Wednesday, October 1, 2008
Cruz/Ragged
Steven Cruz's story shares similar themes with Ragged Dick, offering the main character the same opportunities, but in Steven Cruz's story, instead of just happily accepting his good fortune and high paying job, the main character becomes extremely concerned with the fact that he likely only received the job that he did as a result of his Mexican race. For Ragged Dick, the story ended here, he accepted that fact that some luck was involved in his success and embraced his new life of riches. The protagonist of Steven Cruz's story concerns himself so greatly with the unfairness and hypocrisy of his position that he ends up quitting the high paying jobs that are offered to him, sacrificing his success for his cause. Both of the stories seem to agree that success in America is determined by some element of luck, but the stories separate in that Dick embraced his look and looked upon it as a product of his success, while Cruz's character had the luck to be successful, but in the attempt to maintain fairness, declined it.
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JD, in your blog you have noticed that Cruz is unwilling to accept his american dream, but i think that you overlooked the importance of that. It is important because it is showing that while some minorities can pull themselves up by their bootstraps, the majority cannot. This is because the majority only accepts the minority until their quota is admitted and then they go back to accepting the majority. Without the minority being allowed to lend a hand to other minorities, they cannot advance.
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