This is how many children that died in their Hunger Games, without even being mentioned throughout the three books. All these children were under 18. All these children had parents. All these parents’ hearts sank to their knees during their child’s reaping. All these parents saw their terrified child off at the train station. All these parents heard the sound that signified their child’s death. All these parents received their cold, dead child in a wooden box. All these parents’ lives ended there. All these parents could say or do nothing. All these parents were merely thanked that they gave up their child. Thanked.
And the media focuses on the love triangle.
All these children and all these parents aren’t real
Yeah, sure, I guess that’s true. None of these people were real.
But let’s focus on what this series, and this fact, say about our society.
In the series, the Capitol’s media focuses entirely on the ‘fun’ of the Games- the fashion, the plot twists, the favorites, the strategies, the romance. And the entire time, they completely overlook the fact that 1,678 children between the ages of 12 and 18 have died. Usually brutally murdered by other 12 to 18 year old children.
And how does our real-life media react to this story when news of a movie adaptation reaches them? They talk about the romance. This tragic story of a girl who must choose between her long-time best friend and her new love. Even if she chooses Peeta, they still must fight to the death. The star-crossed lovers of District 12. And many readers of the original novels saw the books through the same lens. You would tell them that you read/ were reading the books and their first reaction was, “Are you Team Gale or Team Peeta?”
Meanwhile, children are fighting to the death.
The fact that our media, and many every-day people reacted to the Hunger Games the same as the Capitol media scares me.
I don’t want this world to be anything like the Capitol. I don’t think any of us do.
And the fact that most of us (including myself) never really considered how many children had died in the games also scares me. But, hey, it didn’t happen now/ in the current story, so it doesn’t matter, right?
I’m not sure about that math though. I think it’s MORE.
Let’s talk about just the first 73 games, ok? Every year before Katniss and Peta.
24 Tributes (1 girl + 1 boy x 12 districts)= 1 Victor + 23 Dead Every year
23 x 73 = 1,697
EXCEPT, the 50th games (The games Haymitch competed in) had DOUBLE the number of tributes. An extra 24 kids died that year.
1,703.
Now, 22 kids died in Katniss and Peeta’s first game, because they both live.
1,725.
In 74 years, the brutal, violent murders of 1,725 children aired on TV in Panem, and in both the Capitol, and on the red carpet in our world, the first question people want to ask it “Team Peeta?” Damn.
i’m not even in this fandom, but damn, that’s scary
And here we have people who GET the hunger games.
#until this moment#i didn’t realize there were still people who haven’t figured out that our reactions to media are an important indicator of our values#it doesn’t matter that they aren’t real#our reaction on a story primarily about children killing each other#was to focus on the romance#it wasn’t a romance#it’s a story about a tyrannical governemt sentencing children to death as a means of intimidating the sectors into submission#and we reacted to the games exactly the same way the capitol did
you can be as meta as you can but you can never be this meta