on God’s will, but her own logic about people. She believes that she, a white person with a good disposition, will clear the path to heaven for the lesser. Her knowledge does not rest upon the will of God, but on the racist environment she lives in. Ruby Turpin is a closet racist, she loves to categorize people and put them in boxes. It is the environment …show more content…
But the influence around her is not invincible. Ruby Turpin has been given the capability to break out of her mold and become something more. She has been given by God a chance to become a better Christian. A culture and way of life are engraved into your being from the beginning of your birth. A hypocritical culture, like that of the South, creates an interesting conflict of ideas and beliefs. The ordinary Southerner is a Christian who worships God every Sunday; one believes that at the end of time, God will judge them by looking at all his lifetime’s deeds, both good and bad. But he is also born into an environment that has a lot of prejudice. These opposing values, one symbolizing charity and brotherhood and the other representing an elitist culture, are taught and engraved in the South. Ruby Turpin believes she is a good Christian women …show more content…
She, unlike the other characters we encounter in the story, ponders over the caste question. In one sense Ruby Turpin is better than her husband, Claud, and most other Southerners. She constantly ponders and obsesses over the classification of people as she may have a guilty conscience. Her constant thinking might make her able to come to terms with her own attitude. Claud is a man that accepts the bias culture that he has grown and lived with. Moreover, he neither questions nor ponders about the social question he is surrounded with. He chooses to ignore it. On the other hand, Turpin falls asleep pondering this question. Quote. Her nonstop mulling over this question shows that it is possible for her to grow into a more perfect Christian. The idea that while others do not think about the bias they have grown with, Ruby Turpin thinks about this social norm every day. Ruby Turpin at her core is a person with contradicting beliefs: a Christian, and a judgmental Southern. She is a person capable of being apathetic to the plight of others. She agrees with the spirt of the song. The gospel song’s message “You go to your church / And I’ll go to mine / But we’ll all walk along together … We’ll help each other out” (496), which is played in the reception room, states that all though we are all different we are all Christians and that we