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Irony In Harrison Bergeron

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The Irony of Freedom Is a society “equal” if people, who are born with different qualities than the normal citizen, are oppressed to conformity? Kurt Vonnegut explores this question in his short story and uses several ironic situations to illustrate how unequal this futuristic dystopian society actually is. This homogenous world is based on false premises that by molding variations in individuals can result in conformity; however, people are born with human predispositions and differences related to body size, intellect, and beauty. This inclination of diversity makes it genetically impossible to adapt to a sterile conforming society, which exemplifies the story’s main theme. In “Harrison Bergeron”, the author, Kurt Vonnegut, uses irony to illuminate the story’s theme of society versus the individual by exhibiting the limitation of people’s freedom, deciding what morality is, and the …show more content…
The government in this society attempts to ensures the same level of athleticism and height throughout its population so everyone is pronounced “equal” by equipping abnormally tall or athletic people with certain handicaps. This explores another instance where Vonnegut uses irony to establish the story’s underlying theme. An ironic message the society exhibits is that if an individual is anyway out of normality, he or she is severely oppressed as shown when Vonnegut describes the first glimpse of Harrison Bergeron. He is said to be wearing multiple pieces of scrap metal, causing him resemble a “walking junkyard”, which computes out to three hundred extra pounds, all because Harrison is seven feet tall and more athletic than the government proclaimed “normal” person (Vonnegut 218). Harrison acts as the individual facing off against society and the government of Vonnegut’s story serves as a tyrannical force that exerts its message of equality through ironic

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