In The Fifth Season, Syenite says that she hates Alabaster for forcing her to abandon “polite fictions and unspoken truths that have kept her comfortable, and safe” (348). N. K. Jemisin used characters and histories in her novel to draw parallels to the current sociopolitical climate across the world that has led to people accepting the easy explanations in life, allowing them to justify their discrimination of others due to nothing but these simple fictions.
Many characters choose to discriminate against Orogenes because they witnessed one Orogene with unfavorable characteristics or read that they were bad people. Many people in the stillness believe that, if one Orogene destroys a town, then they all must be that dangerous. Some people, such as Rask, have seen this hatred and realized that it is founded upon irrational fear more than anything else. Rask’s sister was taken because she was an Orogene and he shows compassion towards Essun because he understands that she is not the problem (51). Rask never saw his sister as a threat, the threat was people taking her based off one fact about her. These fears are the same that would lead people to shout hate speech at Muslims after 9/11, they are judging them while not understanding them. Alabaster expresses his anger towards the people who classified Orogenes as inhuman as he feels that it is a lie, “so they don’t have to feel bad about how they treat us” (354). However, some look for even more sinister ways to justify their discrimination. Jemisin describes the stone lore as something tampered with to show how history can often pervert what reality is trying to convey. Alabaster tells Syenite how the second tablet is likely damaged because someone disagreed with the message of it and either did not care what happened to it or wanted it destroyed (124/125).
Jemisin’s themes are mirrored in the world today. People being classified as lesser, criminal, or a terrorist based solely on the color of their skin has been a problem across the world for centuries. The idea that someone would alter history to serve their own agenda is something commonly seen in the US even now. Some religious schools refuse to teach evolution despite its support through scientific data; they are ignoring the truth because it does not agree with their stance as a church. Religious institutions may say the same of scientific bodies, but both agree that people are choosing the truth and history they want. Alabaster mentions how some people even go to the extreme lengths of removing parts of history that “don’t matter to the people of the time” (124). Individuals here are discriminatory once again. They have chosen what history matters to them, based on their own biases, and taken those beliefs into physical and verbal attacks against other people. Jemisin saw these atrocities being carried out in the present day, presenting them in the novel through the plight of Orogenes to create a subtler portrayal of race relations.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteI would definitely agree with you that Jemisin intentionally structures the world of the Orogenes to mirror the current socio-political climate of America today. The Orogenes face tremendous discrimination, which seems to parallel the discrimination faced by Muslims after 9/11. In the novel, all of the citizens seem to fear and despise Orogenes because they hear from the government of all the terrible abilities they have. Even Damaya’s parents are afraid of her because she is a “rogga” and consequently do not take care of her (40). In our world, anytime the media depicts the Middle East it seems as if all we see are crazy, radical terrorists that conspire to take down America. We never see the normal, working-class citizens who do things like play with their kids, cook for their families, gossip--things that any American would do.
ReplyDeleteOrogenes, if they are to be a functioning part of society, must be controlled hence why they are overseen by the Guardians, “because no one would really trust a group of filthy roggas to manage their own affairs” (255). In addition, they “must never show anger because it makes the stills nervous” (63). They need to act in accordance with what the Guardians what because any wrong action they take will be magnified, because “frightened people look for scapegoats” (43). Likewise, the media feeds us the idea that we need to “control” Muslims, telling us that we can protect against them by allowing the TSA to do multiple checks on them in airport security lines, over-monitoring mosques for criminal activity, and enforcing a flat-out Muslim ban. After all, any wrong action that a Muslim takes means that all Muslims are terrorists. This is what we tell ourselves as we ignore the substantially more mass shootings that are a result of home-grown, conservative white men.