lunch with tom and daisy buchanan
a question of moral judgement in 11th grade english honors
Picture this: a high school Honors English class filled with semi-bored juniors. The required reading? The Great Gatsby. How perfectly stereotypical— I’m sure the majority of my readers have experienced this as well.
We had just finished chapter one, where we meet three of our main characters. But the ones relevant to this post are the Buchananas— Daisy and Tom. For those who haven’t read it, they’re the epitome of wealth, living in a lavish mansion with an equally lavish lifestyle. Daisy Buchanan is consumed by this, reveling in her money to keep her status high. She owns nice things and subsequently expects them. Her husband Tom Buchanan has a single-minded view of the world, demonstrating an extremely brutish personality and racist ideals. He believes white people are superior to the rest of the population and fears being subjugated— assuming some unneeded victim complex. Tom is forceful, jealous, and an extreme chauvinist.
My English teacher decides to pose a question— which of the Buchanans would you rather have lunch with?
I thought the answer was quite simple as I selected Daisy, along with four-sixths of the class. Yes, perhaps she’s a flawed character, as are all of us. She is absolutely a bit annoying, but a classic product of her environment. Yet when my English teacher asked the class who would go with Tom, a substantial amount raised their hands. They were all boys. My teacher looks appropriately confused, and decides to ask why. Here is the exact quote.
“Well I know he’s like racist and like things like that but to be honest he sounds like he’d be fun to hang out with. He’s like really rich and stuff and I feel like we would have a good time together.”
My English teacher asks if he’s sure he doesn’t mind all of Tom’s extremely flawed personality traits, and he insists he’s sure. Perhaps Tom would even pay for his lunch! Several boys nod in agreement with him.
Maybe this was just a harmless question, but the answers certainly were not, especially from a broader viewpoint. That boy isn’t racist himself, yet his complacency was frankly appalling. But the question reminded me a bit of the election that just occurred, which I almost didn’t want to discuss here. Yet here we are. I am not sorry to say I completely despise Donald Trump; this is not a post to justify my hatred if any of you desire, but I do believe he is an awful person who has an offputting confident personality that compels people to rally behind him.
Like Donald Trump, Tom Buchanan is also rich, has cheated on his wife, and possesses some highly questionable morals that accompany his “charisma”. But choosing to honor these qualities, to continue to support people who exhibit them tells people that these things are alright, and things to be ignored.
Of course, not everyone decided to choose Tom over Daisy, but there were enough to be significant. We choose to keep promoting charisma over actual moral qualities, which is naturally enticing of course, but a danger to our lives. The people we choose to associate with and support are a direct reflection on us as a person, and it is of course, not okay to encourage these things.