This view is definitely understandable and as much as I disagree, I have trouble finding the words to contradict this view of suicide that's the norm in western culture. But as we talked about in class, a missed free throw isn’t hurting the player, it's hurting the crowd. And a dead baby born into slavery doesn't hurt the mother, it hurts the slaver. When people say “Oh he had so much to live for, so did that baby born a slave. Each had so much to offer the white man and so little to live for within themselves.
There will always be other boys who can play basketball and poets too. If Gunnar hadn't played with Scoby that one day would he still have something to live for? Would he be worth anything at all? If Psycho Loco, the gangbanging killer, had decided to die, is that important? Did he have something to live for? When the officers were acquitted on all charges for the Rodney King beating Gunnar says he feels worthless. That being a black person in America meant your life meant nothing. And I think that's what Beatty is trying to get across. He's a black boy who’s life without his standout skills is essentially meaningless to us and American does not love him enough to stop him.
Gunnar says to Psycho Loco that he just wants to win for once. But to him, winning isn't making the last free throw, it’s throwing the game.
One important thing that Gunnar actually brings up on Good Morning America (I think that's the show) is in response to Dexter Waverly's suicide, when he states that the view of suicide that we all hold is very much the western view of suicide that implies giving up. We can see how this moment served as a foreshadowing for what was to come, as Gunnar doesn't agree with the version of suicide that means giving up, and seemingly believes it is an acceptable way to go out. At the end of the novel, he believes that there is nothing left for him in his life and that he is getting nowhere, so he makes a decision he deems acceptable.
ReplyDeleteYeah like you and Mehul said, is that Gunnar perceives suicide as something very different than the Western idea. For him, it's not about giving up, for him it's about doing something honorable that will have a big impact because of Yoshiko's influence on him.
ReplyDeleteVery interesting thoughts. One thing I think is that Gunnar's whole life has been set for entertaining an audience, and does not actually have worth for himself. Basketball, poetry, everything that 'defined' him didn't seem to be for him. So I think it is reasonable if he believes there's no point in living.
ReplyDeleteHe is only committed to the idea of killing himself until its actually time to do it though. When he thinks of his wife and kid, he pulls himself out of the water. Though you could argue that continuing to live to support his wife and child is living for someone else still, you could also say that living to support his child is in a way fulfilling for him. There is no way to know for sure, but I think in the moments before the current sweeps Gunnar away, he finds something to live for that he thinks is worthwhile.
DeleteGreat post. This novel takes the issue of suicide and spins it in an interesting way, and I believe that the questions you ask in your second to last paragraph mirror those questions that Beatty wants us to ask ourselves. The final couple of chapters in white boy shuffle sped up the plot tremendously, and you managed to talk about the major questions left by that plot acceleration.
ReplyDeleteI think this is one of the most important parts about the novel. Beatty's willingness to take matters far beyond the believeable, to show just how much these causes mean to people, or just how much certain events affect people, that would all be impossible without such a conflated image of the mass-suicide of the African American race.
ReplyDeleteThis plays into the justification of the criminalization and brutalization of black people. On the flipside of black people only being worth to American society if they are poets or athletes, the minute they become anything less then they are worthless, then they are too easy to dispose of.
ReplyDeleteI didn't think about this. I think that's a very difficult way of thinking. I also think it's very harmful. Understandable in that living for someone else isn't having a life worth living, but I think that you shouldn't decide your worth based off of how disposable or in-disposable your country thinks you are. If you want to "throw the game" quit playing basketball, or writing poetry for anyone other than yourself. You don't have to kill yourself. I think that as a political statement, that's stupid. You've effectively ended your life. YOU are saying that you are worthless, and as a public figure, setting an example for anyone else watching you. Not that you can be worth more than basketball or poetry, but worthy due to being a human being. You're setting the example that all black lives are worthless because black people aren't worth more than what they do for white entertainment.
ReplyDeleteAlong the same lines as Saahithi, I think Gunnar's "something to live for" from the perspective of the general population in the book is for their benefit. And Gunnar, unlike the narrator in Invisible Man, finds no fulfillment through pleasing others. That is why your last sentence has so much truth to it. Scoby also feels the same way, but Gunnar has Yoshiko and his child who motivate him to stay alive.
ReplyDeleteThis reminds me of the beginning of the novel, where Gunnar talks about masses of black people following him to the grave. If every black person killed themselves, what effect would that had? Or if there were even some left? Gunnar may believe that the solution, or an escape, is death. What if there is no happiness beyond death? Then wouldn't he be jumping from one miserable setting to another. I guess us readers are supposed to assume there is nothingness after death. Or that Gunnar's situation is so terrible that nothing could be worse.
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