This week I was a bit of a movie junkie. I watched Divergent and Insurgent (both part of a series). Typically I am a chick flick type of girl however, these films intrigued me. I consider them a hybrid between The Hunger Games and The Giver. The premise behind this series is that Tris (Shailene Woodley) lives in a world divided by factions based on different virtues: Abnegation for selfless, Amity for the peaceful, Candor for the honest, Dauntless for the brave and Erudite for the intelligent. Tris does not fit into any one virtue, she is a Divergent. However, the dystopian society hopes that individuals affiliate with one of the virtues because if not, they pose an extreme threat to the population. Since Tris is considered a threat to society she must fight to stay alive.
During the films I began pondering why Tris and other Divergents are so “threatening” to the rest of the world. In my view, the Divergent’s are not harmful in any shape or form but rather they are different and often times society does not like anyone or thing that falls outside the norm. Our obsession with having a label for everything and putting things in tight, little boxes hinders our ability to appreciate the unique aspects of life. No spoilers but, in the end, the Divergent’s are able to defend their honor. The fact that the “outsiders” were able to come together and did not succumb to society’s pressure of fitting into a narrow category left me with a sense of hope. I walked away from these films feeling empowered since they illustrate that individuals can be their own person and do not need a consequence for being different or unusual. In fact, our differences is what makes the world interesting and the more comfortable people can become with their individual characteristics, the better off we will be.
