Reading Response 3: Social Pressures, Then and Now

In Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen has masterfully created a theme or topic that applies to both the 1800s and now. I believe that this theme will always be prominent in the world.

An example of this theme is the relationship between Mr. Bingley and Jane Bennet. Their relationship is subject to almost more social pressures than it can survive. It proves that social pressures can inhibit people from fulfilling their true identities and desires.

In the case of Jane and Bingley, Mrs. Bennet pressures her daughter to marry Bingley because of his wealth. Bingley's sister, Caroline, has the same idea, but for her brother. She wants Bingley to marry someone of a higher social class than him, just like Mrs. Bennet. Caroline's aversion to Jane and Bingley marrying causes her to feel the need to drive the two apart. In response to this distance, Mrs. Bennet constantly nags and questions her daughter about Bingley. As you read Pride and Prejudice you are told that "an hour seldom passed in which she did not talk of Bingley, express her impatience for his arrival, or even require Jane to confess that if he did not come back, she should think herself very ill used. It needed all Jane's steady mildness to bear these attacks with tolerable tranquillity" (96).

Mrs. Bennet's motivation for this nagging is her need to have all of her daughters married well above their social class. This social pressure consumes Mrs. Bennet to a point where she has "nervous attacks", as well as making her daughters miserable.

Basically, the root of Jane and Bingley's unhappiness stems from a.) The Bennet sisters' pressure to marry advantageously and b.) the pressure put on Bingley by his sister to marry advantageously, an urging which keeps him from proposing to Jane for quite some time.

As far as people's true identities, Mr. Darcy's high social status seems to keep others from understanding his true character. When he does not introduce himself in the ballroom or dance with any partner-less women, his intimidating wealth and status make him appear prideful and rude, when in reality he is shy and awkward; but the consensus of the crowd in the ballroom is hasty,"His character was decided. He was the proudest, most disagreeable man in the world, and every body hoped that he would never come there again" (7). Thus, it can be argued that the social system of classes, and the canyons between each level of status, cause a roadblock in people's attempt to be themselves; to understand and be understood.

I think that this theme of social pressures will always apply to life, because people feel the need to have a higher social status, constantly. Even those at the top of the social ladder strive to climb higher. Society will always tell people what they need to be, something 'better' than they already are. In the age of Mr. Bingley and Jane, the prominent social pressure was to marry well, to marry for money rather than love. Now, the social pressures come mostly from the media. Whether it's the rap videos that tell little boys that true masculinity lies in unrealistically sculpted muscles, or the women's magazine that creates unrealistic and unattainable perceptions of beauty; the lies surround us. Society is lying to us about what love is, what normal is. We're lying to ourselves. We can't help it. It has always been this way, and I think it always will be, though I hope that we can change our ways.