Indiscriminate Eliot’s Character Characterized Based on His View on Humanity
38 cannot work anymore. Moreover, by the help of Eliot for those useless people of
Rosewater, not only does he want to be released from feeling guilty but also solely they are human beings.
“Americans have long been taught to hate all people who will not or cannot work, to hate even themselves for that” Vonnegut, 1965: 210.
In that quotation, it can be identified that American people hate the person who has no willing to work or who cannot work. It supports the idea of Eliot’s
action. The condition of the people of Rosewater losing their job happens because their job has been replaced by machines that make them cannot work anymore.
Eliot wants to vanish the image that the people who will not or cannot work should be hated.
“Thanks to the example of Eliot Rosewater, millions upon millions of people may learn to
love and help whomever they see.” Vonnegut, 1965: 213.
The researcher interpretes those as the image of reality that we as human
beings should help the people whomever we see. Yet, in fact, we often help people not because we see that they are in need to be helped, but because they ask
us first to help them. In other words, the message of the story shows that we as human beings should help each other whom ever we see if they need help, no
matter they ask first or not. Furthermore, throughout the novel God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater, or Pearls Before Swine
it teaches the readers about being kind to each other.
Eliot and his father, sometimes his lawyer or his bankers, argue several times about the people that Eliot is trying to help. It is seen that the people Eliot
helps are the same sort of that they are humans.
39 Eliot, particularly when he argued with his father or his bankers or his
lawyers, was almost equally mistaken about who his clients were. He would argue that the people he was trying to help were the same sorts of
people who, in generations past, had cleared the forest, drained the swamps, built the bridges, people whose sons formed the backbone of the
infantry in time of war
—and so on Vonnegut, 1965: 69. From that quotation, the researcher can see that Eliot never differentiates
the people that is trying to be helped. No matter who they are that in the past generation might be cleared the forest, or drained the swamps, or even people
whose sons from the form of the infantry in a war, if they need help, Eliot would help without concerning the differences. It is in accordance with the idea stated by
Debbarma, that humanity is to achieve unity among the living and non-living creatures of the world with the preservation of historical, ethnic and cultural
differences as well as the distinctiveness of nation states and communities, and the first principles of humanity stated by Varnie, which is all humans are sacred,
whatever their culture, race, religion, whatever their capacities and incapacities, whatever their strengths and weaknesses may be. All of us need help in order to
become all that we may be. We are all sacred and shouldn’t be treated differently for anything about us.
It can be seen from Eliot’s capacity to love all people solely for humanity, without concerning their social status or background.
Moreover, the researcher interprets the message as the image of reality that happens in the middle of the society, in which people often help the others only if
they know the person, or they look at the person who needs help first. In other words, the message of the story shows the readera a reflection that people should
help other people without concerning who they are or what they do because it is their nature as a human being.
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