In Grapes of Wrath we saw tractors destroy homes and fields and gerry-rigged trucks as delivery to a promised land. Now in The Beast we have trains that can both quickly transport migrants but also can kill and maim as well as trap them to be robbed or kidnapped.
What is the Beast telling us about technology and machines? Good, bad or a little of both?
In The Beast, technology is represented by the freight train used by Central Americans migrants, it is a tool used for both freedom and endangerment. This reveals how technology can change lives, for the better or for the worse. The story is a journalism style book, where readers learn about different migrants and their experiences riding the train. The freight train is called, “The Beast” because of the uncertainty and risk riders face. The route the trains take is all throughout Mexico eventually leading to the United States. These trains are not made for people but instead cargo, which makes them useful but also deadly. Almost all the migrants taking this journey only have one chance at making it to freedom and it is this train. Riding the train is incredibly risky for them. Along the way there are gangs, preying on the migrants. They want to either traffic or kill their victims. Yet, that isn’t the last of the migrants' dangers. When riding the train, migrant’s have the risk of falling off. On the train there are no naps or sleep, because as soon as you sleep you fall off and you either lose a limb or die. This highlights how technology is neither good nor bad. It depends on how it is utilized. When people are forced to depend on savage technology to survive, it brings to light that the real problem is the corrupt system, not just the train. In the end, The Beast shows how technology can either bring opportunity or threat, all depending on how the journey goes.
ReplyDeleteIn The Beast by Oscar Martinez, technology is seen as both good and bad, used as a tool for survival and a main source of danger. This echoes themes also found in The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck. In The Grapes of Wrath tractors tore through farmland, forcing families to flee into danger in the name of progress. The technology used in The Grapes of Wrath show how machinery can be a force of both movement and destruction, detrimentally affecting those involved. Similarly, the train named “The Beast” in The Beast affects the characters in the novel in many ways. The trains give migrants hope for a better future, as the migrants yearn for a new life. They provide the opportunity to move quickly across far distances, offering an opportunity to escape poverty. Migrants are frequently killed on “The Beast” and are a victim to robbery, kidnapping, and assault. In both stories, technology is not considered as either good or bad, it depends on how it's used and who it's run by. The people running the technology get to decide who the technology benefits. The people operating the tractors in The Grapes of Wrath are distant from the families they shake up, whereas in The Beast the trains are machines without emotion to the lives they carry or destroy. The Beast suggests that technology, when driven by profit and no care for human life, can endanger people rather than uplift them. They warn us that the impact of technology depends on the value of the society that controls it.
ReplyDeleteIn Grapes of Wrath we saw tractors destroy homes and fields and gerry-rigged trucks as delivery to a promised land. Now in The Beast we have trains that can both quickly transport migrants but also can kill and maim as well as trap them to be robbed or kidnapped.
ReplyDeleteWhat is the Beast telling us about technology and machines? Good, bad or a little of both?
In Grapes of Wrath the nature of technology is depicted as a duality, a monster that steals the livelihood of the migrants, and a medium for a better living through its many amenities while in The Beast the author focuses exclusively on the monster part of technology. In the Grapes of Wrath this “monster” is shown taking away the livelihood of the poor at the behest of the rich. This is shown when in the opening scenes of The Grapes of Wrath the tractors are driving the workers off the land of the wealthy because it would be cheaper to use tractors instead of humans being; essentially upending the jobs and sustenance of many people for profit. Then the “monster” slowly changes as the story goes on through the depiction of the Joad family using cars and other technology fueled things like bathtubs. This concept of polarity is rejected in The Beast through the depiction of a freight train that is named “Beast”. The “Beast” is meant to carry one thing, cargo but because of desperation migrants cling onto the top of the “Beast” hoping to be transported from one location to the other. This is where the negative aspect of technology is expanded on, the migrants on the “Beast” know that one mistake, one second of distraction could cost them their life. For example a man called Wilber recounts a story about a man who essentially killed himself because of the “Beast”. When speaking about the man, he said “Who got his leg chopped off by a wheel. The guy just couldn't lift himself up once he was already running. And since the train was going so slowly,he had enough time to see his chopped leg, think about it, and then put his head under the next wheel” (52). Wilber goes on to explain that because the man lost his leg to the beast he decided to just die as how could he get a job with only one leg. From this account of the “Beast” it is clear how negative the influence of technology and machinery is in the Beast.