the lottery and Harrison Bergeron

People have been participating in governing their countries either directly or indirectly since a sort of politics came into being. A small number of people can monopolize authority and abuse it for the sake of their own benefits unless masses of people take part in governing their countries. Therefore, their participation plays very crucial roles in their societies. By not taking their political actions, they can become passive. It can result in unfavorable societies. The Lottery and Harrison Bergeron stories criticize reckless obedience made by people in two societies described in very sensational manner. Purpose of this essay is to analyze how the stories describe passive societies in order to criticize a blind obedience by comparing and contrasting two stories. Both stories have more similarities than differences between the society structures and more differences than similarities among the characters for criticizing a blind obedience for authorized power.

Similarities between two society structures in the stories will be discussed in this part. First, there are cruel policies in both societies. In the Lottery story, a person who picks up the lottery paper is supposed to be stoned to death. In the Harrison Bergeron story, outstanding people are supposed to be equipped with handicaps depending on their ability. Even though, those policies look very anti-ethical, people in both societies never question and just obey them. The people show typical blind obedience to readers. Second, both societies have their own specific purposes with the cruel practices. In the Lottery story, the villagers do the lottery to ensure their good harvest as Mr. warner said “Used to be a saying about Lottery in June, corn be heavy soon”. (The Lottery, par 33) And, the writer of Harrison Bergeron story says “ They were equal every which way.” (Harrison Bergeron, par 1). The society intends to make people equal in this story. The next similarity is that powerful authorities