How society's stressors may have created Bigger's crimes.
In Native Son, readers are constantly questioning Bigger's actual guilt in the crimes he has committed. Bigger's first murder can be played off as more of an accident, while his later crimes against Bessie are, to say the least, much more intentional.
At first glance his guilt seems to be clean cut. His first crime was an accident, for which we can kind of forgive him for, but his second crime was incredibly intentional and therefore he is guilty.
This all seems very easy to comprehend until we reach the final scenes in the book where Bigger's lawyer essentially says that the guilt does not fall on Bigger for his actions, and instead, it falls on society. Society made the way that Bigger is, so if we as a reader want to blame anyone for his crimes, we should blame society.
Interestingly, there almost seems to now be a connection made by Bigger's lawyer between his guilt, and how much free will he had to make the decisions that eventually sealed his fate.
So I began thinking, what exactly is free will? And does Bigger have free will at all in the society he lives in?
Usually free will is viewed from a religious perspective, but instead, I will try and attack these questions from a very sociological standpoint. How class, race, and Bigger's gender eventually determined his fate by way of stressors that could have very well altered his mental state.
When it comes to Bigger's class, it is immediately evident to the reader that he is a very low-income character, in the racially segregated city of Chicago in the 1930s.
So how does this already affect his character? I think that Wright's depiction of the stressors that Bigger has to deal with daily due to his class are very telling. For instance, a big motivator that kicks off the events that lead to Bigger's first killing stems from the fact that his mother needs him to get a job. He needs the teenaged Bigger to begin supporting his family.
While Bigger kind of pushes off his mother's wishes, this does bring up a very relevant and unfortunate side of poverty. Usually, as upper-class citizens, we are used to our parents providing for us, but for lower-class peoples, as soon as you are old enough to work, you have to help support your family.
That is stressor number one for Bigger that may affect his mental state and subsequent guilt: because he is lower class there is constant stress that he must provide for his family.
Secondly, gender really does come into play constantly throughout this novel, and leads to another stressor that could relieve Bigger of his "free will". It is obvious through scenes as early as when instead of telling his friends he is afraid of robbing a white man, he beats up his friend to waste time, that Bigger has issues dealing with his emotions.
Part of this also stems from his class, and the fact that he has to support his family/ be the man of the house since his fathers passing away. Toxic masculinity is a definition for when a man responds to society's expectations of him by becoming what society expects for him to be.
Bigger can be described as heartless at some moments, and emotionally immature, almost blissfully unaware. I would argue that a huge part of this comes from the fact that he is dealing with the stressors from his class, and gender.
Finally, his race comes into play constantly. He is in a segregated city, and racism is an extremely prevalent theme throughout the book. You could even say that Native Son is a protest novel, of which he is protesting racism.
Double consciousness is an idea that pops in my mind when I think about Bigger's mental state in Native Son. Double consciousness is a theory that when people of color think, they have to think of themselves in two different ways. One of these ways is their true self, while the other is how society will few them because they are a person of color.
Now, while I do not like Bigger's characterization at all, and I could even argue that he is not supposed to be a person, but rather is supposed to be an exaggeration of the worst parts of a person, even Bigger has moments of double consciousness.
For instance, his response to the white communists being "kind" to him, is a perfect example of this occurring. Instead of him thinking of himself as a person, he is thinking through society's view of him. He is thinking, why are these white people being kind to me when I am so clearly black?
In conclusion, I believe that Bigger throughout the novel, could be struggling mentally with many stressors that are not really looked into by the narrator( which I think is because it was the 40s when he wrote it so a lot of these terms were not really researched yet) but there are still signs of these stressors that could have very well so altered his mental state; that when he first kills, there is almost a break in him.
I think that if Bigger is supposed to be a person, he must be suffering from something that isnot mentioned entirely in the novel. And I think that what caused this mental break is a combination of his stressors from his class, race, and gender.
At first glance his guilt seems to be clean cut. His first crime was an accident, for which we can kind of forgive him for, but his second crime was incredibly intentional and therefore he is guilty.
This all seems very easy to comprehend until we reach the final scenes in the book where Bigger's lawyer essentially says that the guilt does not fall on Bigger for his actions, and instead, it falls on society. Society made the way that Bigger is, so if we as a reader want to blame anyone for his crimes, we should blame society.
Interestingly, there almost seems to now be a connection made by Bigger's lawyer between his guilt, and how much free will he had to make the decisions that eventually sealed his fate.
So I began thinking, what exactly is free will? And does Bigger have free will at all in the society he lives in?
Usually free will is viewed from a religious perspective, but instead, I will try and attack these questions from a very sociological standpoint. How class, race, and Bigger's gender eventually determined his fate by way of stressors that could have very well altered his mental state.
When it comes to Bigger's class, it is immediately evident to the reader that he is a very low-income character, in the racially segregated city of Chicago in the 1930s.
So how does this already affect his character? I think that Wright's depiction of the stressors that Bigger has to deal with daily due to his class are very telling. For instance, a big motivator that kicks off the events that lead to Bigger's first killing stems from the fact that his mother needs him to get a job. He needs the teenaged Bigger to begin supporting his family.
While Bigger kind of pushes off his mother's wishes, this does bring up a very relevant and unfortunate side of poverty. Usually, as upper-class citizens, we are used to our parents providing for us, but for lower-class peoples, as soon as you are old enough to work, you have to help support your family.
That is stressor number one for Bigger that may affect his mental state and subsequent guilt: because he is lower class there is constant stress that he must provide for his family.
Secondly, gender really does come into play constantly throughout this novel, and leads to another stressor that could relieve Bigger of his "free will". It is obvious through scenes as early as when instead of telling his friends he is afraid of robbing a white man, he beats up his friend to waste time, that Bigger has issues dealing with his emotions.
Part of this also stems from his class, and the fact that he has to support his family/ be the man of the house since his fathers passing away. Toxic masculinity is a definition for when a man responds to society's expectations of him by becoming what society expects for him to be.
Bigger can be described as heartless at some moments, and emotionally immature, almost blissfully unaware. I would argue that a huge part of this comes from the fact that he is dealing with the stressors from his class, and gender.
Finally, his race comes into play constantly. He is in a segregated city, and racism is an extremely prevalent theme throughout the book. You could even say that Native Son is a protest novel, of which he is protesting racism.
Double consciousness is an idea that pops in my mind when I think about Bigger's mental state in Native Son. Double consciousness is a theory that when people of color think, they have to think of themselves in two different ways. One of these ways is their true self, while the other is how society will few them because they are a person of color.
Now, while I do not like Bigger's characterization at all, and I could even argue that he is not supposed to be a person, but rather is supposed to be an exaggeration of the worst parts of a person, even Bigger has moments of double consciousness.
For instance, his response to the white communists being "kind" to him, is a perfect example of this occurring. Instead of him thinking of himself as a person, he is thinking through society's view of him. He is thinking, why are these white people being kind to me when I am so clearly black?
In conclusion, I believe that Bigger throughout the novel, could be struggling mentally with many stressors that are not really looked into by the narrator( which I think is because it was the 40s when he wrote it so a lot of these terms were not really researched yet) but there are still signs of these stressors that could have very well so altered his mental state; that when he first kills, there is almost a break in him.
I think that if Bigger is supposed to be a person, he must be suffering from something that isnot mentioned entirely in the novel. And I think that what caused this mental break is a combination of his stressors from his class, race, and gender.
I absolutely agree that society's environmental stressors are the primary source of Bigger's actions. Wright sets up Native Son like an experiment and if we consider the environmental factors that you mentioned, class, race, and gender, then its clear that Bigger isn't meant to be viewed as a singular Black man that killed someone. Instead, Wright shows us how the society around Bigger shapes him to act the way he did and reconsider how many of Bigger's actions are truly under his control.
ReplyDeleteI like how you touch on a variety of different stressors rather than just race, which is obviously the most prominent issue throughout the book, but there are other issues that combine with racism to make Bigger's life exponentially more terrible. Toxic masculinity is a pervading aspect of the book, yet for some reason I didn't dwell much on that topic because I was so focused on the race aspect. However, now that I'm thinking about it, Bigger's gender plays a big role in the way he thinks of himself and the way he presents himself, making it a major part of his story.
ReplyDeleteI completely agree with the idea that the stressors in Bigger's environment are a source of Bigger's actions. I also like how you touch on the variety of stressors Bigger is affected by throughout the book. While racism really influences who Bigger is, his socioeconomic status and gender are huge influences as well. Moreover, I found the point of Bigger as an idea and not as a human very interesting. I too saw clearly that Wright has created Bigger, not as a representation of Black men in society, but of the absolute worst parts of people society creates all characterized by this horrible character; and I like how you speak on his lack of humanity, thinking about himself as the way society sees him.
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