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Başak Buçan

Amer284

Horton Hears A Who Review by Civil Disobedience

Horton Hears a Who is a representation of civil disobedience, which is an act of resistance

to the ruling class and the oppressive power of a society, intending to create equality and ac -

quire rights. In the movie Horton lives in the woods and he lives in a stable system that is

governed by a kangaroo who declares herself as the leader of the forest. She makes rules and

expects people to obey them. It keeps continuing until Horton explores a community that is

on dust on a flower, it leads him to show resistance to authority, trying to make his commu-

nity aware, waking them up from the reality created by the kangaroo's decisions and beliefs.

Horton is advocating his community’s rights. His attitude became the new character of soci-

ety as the movie progressed.

The central power of the forest creates privileges for herself like, her child is getting edu -

cated privately, and she isolated him from other animals of the forest. According to her the

others are wild and foolish. Unlike her, Horton believes in equality of all, he tells stories

about the creatures in the forest to his friends, he is someone with imagination, but the kanga -

roo only believes what she sees, feels, and hears. So she can be defined as a realistic person,

and these fanciful stories are not things she approves of. In this society of her truths, she does

not want anyone to be confronted with other realities and tries to end the might of questioning

her authority, she wants children to grow only by her doctrines.

From another angle, the community Horton explored is called “Whos”.They live in a soci-

ety, have a democracy and a mayor, and are not aware that they live on a flower. Mayor came
from a family where being a mayor is passed from father to son and now he is trying to con -

vey his son to become mayor but he has different ideals, he has a dream job that he does not

have a chance to choose in the system he lived until the society encounters a problem which

is the possibility of ending their world. Also, Whos’ has a patriarchal society structure deduc-

tion of the mayor has ninety-six girls and one son and he is trying to become more intimate

with his son because of his dedication to passing his job to his son.

Synchronously with Horton's exploration, Who's started to live in odd circumstances such as

the shift of the seasons but the only one who realizes that is the mayor he tries to tell this to

community leaders, who are likely to jury, but they don’t accept it because nothing bad hap-

pened in the village of Who’s before and they are getting prepared of 100th anniversary of

the village, They don't want anything to get in the way of this, even if it's an apocalypse.

No one listens to the mayor, just as no one listens to Horton. Like Horton, he is also accused

of being an imaginative person and breaking the rules and it can be said that both of them are

showing a form of resistance and civil disobedience with good intentions, to benefit their so-

cieties. After the contact with Horton, the mayor gets advice from a scientist and tells it to

Horton, In who's village, democracy, and logic work better than in the world where Horton

lives, because when the responsible person from the community encounters a problem, the

first thing he does is go and seek help from a scientist and he gets an answer that if they don’t

settle in a stable place, they world will be extinct. With the help call from the mayor, the

hero's journey starts. Horton became the voice of this marginalized group of people. The

Who’s is a metaphor for a minority group that is not recognized by the larger communi -

ty.Who’s can be defined as a more democratic community rather than Horton’s community

the people of the forest looks like a society that operates under a dictatorial regime, and the

army of gorillas becomes a threat to the people when the leader does not get what she wants.
The problem with oppressive authority in the movie is that they try to fool people by telling

lies and demanding that they spend the day without searching for any information and live a

life that is not even slightly equal. Because they are demanding equality or attempting to pro -

tect society and create a safe living environment, they are both dismissed and alienated by so-

ciety because what the majority agrees on is assumed to be true, which is known in sociologi-

cal theory as cultural hegemony; the dominant groups' ideas and habits shaping the societies

ideas and lifestyle, in other words , popularity of the common. In her lecture to the forest ani-

mals, the kangaroo tells parents that Horton is poisoning their children, making them aware

of the outside world potentially leading them into questioning her rule.Therefore he should be

getting punished. At this point, the Who people try to prove their existence to the animals in

the forest by “making noise”, each member of the public makes as much noise as possible. So

they engaged in active resistance to prove their existence.

What is recognized here is that if a voice is raised against injustice, everyone, even minori-

ties, has the opportunity to have their voice heard and live in a better society. Horton educates

his society and the audience that no matter how little or unimportant someone or any group

is, they are still worthwhile and deserve to live by remaining committed up for Who's and

supporting their right to endure.

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