The Theme of Prejudice in To Kill a Mockingbird Essay -- To Kill a Moc

The Theme of Prejudice in To Kill a Mockingbird ‘To Kill a Mocking Bird’ teaches us about the deceit and prejudice amongst the residents of Maycomb County, all of whom have very contrasting and conflicting views. We are told the story through the eyes of little girl, Scout, and the day-to-day prejudices she faces amongst society. Her father, Atticus, is a white man defending a Negro, even though the town frowns upon such a thing. He is trying to bring order to the socially segregating views, both within the court and out. The most common form of prejudice, which is seen many times throughout the novel, is racism. The white folk of Maycomb County feel they have a higher status in society than the black community, and that the Negroes are there simply to be controlled by the whites. The views of a Negro do not matter; they are worthless to a white person. They are seen as dirty and ‘beneath’ a white. This is true even in extreme cases such as the Ewells being compared to the black community. Even though the Ewells are seen as low class, shabby and disliked, they are still given a higher status than any Negro. You find out the position of the Ewells quite early on in the book, after Scout meets the youngest child of the family, Burris. Atticus tells Scout â€Å"†¦the Ewells had been the disgrace of Maycomb for three generations. None of them had done an honest day’s work†. This statement from Atticus gives us another form of prejudice; class. By saying that they are a disgrace and have never done a days work, degrades them and thus makes them sound lower class, which essentially they are. This topic is raised a few times in the book, but fundamentally with the same view. The Ewell children however are treated... ...t the verdict will be guilty. Tom Robinson has been discriminated by a biased community, a community of Negro haters. Tom is found guilty, even though the evidence given proves him to be innocent. Tom was never given a fair chance in the trial. The guilty verdict is the result of a racist community. As I have said, prejudice is a key factor in ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’. It sets storylines, gives people different opinions and makes people biased towards different issues. It just shows how life was in the 1930’s, and the way that race, sex, class and religious prejudice has changed over the years. People were scared to voice their opinions, afraid of what the community might say if they did. If this had been changed and people weren’t so biased that maybe that innocent man would have lived, and people would not have been so discriminative to one another.