Mockingjay: Destroyer of all Fear The never ending tasks given by the Oppressors. The Oppressed feel as if no one is on their side. Hope has disappeared from every corner, but people are sick and tired of being sick and tired. These people who have been shut down their whole life and have been told what to do since day one have begun to realize they have some power of their own together. In Suzanne Collin’s “The Mockingjay” the districts are fed up with the Capital’s actions and are ready to pursue an uprising. From little on we are taught to fear our mother, fear our father, and even to fear the Lord. This fear is holding us back from accomplishing anything that we want to pursue ourselves and causing us to be in the palm of someone else's hand. These people don’t hesitate to finish the task that was forced upon them by someone who is a higher power from them. They also aren’t doing it because they enjoy it. They are working because the fear has taken over and left them with no hope. Collins describes each district as having one job, and each district has their own separate job. The Capital is described as such a glamourous place with thousands of glamorous people living there, but without the other twelve districts the Capital would be powerless(“The Hunger”). These districts don’t feel powerful or don’t see the power they have because the Capital only allows them to know limited things and have limited opportunities. All district Gelsthorpe 2 twelve knows is mining coal, burning coal, and using coal to fuel fires. They can’t see the other districts and have never pictured themselves working as a whole because the littlest amount of fear from the Capital comes creeping in and all visions and ideas are struck dead. In Frederick Douglass’ “Learning to Read” his mistress is caught in the middle of wanting to help the oppressed but also being the one in power. At first she was a “warm tender hearted woman”(Douglass 636). She knew what she was doing was wrong but wanted to help the oppressed. Having a distinct status is more important to these people than ending the evil doings of imperialism. This turned her “tender heart into stone”(Douglass 636). Douglass’s mistress is much like the Capital and their wrongdoings. They know sending people into these so called “games” for entertainment is wrong and dehumanizing, but they love that they are feared by many. Power is addictive and once someone has obtained that power it latches onto them like a blood sucking leach and can’t be pulled off without an outside force attacking it. The districts and Katniss as the “Mockingjay” are that outside force needed to delatch the leach of power from the Capital. In George Orwell’s “Shooting an Elephant” an elephant has been let loose and its destructive behavior allows Orwell to get a better understanding of “Imperialism” and “motives for which the government acts”(Orwell 396). This elephant is a symbol representing the Burmese people or the oppressed. The elephant was chained up and abused much like the Burmese people have been abused from the higher powers towering over them. Once the elephant got tired of the chains that were keeping his freedom unobtainable his “attack of must was due”(Orwell 396). The elephant was rebelling. Destruction was the only thing set on his mind and not much could Gelsthorpe 3 stop him. The elephant had gone berserk and was destroying everything in the town. People of the districts are ready to let loose much like this elephant on the Capital. Katniss gave these people hope. President know is smart in a way to try to befriend Katniss and knew exactly what the outcome was when the berries were first presented in the games. He tries to be allies with Katniss because he too now has fear creeping upon him. Slowly but surely he can feel his power being sucked away from him and out of fear for himself he only makes things worse for the rest of the districts. The Capital created a fire ever since the first hunger games was created. They made their own selves “a boiling frog”, and the “water in their cauldron was getting warmer and more signs of distress were beginning to appear”(Quinn 3). Even though the capital was creating a bad fire for themselves, the districts were joining together and starting a fire to get everyone motivated and knowledgeable about the Mockingjay. The districts at this point can not be stopped they have so much hope, passion, and fire underneath them that they are lethal. The Capital however has fallen into their own fire of destruction. They are burned out because they are powerless without the districts on their sides. All they know is how to be in power from the beginning. They took over because no one else knew how to. They never felt what it is like to fight for something or to earn the right to have something. That is what sets the Mockingjay apart from the Capital. They have a cause. They have determination. It is going to have to take a lot more than just a silly Capital to put their fire out. The uprising has just become a new normal for the people in this world. Much like how “efficiency has become the social norm” for our own world(Rifkin 331). The Capital can put a Gelsthorpe 4 front and keep trying to send in Peacekeepers to aid the situation, but it is way too late. The districts know it, the Capital knows it, and anyone associated with the Mockingjay knows that a war is coming and already beginning to form. The Mockingjay has soaked up all the hope and poured it out all across the districts to give them their own sense of hope and pride in what they are doing. The Capital is silent, the districts are quiet, everyone is waiting patiently to hear the Mockingjay sing her song. Once the song is heard there is no turning back. The uprising has begun.

Works Cited
Douglass, Frederick. Learning to Read. New York: W.W . Norton &, 2014. 635-641. Print.
The Hunger Games: Mockingjay. Dir. Francis Lawrence. Belga Home Video, 2015. Film.
Orwell, George. Shooting an Elephant. New York: W.W . Norton &, 2014. 394 - 401. Print.
Quinn, Daniel. The Boiling Frog. Bantam, 1996. 1-3. Print.
Rifkin, Jeremy. The Efficient Society. New York: W. W. Norton, 2014. 330-332. Print.