Why Do We Submit to Injustice? | A Review of Sunrise on the Reaping

Earlier this year I undertook the cumbersome task of filing my taxes. The process, as is typically the case, was tiring and unnecessarily complicated. Lamenting this I recalled a piece of information shared with me several years ago: the IRS could just tell people how much money they owe in taxes and provide a free and straightforward filing program for all citizens, but because of lobbying from companies like Intuit, many people are instead forced to pay money to figure out how much they owe, and if they get it wrong, well, hopefully it doesn't land them in jail. 

This kind of corporate lobbying isn't some big secret, it's public knowledge that Intuit and other large corporations manipulate and buyout government leaders in this way, influencing policy that negatively impacts everyday citizens in the process. And yet we, the people still allow it to happen. Why is this? Indifference? Laziness? A defeatist mindset?

These same questions could be applied to the broader injustices being carried out by the current presidential administration. The executive office has consistently demonstrated blatant disregard for the law and its citizens, by defying court orders, deporting U.S. citizens without due process, contemplating the suspension of Habeas Corpus, attempting military takeovers of major cities like Washington D.C. and Los Angeles, creating detention centers akin to concentration camps, and talking of creating a television show in which immigrants have to compete in cultural contests for U.S. citizenship (sound like something familiar?) 

Public outrage grows daily, and yet no mass resistance movement has formed. Many people read the horrors in the news with heavy hearts but question if anything they could do would really make a difference. And yet, glaring throughout human history are instances in which the discontent masses have successfully toppled unjust and oppressive governments. So what holds us back in the present moment?*

*To be clear, I am a fervent pacifist. I firmly believe in the power of peaceful mass resistance, and think that organized acts such as boycotts, forming mutual aid organizations, and educating people on their rights can be far more effective and better for society as a whole than a violent uprising. 

"Nothing appears more surprising...than the easiness with which the many are governed by the few...we shall find, that, as Force is always with the side of the governed, the governors have nothing to support them but opinion. It is therefore, on opinion only that government is founded; and this maxim extends to the most despotic and most military governments, as well as to the most free and most popular." 

- David Hume

This quote from Scottish philosopher David Hume's Essays Moral, Political, Literary appears in the prelude to Suzanne Collins' most recent novel, Sunrise on the Reaping. The book is a prequel to my personal favorite books, The Hunger Games trilogy, and follows the story of Katniss Everdeen's mentor and fellow victor, Haymitch Abernathy. 

The book begins with young Haymitch on the morning of the reaping for the 50th Hunger Games, and follows his tragic descent into becoming a victor and survivor of the games. Throughout the novel Haymitch is forced to confront the concept of implicit submission, that is to say, the unspoken social contract the binds the oppressed to their oppressors. While mentally and physically preparing himself for the horrors of the arena, our protagonist asks himself:

"Why do we let the Capitol brutes rule us? Because we're cowards? Because we're stupid?"

Haymitch wrestles with this question of authority in the lead-up to the games, and comes to find his raison d'être in the process. The reckless brutality of the Capitol is treated less as a cruel spectacle, and more as a heavy reminder that those in power only take advantage of those they rule over as much as the masses allow them to. 

"Why do you agree to it? Why do I? For that matter, why have people always agreed to it?"

When it comes to wielding power, propaganda is key, and Sunrise on the Reaping makes this abundantly clear. Haymitch's games are briefly mentioned in the second Hunger Games book, Catching Fire, but readers come to realize that much of what they thought they knew about the second Quarter Quell was a farse. 

Propaganda has the ability to shape narratives, and with it the power to reconfigure our collective perception of reality. Like the beleaguered citizens of Panem, every type of mass media we consume is a form of propaganda, whether we recognize it or not. Haymitch's games make this abundantly clear, and we see the erasure of acts of resistance used as a weapon to frighten the masses into continued submission.

"I still don't think the fear they inspire justifies this arrangement we've all entered into. Do you?"

From the pure perspective of a Hunger Games fanatic, Sunrise on the Reaping gives the original trilogy so much more depth and meaning. Readers finally understand why so many victors in particular were deeply supportive of the rebellion against the Capitol, and you come to realize that Katniss was simply the spark that set off a fire that was decades in the making. 

Sunrise on the Reaping is also arguably the darkest of all the books in the series, and the novel reads like a tragedy, particularly in later chapters. As a long time fan of Haymitch as a character, I found my heart aching for the young boy who was hardened by the cruelty of the Capitol. He is not simply a grumpy and at times comedic alcoholic, but also a brother, friend, and lover, stripped of absolutely everything he ever held dear in the pursuit of justice. 

"The snow may fall, but the sun also rises." 

- Suzanne Collins

Whether or not Collins intended it, Sunrise on the Reaping is a powerful addition to the Hunger Games series that aptly reflects our present moment in history. Like young Haymitch and all the tributes that preceded or followed, we must ask ourselves if we will choose to submit to the powers that be. Will we continue to indulge in the propaganda machine, which feeds us a constant rhetoric of fear, division, and hatred? Will we mobilize en masse to reject the cruelty that has become normalized in our world? And will we have the courage to choose action over submission, hope over fear, and love over destruction?

"That the sun will not rise tomorrow is no less intelligible a proposition, and implies no more contradiction, than the affirmation, that it will rise." 

- David Hume