P3+MDang

As individuals, we all have the choice of what we judge right from wrong. Faced in times of injustice, we overcome these obstacles with the choices we make. Our judgments are influenced by the basis our own individual morals and ethics. How we determine whether the course of negligence is right or wrong is based on individuals’ ethics applicable to those. In John Steinbeck’s Grapes of Wrath, the migrant workers are faced with obstacles that they must choose, whether wrong or right. One’s betray of another in times of desperations lead to further injustice in the face of many. Today many people still face injustice in the disguise of homelessness. Forced to live on the streets, homeless, foodless, and alone, who is to blame? Is this one man’s fault, or America? As an individualistic society where we obtain freedom, we are not equal. As individuals, everyone has the equal opportunity to change their fate. Regardless of health, is the government to blame?

In Grapes of Wrath, Steinbeck throws many obstacles that challenge the Joads' morality and test their ability to adapt. In chapter 1, the migrant workers are forced to decide whether to stay in their agrarian society or move westward. The choice is not solely based on environmental challenges, but survival. Not only is the quality of air questionable, but the land is dead. The farmers’ only way of life is through farming. To pick up and leave to a new culture is to face to challenges and adapt. The dog getting run over is a sign for the Joads’ of the struggles that foreshadow them. As the novel progresses, Steinbeck shows how the depression not only troubled the choices of farmers, but the whole country. In chapters 13 and 15 a family passes through the diner, hungry and unable to pay full price. Mae, the waitress first hesitantly refuses, but after being instructed allowed for a minimized payment. The truck drivers later tell her to” go to hell “and leave her extra money to spot for the unfortunate. This shows the troubling decisions everyday people had to face. Mae sympathizes with the unfortunate, but at the same time, she can only to an extent. In reality, not only are farmer’s economically in trouble, but bakers, salesmen, businessmen… In a cut throat world, where everyone is trying to survive it is hard to choose between what you know is right and what you feel is right. Not only does Mae face conundrum, but the business men does too. The question is who is right and wrong? People are plagued from selfishness and their own personal interests and motives. The business men, like when the Joads’ face the car salesmen in chapter 18, he is faced with a challenge. Whether right or wrong, he, like the farmers must adapt to survive. Although selfish, in reality, he is trying to survive and to get further trapped in the thralls of poverty. In chapter 21, where the tractors take the migrant’s land is another example of questionable actions to survive. Steinbeck shows how history repeats. As the landowner’s predecessors with the Mexicans squatting on their land and then eventually taking it, these people feared the “Okies”. Because of this fear, the landowners create a system of barbarism, treating the men like animals and turning them against one another, eventually regaining their lands to reap the benefits of their hard labor. The depression mobbed the men as they were being exploited, as well as the women. In the last chapter, Sharon of Stone just losing her child lets the feeble man feed upon her. This is the ultimate challenge of judgment. In times of desperation, you can either help or not help. Sharon of Stone feeding the man is a symbol of moving on. Just giving birth to a stillborn, she is willing to mother and nurture another. She shows strength that she can move on, and even though losing a child, she follows Ma Roads’ insinuation, based on a moral that has molded her from her journey there. Coinciding with the choices of right and wrong, and individual also faces obstacles of confronting injustice.

In today’s society the issue of homelessness is becoming a rising epidemic. Living in America, where we are an individualistic society and have the freedom to change and coarse our destiny is it the faults of the individual that they are homeless? To a certain extent is homelessness an injustice. In Exposing the Myth, Joseph Perkins reports that, “40% of poor spend 2/3 of their income on housing; a missed paycheck, a health crisis, or a high utility bill brings the threat of homelessness.” In this case, this shows the injustice of the people. The federal or national government should step in and first help maintain and contain poverty so the people can move up, instead of fall further into the grasps of debt. Perkins says, “Homeless advocates continue to promulgate the myth that homelessness is primarily an economic problem rather than a mental health and substance abuse problem.” Homeless surveys say that “28% of homeless are mentally ill and 41% are substance abusers.” This leaves approximately 31% of homeless as out work employees, war veterans, or you’re average hobo and bum. Perkins is to “have federal government create job programs for them, create property and income assistance.” The government shouldn’t have to let its people live on the streets, where they have to resort to eating out of trashcans as means of survival. Like in Lars Eighner’s situation, where he to had dumpster dive to maintain survival, the government should step in before this ever happens. If the American government can not even feed its people, then how can it govern it? Although we live in a society where we are unfortunately not all equal, we still have the freedom to coerce our future. Except for the occasional situation where we have mentally ill and substance abusers who have factors that hinder their ability to survive, it is unjust to leave them alone to figure things out for themselves.

Overall, the basis of an individual's judgment of what is right from wrong and their role of confronting injustice, relies on the the individual's moral's and ethics. And usually obstacles to overcome molds characteristics. As humans we tend to act on selfish motives, but in Steinbeck's, Grapes of Wrath, he shows how we have to work together, because the government will not help, which he uses as a testament to his beliefs of the drawbacks of a capitalistic government. Like the difficulties the Joads faced on their journey to the West helped mold each individual to learn that to survive, everyone must work in an inter connective community, while the homeless learn the importance to property, so when and if they return back to the working community, they can cherish and learn how to sustain life again.