Of Mice and Men

Gabriel, John
Mr. Gonzales
English II Pre-Ap
Period 1

The Discriminating Fact

Discrimination is universal, it’s everywhere, and in fact, it happens to everyone. The victims of Discrimination are usually misunderstood, harshly judged, and very mistreated and this causes discomfort in the victims in the future. The reactions to Discrimination varies on each type of person as Discrimination is often based on qualities and abilities. Discrimination shapes the story by targeting vulnerable characters in order to exploit their weaknesses and control the minorities including gender, race, & age of the ranch in order to prosper.

In the story, Discrimination is used for benefit by an individual in order to gain control for himself. This conflict occurs between Curley, a small guy and Lennie, a bigger guy. Lennie is picked on due to his lack of intelligence and size. This type of behavior gave Curley the advantage in the situation and made the best of it. In This quote, “Curley likes a lot of little guys. He hates big guys (pg. 26)”. This quote basically explains why Curley discriminated Lennie, why he would be so aggressive towards him. This decision would later haunt him due to his confrontation with Lennie. Another character that was discriminated was Curley’s wife, but this time due to her gender. Curley’s wife was often misunderstood in the ranch due to her attention hungry self and flirting ways. The men discriminate her due to her circumstance of being the only girl on the ranch and always trying to attract attention. George even said, “Ranch with a bunch of guys ain’t no place for a girl, ‘specially like her”(Pg 34) This quote voices George’s opinion on Curley’s wife. Due to Curley’s wife’s nature, she was shunned by the ranch workers and this led her to finally snap and take drastic measures. This sudden change didn’t turn out the best and led to a series of changes in the novel. Finally, the last character targeted for discrimination was Crooks. Crooks is African American in the 1930’s when blacks were still unprivileged and segregated from whites. Throughout the story, Crooks was always mistreated and isolated from the world due to the color of his skin. This affects him mentally due to the isolation from other humans makes people sick.

Discrimination has always been around due to human nature of being the “top dog” of the social class. It really goes back to the topic of shaping people’s lives and like how no one is really “pure” minded about anyone due to discrimination in their lives. they are the person they are due to the discrimination directed upon them during their lifetime. Steinbeck’s purpose for providing scenarios and plots for discrimination are of many. Steinbeck really wanted to portray how Discrimination affects people’s lives and how it could really change the outcomes of reality. He used examples of how “aggressors seek out the prey” like how Curley seeked out for a big guy to take advantage of and establish his dominance.

In conclusion, Discrimination is a key factor in changing the outcomes of everything, whether it’s opinions or like how Curley being smaller than Lennie and creating this tension between them that can prove to be deadly. Lennie was probably a target for discrimination during his younger years due to his lack of intelligence. This made Lennie a target and this is probably why Lennie has no control of his actions and ability to think properly. Discrimination really plays a key role in determining the future of