What I Received from The Giver

There were a lot of things that really stood out to me in the book and connected with some aspects of our culture. Here are just a few of them.

     In the community there is no violence because of sameness and to me this symbolizes how our world still has violence between people because of differences. The community in The Giver works so cohesively because of Sameness and I think that Lowry is trying to tell us that our culture is divided and there would be less violence and more cohesiveness if we accepted our differences for one common goal, to make the world a better place.

Einstein once said, "If people are good only because they fear punishment, and hope for reward, then we are a sorry lot indeed." We shouldn't mind other's beliefs on things such as religion and we should put aside our differences and be good simply because it's morally the right thing to do. We should want to better mankind regardless of cultural and religious differences and try and avoid violence at all costs.

     I found it interesting how in The Giver the community is controlled by their lack of choice, while we are divided by our choices. We've been learning how the media and advertisers are dividing us by our interests and we our divided within society by our choices. Just think of the way people perceive someone to be by their appearance, we're judging people without even knowing it.

     I believe that Lowry is implying that we have choice, but are we always making our own choices? In other words, are some of our choices being made for us by others? We've learned in class that our choices are definitely influenced by others. I think Lowry is showing us that this is what happens if we lose our freedom of choice, she is reminding us to stay in control of our choices rather than being controlled by our choices. We should try and make our own choices and not judge others on their own choices.

    Lowry creates the community without emotions and color and it really made me think of how much we take our vision for granted. People in my history class can't even stay awake through a black and white video and it represents how some people forget that at sometime that black and white videos were all we had. Before that, there were no motion pictures.

    I'm glad that we have color now, but I think that everyone should see something in black and white to appreciate what we have today and not to take it for granted. The world is a beautiful place and I'm glad that we have cameras to take pictures, because as they say a picture is worth a thousand words.

     In the Giver we see how people are separated by their age and treated differently based on their age. Elders live in the House of the Old, their is the Childless Adults area, and the nurturing center. We come to learn in the novel that the Giver is rarely used and only used when something comes up that's never came up before. This shows how our society takes elders wisdom for granted.

    I believe that younger people simply don't have the patience they once did to listen to elders. They are so excited about video games, Facebook, and life in the fast lane that they find it hard to sit down and hear of an elder's advice or hear a story of significance from their life. I just think that our culture is beginning to take elder's wisdom for granted. When Rosemary died the Giver lost her memories, we need to remember that we don't get to just download our grandparents memories and that time is limited so you should take the time to learn from someone with lots of life experience.

    I believe that the last paragraph connects with how Lowry sets up the family unit that does not have love and has kids and parents selected for one another. They are created by genetic scientists. Lowry shows a family that has no love, no grandparents, no warm feeling around holidays. What she wrote connects with us today, the family isn't valued as it once was.

    A family watching a televisions show together once or twice a week was really common back in the day and now everyone has cell phones, they're on the go and they don't want to slow down now to take leisure time. I believe she's saying that families should stay close and not drift apart like how they seem to be in today's culture.

That was just a few ideas that came to me as I read the novel and I thought that it signified what some writers call a "cultural crisis."