The Giver Episode 2

[00:00:00] Speaker A: Would you feel more comfortable on an improv stage or canoeing in the backcountry? Find out which Book Interrupted member you're most like by visiting www.bookinterrupted.com members. [00:00:16] Speaker B: Parental guidance is recommended because this episode has mature topics and strong language. Here are some moments you can look forward to during this episode of Book Interrupted. [00:00:26] Speaker C: I feel like Lowry got bored, but. [00:00:30] Speaker D: Then it wasn't like he walked around with a boner all the time. [00:00:34] Speaker E: Oh, totally. Right? Like low key white supremacy. [00:00:38] Speaker B: Stop it's. [00:00:39] Speaker A: Figurative, all of the comforts of our life is not actually that good for us. [00:00:44] Speaker F: How did we lose that one? Oh, she couldn't have the sex. We lose so many that way. [00:00:49] Speaker D: We lose so many. I wonder why this book was banned. Babies in the garbage seems normal. No way. My body without my body is information is trying to learn something without being disrupted. Mind, body and soul inspiration is with us and we're going to talk it out on Book Interrupted. [00:01:32] Speaker B: Welcome to Book Interrupted, a book club for busy people to connect and one that celebrates life's interruptions. During this banned book cycle, we're reading The Giver by Lois Lowry. This book has been banned for violence, sexual references, infanticide euthanasia, and suicide. If you'd like to join along, this book cycle is from August 1 to October 1. Let's listen in to this episode's. Group discussion. [00:02:02] Speaker D: This is the last episode for the book The Giver by Laus Lowry. [00:02:07] Speaker B: I think it's Lois, isn't it? [00:02:09] Speaker F: I don't know, but I like it. [00:02:10] Speaker A: It is Lois. [00:02:11] Speaker G: Listen, I saw an interview and she said it's pronounced really, really? [00:02:17] Speaker D: No. Oh my God. You're something else. Can you imagine? It's pronounced lauer. [00:02:25] Speaker F: Laueth. That's Dearte, dear Tay. [00:02:35] Speaker D: I love that. [00:02:36] Speaker A: Wonderful. Feels like it's been a really long time since we talked about this book last. [00:02:42] Speaker D: I don't even remember ever talking about it. Are you sure this isn't the introduction episode? [00:02:47] Speaker F: I remember talking about it because I couldn't believe the liberties that the movie version took. [00:02:53] Speaker E: I was like, what? [00:02:55] Speaker F: The main character isn't a teenager having his first love experience? I was like, this changes everything. [00:03:02] Speaker A: Yeah, that's funny, right? He's supposed to be just entering puberty. That's why they take the pills, feel the things. They have to start taking it. [00:03:10] Speaker D: Then I just realized that that never really went anywhere. He took them, and then it was like that was also the first day he didn't take the pill. But then it wasn't like he walked around with a boner all the time. [00:03:24] Speaker E: I completely agree. I feel like they've made it a. [00:03:28] Speaker A: Point to say the pills aren't about boners. [00:03:32] Speaker E: Yeah, kind of. I feel like they're about boners. [00:03:37] Speaker D: The boner might be the end, but the beginning is the thoughts, the feelings, the whole of puberty. [00:03:44] Speaker E: It's the wet dreams, I think. [00:03:46] Speaker A: Not just puberty, because the parents take them too. All of the adults take them. It's about numbing your feelings. The feelings are not acceptable. [00:03:56] Speaker D: Exactly. Even when they're, like, at the table. [00:03:58] Speaker A: And they're saying, I had a feeling today, even said the book, they don't know the meaning of that feeling. [00:04:03] Speaker D: Yeah. They're like, rehearsing. [00:04:06] Speaker F: Exactly. And the variety of emotions and feelings are a threat because that's what could lead to nonconformity. And I think that's one of the main themes from the book and the movie. [00:04:21] Speaker A: In his pants. [00:04:22] Speaker F: Yes. [00:04:23] Speaker D: And His Pants is about nonconformity in the pants conformity of the boner, his trouser tent. [00:04:29] Speaker A: Your pants aren't hanging properly. Have you been taking your pills? So, agreed, the boners are part of it, but that's not the main reason. Yeah. [00:04:42] Speaker C: I mean, it's really ultimately about control, though, right. The whole society is about ultimate control. And I think those stirrings the pills for the stirrings is a big part of it. [00:04:55] Speaker D: I think it's kind of weird, too, though, because before the pills, there are still feelings. You know what I mean? Like, as people not part of that society, you have feelings like toddlers have tantrums. These are feelings, the basics. Right. So I don't understand the timing unless that's I guess the requirement is once you reach this age, you're expected to control your feelings. And so this pill will help you. [00:05:18] Speaker C: I think it's your sexual feelings in particular. [00:05:21] Speaker E: I think so. [00:05:22] Speaker D: I think Mare's saying all feelings because the adults are still taking it. [00:05:26] Speaker A: You're right. It's probably an emphasis on sexual. [00:05:28] Speaker F: I think it's even the nuances of feelings. It's the more complex feelings, the potential for having even emotional paradox within, if it's not very clean and straightforward and can lead to purpose in some sort of communal functioning way. It seems like that's when emotions were troublesome. [00:05:50] Speaker B: I think it could also be desire, because you can't even have the desire for your own career. They tell you what you're going to. [00:05:57] Speaker G: Do or your children. [00:05:59] Speaker F: Yes. [00:06:01] Speaker B: Anything beyond that age. [00:06:03] Speaker F: Yes, you're right. It is desire. [00:06:05] Speaker B: There's all kind of desire, maybe that. [00:06:08] Speaker E: I think everyone having their own desire. What did they call it? Sameness. I think if everyone had their own desire, they wouldn't be having this sameness. And so that's probably part of why they take the pills, too, is they want everyone to think the same, feel the same, do the same. [00:06:25] Speaker D: And the timing is about I guess adolescence is when you really start to explore your individuality. And I guess that's what they're trying to dampen. No individuals here. Everybody got to be the same. [00:06:35] Speaker E: And that's when you start to rebel as well. [00:06:38] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:06:39] Speaker C: And bring it back to the sexual component, because I'm just going to keep bringing it back there. I think that that's around that age, right, where people start their hormones are kicking in. They're starting to find people attractive. They're sexually attracted to people. So I think that's what I took. [00:06:57] Speaker A: Out of the book. [00:06:58] Speaker C: When they were talking about the stirrings, it was like of that age when you start hubba hubba, but they also don't want that. [00:07:07] Speaker D: Right. [00:07:08] Speaker B: They even pick your person you marry based on how they think that relation will be more harmonious. [00:07:15] Speaker D: Right. [00:07:16] Speaker F: And advantageous to the collective. [00:07:18] Speaker D: Right. [00:07:19] Speaker B: Not about exactly. [00:07:21] Speaker F: Yeah. [00:07:21] Speaker E: Even there's a section in the book where they say, I think Jonas says, why don't we let people pick even their own partners? And then I believe the giver says something along the lines of what if they pick wrong? And so I think that's a part of the society, too, is who's ever in power thinks that they know right. And believes that everyone will pick well, maybe not everyone, but certain people will pick wrong options, and then that could lead to a catastrophe. [00:07:51] Speaker A: Can we talk a little bit about the giver? The actual guy? So he was chosen. He's got this super painful and terrible job is to feel all these it's. [00:08:01] Speaker F: Like the worst job. [00:08:02] Speaker A: Yeah, the worst job. And yet the power of a controlling group to make somebody still do it. And then his daughter can we talk about the daughter? [00:08:12] Speaker C: Yeah, rosemary. [00:08:13] Speaker A: She was the first one chosen to be the receiver. He loved her, and yet he went along with it. It's just amazing how you can have control and people go along with it because they couldn't have lived without the giver. Even though he had all this pain, he accepted that he had to because. [00:08:31] Speaker D: You just said he couldn't live without the giver. Then I was like, yeah, why do they even have that? Because he's the guy holding it all. If he didn't exist, then everyone has to have it, basically. That's the point. Right? [00:08:39] Speaker F: Yes. [00:08:40] Speaker B: The fact that he loved Rosemary and then she released herself, then I think that circumstance ultimately led to the Giver and now the new receiver, Jonas, making the decision to give the memories back to everyone. [00:08:56] Speaker F: Yes, absolutely. [00:08:57] Speaker B: Because of that feeling of love and heartache, I think the giver had to. [00:09:02] Speaker F: Have that experience because it almost acted as that disruptive force that opened up a space within his mind to start considering other and other being. What? He wasn't socialized to think, believe and. [00:09:17] Speaker D: Feel or potentially even consider himself. [00:09:20] Speaker F: Oh, yes. [00:09:21] Speaker D: Because that's really what they're all you know what I mean? Wiped clean of doing. They're just like the collective. The collective. The collective. And through the loss of his daughter, he couldn't deny and being a feeling holder, he's already vulnerable as far as they'd be concerned. He couldn't deny himself because that love trumped the collective, I guess. Really? [00:09:39] Speaker F: Yes. And is love our biggest form of desire, regardless of whether it comes out sexually or vocationally or whatever? [00:09:48] Speaker D: I think it's more about the connection which comes out with love, too. Nobody's connection in the Giver is authentic. [00:09:55] Speaker F: Because authenticity is suppressed within the society. [00:09:58] Speaker D: Yeah, exactly. [00:10:00] Speaker A: Very lonely place for someone not taking the pills. [00:10:03] Speaker D: Right. Could you imagine people just want to understand. [00:10:05] Speaker A: They're like, I'm feeling, oh, you lost your temper, go to bed, stomped your foot. Anger. Right. [00:10:14] Speaker E: How the society is set up, even the receiver or the giver, they are set up to be so isolated that it's surprising that even Jonas maybe not surprising, but he's like, when he gets the memories of grandparents, he says, oh, I wish we had that. He wants that love. And it's so sad that they let the giver or the receiver feel all these feelings and then they can never share that with anyone, and they can never feel it beyond their memory. And that is so sad and isolating. And I think that's part of how they keep the receiver or giver in the community is just no one else knows about these feelings and memories. So even if they told them, they're probably like, what are you talking about? [00:11:00] Speaker F: Well, in effect, what you're describing is that they're keeping the giver and receiver traumatized. Because trauma tells us that we are alone in our experience, that we are isolated. [00:11:11] Speaker E: Absolutely. [00:11:12] Speaker F: And so that perpetual loop, that stress cycle you're right. Is in a way, preventing the giver or receiver being able to break out and connect. The fact that Jonas was able to is monumental. [00:11:25] Speaker D: It's funny that you say that, though, because obviously what you're describing, I wouldn't want to choose, but when Mayor first said, it's the worst job, or whatever, inside, I was like, no, it's the best job. What I was reading, I was like, I want to be the giver of the receiver. I don't want to be the rest of the fucking robots. So I guess that's just like a reflection kind of, of maybe my acceptance that it's about balance. Right. You can't know joy if you don't know despair. [00:11:49] Speaker F: And you can't know true purpose unless you understand your pain. [00:11:54] Speaker D: Yeah. So the pain is painful and bad, but it's actually good because by contrast, it really highlights the good feelings. [00:12:02] Speaker F: Yeah. [00:12:03] Speaker C: I found it interesting to Ashley's point. Do you remember how they had the day that they could all play? And Jonas, because of his memories, he couldn't play with his friends like he used to remember they were playing, like, the war games. The war games, yeah. And he had experienced what war is like, and he couldn't interact with them. So I feel like that really cemented his isolation and that he could no longer just be a kid and play with his friends because he had Mrs. So it's almost like, further isolates him having this. [00:12:31] Speaker E: Absolutely. Yeah. [00:12:33] Speaker C: One thing I thought was really interesting, part of it I'd love to see happen more in our everyday lives is the clarity of language. You know how they would always get in trouble if they said, like, oh, I'm starving. Okay, no, but you're not starving. When I was reading it, I thought, sometimes I wish we had that more in our everyday life as well. But then it would just get really friggin annoying, though, too. [00:12:55] Speaker D: Right. [00:12:55] Speaker C: Because sometimes you just want to blow. [00:12:56] Speaker D: Off scene and be like, I'm starving. [00:12:57] Speaker C: It's like, okay, no, I'm actually not physically starving. So, anyway, I wanted your perspectives on. [00:13:02] Speaker A: That, too, now that you mentioned that. I think that part of it is that one of the reasons we exaggerate is to communicate a feeling, how extreme we're feeling about this particular situation, or our mood. Exaggeration sometimes goes along with mood and excitement. So I think maybe it's like, uhoh, they're getting a little too close to feeling something. [00:13:23] Speaker E: Right. [00:13:24] Speaker A: Like, stop and think. Don't feel. Just think and pick the right word. [00:13:30] Speaker E: I feel like they didn't like when people were feeling extreme, when they would say certain words, and it was kind of extreme. Like, starving is somewhat of an extreme of being hungry. Asher, I don't remember what he said, but then he got whacked. Oh, right. He said whack instead of snack. [00:13:47] Speaker B: Oh, yeah, I forgot that part. [00:13:49] Speaker E: I think that's pretty hardcore to whack a kid. Yeah. [00:13:53] Speaker A: Asher was very likable. [00:13:54] Speaker C: Yeah, he was, wasn't he? Yeah. They kind of do a spin off on Asher. [00:13:58] Speaker D: A spin off? [00:13:59] Speaker A: Well, there this is a four book series. [00:14:02] Speaker D: Oh, it is. [00:14:03] Speaker E: I realized, actually, I thought it was. [00:14:05] Speaker F: The single book I'd be interested in reading the other. [00:14:09] Speaker G: Did you read any more, then? [00:14:10] Speaker A: I've read two of the four. I should try to read them before the podcast. I read two of the four this. [00:14:16] Speaker F: Week because, again, they're not classic Meredith. [00:14:19] Speaker A: So one of the things that I like about the book, but a lot of people hate about the book, is that at the end, you don't know what really happened. And so it makes you think hate. [00:14:28] Speaker D: It like, did this happen? [00:14:29] Speaker A: Did that happen? You really start reflecting on the book, on what it could mean, and is it a happy ending or a sad ending, or can I choose? And all that stuff. Right. But if you want to read some more of the books, there's some closure in the last book about what happened at the end in the first book. So I read the second one, which is not in this community. It's a different communities. In this dystopian future. There's this community, but there's other communities, and they're running the show differently, and there's different aspects of control or not or lack of different communities interact with each other a little bit. [00:15:04] Speaker F: Oh, my God. [00:15:06] Speaker D: Can I make a prediction? Okay. [00:15:09] Speaker B: Yeah, make a prediction. [00:15:10] Speaker D: I just think that Book 2 may be the extreme opposite. So this one was super controlled. So I think book two is going to be like, and then what if there was no control? [00:15:19] Speaker B: I want to know the second book, if you read it, Mare, or is it the third? I want to know which book tells me if these guys lived. That's all I want to know. [00:15:29] Speaker D: I need to jump number four. Number four. [00:15:32] Speaker B: I'm only reading number four. Do it, Sarah. [00:15:34] Speaker F: Do it. [00:15:35] Speaker A: So I haven't read the third one. Which then do you know? [00:15:38] Speaker D: If it's another society, then the third one is a third example. [00:15:42] Speaker A: I don't know about number three. Number two is a different society and there's control as well, but in a different way. [00:15:48] Speaker D: Okay. [00:15:48] Speaker A: First it seems like there's less control, but you find out later. [00:15:52] Speaker D: Secret. [00:15:53] Speaker A: There's still people in charge doing stuff, right. Pulling the strings. There's a character in that book that is in book number four as well. I'm wondering if maybe there's characters in the third book in the last book. I don't know. [00:16:08] Speaker F: Yeah, that would be interesting. [00:16:09] Speaker B: Book four. I'm going to go right to book four then. [00:16:11] Speaker A: Book four you are. [00:16:12] Speaker F: I was going to ask, would Sarah be able to give herself permission to skip over two and three? Because it's a sequence. [00:16:20] Speaker B: I don't want to know about the other. [00:16:21] Speaker D: Okay. [00:16:21] Speaker C: I don't want to know the world, okay. [00:16:23] Speaker B: I need to know if the little baby and Jonas live. [00:16:27] Speaker E: That's how I feel too, Sarah. I feel the same way. [00:16:31] Speaker B: I just want to know. [00:16:32] Speaker E: Yeah. [00:16:33] Speaker B: I don't even care. [00:16:34] Speaker F: I want the version that's in my head. [00:16:36] Speaker C: What does it care? [00:16:37] Speaker F: What's the out oh, my God, I'm so the underdog rises and everything is glorious in the end and everyone loves each other. [00:16:46] Speaker B: Do you think they debugging down the. [00:16:47] Speaker D: Hill into town, into town, racing arms. [00:16:51] Speaker G: Of grandparents into forever Christmas Land? [00:16:54] Speaker B: Forever Christmas Land. [00:16:56] Speaker D: Yes. [00:16:56] Speaker B: Me too. [00:16:57] Speaker F: Yeah. And then that's the beginning of rebuilding a new way for that society and it all works out. [00:17:07] Speaker B: They adopt them, the grandparents are there. It's like perfect. That's what I want to he has a boner. [00:17:14] Speaker E: He has a boner. Oh, my God. [00:17:19] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:17:21] Speaker B: That's why I don't want to read. [00:17:22] Speaker F: The fourth one because I'm like, no, I'm holding on to this. [00:17:25] Speaker A: Well, even if you just read the synopsis, you'll get a little closure. But it's called sun. It's called sun. [00:17:31] Speaker G: S-O-N or S-U-N-S-O-N. [00:17:34] Speaker A: It brings us back to the community and the giver. And the main character is a girl who's been chosen to be a birth mother and she gives birth to can you guess? [00:17:46] Speaker D: It. [00:17:52] Speaker A: Starts as a parallel story. [00:17:54] Speaker D: The baby. [00:17:55] Speaker F: The baby from the babe. Yeah. That baby was interesting. I felt like there's a lot of potential loaded there with that little one. [00:18:06] Speaker B: I love him. [00:18:07] Speaker F: I know. [00:18:08] Speaker B: They're going to release him. [00:18:10] Speaker A: Yeah. Failure to thrive. Why did he just freaking go to sleep? [00:18:15] Speaker D: I know. [00:18:16] Speaker B: Just because he couldn't sleep. [00:18:17] Speaker A: I love they're like failure to thrive. [00:18:19] Speaker D: But you know what's funny, too, is like he's failing to thrive because, again, back to the trauma point. [00:18:25] Speaker F: Thrive under their standards. [00:18:28] Speaker D: That connection and the way they're doing it, as far as what we know is wrong. Exactly. What you can take you from your mother immediately. [00:18:37] Speaker G: You get housed over here and we're. [00:18:38] Speaker F: Going to wonder about why. [00:18:40] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:18:40] Speaker F: In your isolation and non connection, you're acting up. [00:18:44] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:18:45] Speaker C: And what do you think about Jonas giving Gabriel the memories to help Gabriel sleep? [00:18:51] Speaker D: I like it. [00:18:52] Speaker F: Oh, I loved it. [00:18:53] Speaker B: I loved it so much. [00:18:54] Speaker F: I loved it. [00:18:55] Speaker D: Everything that Jonas did, that was a rebellion. [00:18:57] Speaker E: I was kind of expecting there to be more of a punishment for him to be doing that. I thought someone was going to find out or something, and that was going to be a big problem. But it was kind of wholesome he. [00:19:10] Speaker D: Was just storytelling kind of helping. [00:19:16] Speaker E: We would do to our babies. Yes, totally. [00:19:19] Speaker C: Until he was going to go be released, though. Right. [00:19:23] Speaker F: So, in a way is one of the things that the first book then is exploring is the author's idea that our humanness is actually connected to and tied up within emotions, memories and storytelling? In a nutshell, is that kind of what you think the author is playing with? [00:19:43] Speaker A: She probably read Women Who Run with the Wolves before she wrote it. [00:19:48] Speaker D: Maybe. She's probably one of the four. [00:19:51] Speaker E: I also think it's individuality is a big part of it, too. [00:19:55] Speaker F: Yes. Authenticity, individuality. [00:19:58] Speaker B: That's why they had to get rid of one of the twins. Remember, there can't be anybody that's which. [00:20:03] Speaker A: Is ironic because they love sameness. They love sameness, yes. But too same. [00:20:08] Speaker D: Yeah. Because they're all essentially twins. [00:20:10] Speaker F: Yeah, isn't it? But not too much the same. That's where we draw. [00:20:17] Speaker D: Also, maybe because twins come with that built in at least by folklore. I've never done a twin study myself, but that built in connection. Right. Everyone always oh, I was three states. [00:20:29] Speaker G: Away and my foot hurt. [00:20:31] Speaker B: All right. [00:20:32] Speaker G: When hers caught on fire or whatever. [00:20:38] Speaker B: Also, each family has to get one girl and one boy. They would have to separate them, right? [00:20:45] Speaker D: Yeah. You can have like, a sisterly bond because we shared a bedroom for 40 years. Because that happens too. [00:20:52] Speaker E: Right. [00:20:52] Speaker D: You and Leah still sleep together, right, Kara? [00:20:55] Speaker F: Obviously, yes. I'm really struggling right now. She's traveling and I'm like, we're not sharing the bedroom anymore. [00:21:03] Speaker D: Oh, my God. [00:21:04] Speaker F: Do you guys remember being kids? For anyone who had a sibling, leah and I would have to share bedrooms. Every house we'd moved to. And it was always like, I want my own room. And then finally we moved to a house where we had each our own room. Do you think we spent time in our own room? [00:21:21] Speaker D: That's just what kids are like. I'm realizing they're like, I hate this. And then you're like, fine, we'll never do it again. And then they're like, what's the only thing I want? And you're like, I don't know how to respond to you. It's the only thing. You just want me to go crazy. Yeah. [00:21:35] Speaker F: Story of my life. [00:21:37] Speaker C: We had a snow day, right? And something was going on with work, so the buses weren't running. So if the kids went to school and I had to pick them up, it was in between something that was really important with work, right? So I said to them, hey, could you just stay home today, not go to school and do, like, the online school not even, right? [00:21:54] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:21:54] Speaker C: One said, oh, yeah, for sure. The other one goes, no, I want to go to school. [00:21:58] Speaker A: I'm like, you're so shit, budy. [00:22:00] Speaker D: Like, you're just doing it to push. [00:22:02] Speaker C: Back against me, right? They go, Fine, okay, I'll figure this out. [00:22:05] Speaker A: Go to school. [00:22:06] Speaker C: And then, sure enough, by the end. [00:22:07] Speaker E: Of day, he's like, that was a. [00:22:08] Speaker C: Big mistake, going to school. [00:22:10] Speaker F: Yeah, it was. [00:22:11] Speaker D: Learn, you a loser. Now you're home to suffer the consequences. [00:22:16] Speaker A: And then you're like, Remember this for next time. [00:22:18] Speaker D: And they never will, and they never. [00:22:21] Speaker A: But it's different this time. [00:22:23] Speaker D: I've changed my mind. [00:22:24] Speaker C: It was just to push against me, right? [00:22:27] Speaker D: It was just to be independent of the sibling. [00:22:31] Speaker E: Yes. That independence and individuality. [00:22:34] Speaker D: They want to go. I don't want to go. Or they don't want to go, I need to go to school. [00:22:38] Speaker G: I must. [00:22:39] Speaker F: Yes. [00:22:39] Speaker D: This is how I know who I am. [00:22:43] Speaker F: I define myself in accordance to your opposite. [00:22:48] Speaker A: What do you think about the people or person who designed this society? Part of it's all around. Comfort. We don't want any discomfort. And that's kind of a little bit like our world now, where we're being told this story that comfort is good. But now what we find is that all of the comforts of our life is not actually that good for us. [00:23:09] Speaker E: Right? [00:23:10] Speaker D: What's that movie with the fat people in the chairs? Is it Wally? [00:23:13] Speaker F: Oh, I love Wally. [00:23:15] Speaker D: That's the result of extreme comfort or whatever. And instant gratification. [00:23:19] Speaker A: We can't remember anything, right? [00:23:21] Speaker E: Yes. [00:23:21] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:23:22] Speaker A: You need some Adversity, Eva. [00:23:26] Speaker F: I'm sorry. I love it when he calls Eva's name. [00:23:29] Speaker D: It's so beautiful. It's one of my favorite movies. [00:23:35] Speaker A: I was talking to a friend yesterday about this, about health and stuff. If you want to be healthy long term, you have to do some things that are uncomfortable. But if you're always told the story that comfort is good and you should want comfort and we're striving towards it, then it makes it harder to be like, I'm going to do this hard thing to be healthy, rather than saying it's a good thing to have a little bit of Adversity. Like with Jonas, it's a good thing to feel these bad things because then we have a richer life, or totally. [00:24:03] Speaker D: It also ties in with Glenn and Doyle saying you can do hard things as an epiphany, right? Like, as if things shouldn't be hard. Things are hard and I can do them. I don't have to drink and drug my life away just because things are hard. Yeah, that good. [00:24:18] Speaker F: Things can come out of me being resilient. Exactly. [00:24:24] Speaker D: It's about discomfort. [00:24:25] Speaker F: Yeah. Actually, that's something that's come up. Been observing that amongst my daughter's generation, at least, their friend group, a lot of talk around that makes me uncomfortable. So and so is making me uncomfortable. And, you know, like, you just hear something enough that you start to be like, is this like some sort of weird pattern? But it's almost like it's being used I don't want to say weaponized, but it is almost being used as a manipulative tactic. I can't read your mind, you can't read mine, but the way it's being delivered, it's as if you should know that that would make me uncomfortable, instead of it just being like, oh, that makes me uncomfortable. I'm going to look after myself now, and I need to do X, Y, and Z. It's just looked at like, that makes me uncomfortable. You're a bad person. How could you bring that up? Don't you know the golden rule is ultimate comfort here? It's just a weird observation, and I don't even know what I think. I'm raising it because I just can't get my head around it. Just this ethos of the way we do things around here have everything to do with our comfort. [00:25:29] Speaker D: Well, and I think also it negates what should come out of your expression of your discomfort, which could be a conversation that could lead to learning. Right. That ties for me with cancel cult. Like, you made me uncomfortable, so now you're canceled or what? [00:25:43] Speaker F: Now you're canceled. [00:25:44] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:25:45] Speaker D: Or you've done something wrong, whatever it might be discomfort, whatever. So now you must stop existing and lose all of your financial ability to support yourself or whatever. [00:25:53] Speaker E: Right. [00:25:54] Speaker D: And sometimes we make mistakes. Sometimes the response is appropriate. Exactly. But most of the time, we are not acknowledging that humans are fallible and make tons of mistakes all the time. And if you were just ready to talk about it in a way with the goal of learning or improvement or growth or whatever, then your discomfort could actually be the starting point of a better person out of both of you. [00:26:18] Speaker F: Yeah, totally. Is that what the pill is about, then, with the giver? It's not just desire. It's let's just make sure no discomfort arises, because that's too much of a variable. [00:26:30] Speaker A: And that's the twins, too. People get uncomfortable when they call somebody by the wrong name. It would happen more often. [00:26:38] Speaker D: I need comfort too much alike. Could you just wear a hat, please. [00:26:46] Speaker E: Everyone? [00:26:47] Speaker D: They do have name tags, though, right? [00:26:49] Speaker B: They do, yeah. [00:26:50] Speaker D: They should just make twins have surgery. But I think it's more than just the looks, too. Right. Because I think that secret twin connection, because otherwise they could be like, okay, they're twins, but as a baby, we gave one of them a nose job. We tattooed their face. Number one. [00:27:08] Speaker B: A tear. [00:27:11] Speaker D: Literally. Or I was going to make this point about the language that Virginia was saying. It's like when people are saying literally, I'm doing it all the time right now, when it's not literally, literally, figuratively. Oh, I do the same thing all the time. [00:27:27] Speaker B: I had a girl I used to work with that was her biggest pet peeve, because people constantly say literally and she'd be like, okay, listen, none of this is literal. [00:27:36] Speaker D: Everyone here, none of it's literal. [00:27:39] Speaker E: Stop. [00:27:39] Speaker B: It's figurative, that's it. Now we can move on with the meeting. [00:27:45] Speaker A: Figuratively. Just try to replace it with figuratively. [00:27:48] Speaker D: Figuratively, figuratively. [00:27:50] Speaker B: But it doesn't give you the punch. [00:27:52] Speaker A: Right? [00:27:52] Speaker D: Literally, yeah, because it's the same thing as starving. I was literally dying. [00:27:58] Speaker F: Yeah, literally, you're right, it is all figurative. [00:28:04] Speaker B: You weren't literally doing that and you were dying because you're telling me right now, stop. [00:28:10] Speaker D: Well, we are all literally dying in some long version every day. [00:28:14] Speaker B: Yeah, that's true. [00:28:15] Speaker C: I liked in the book, too, how they brought that back, Jonas, and know how they were walking away. And then he's like, oh, this is what starving actually feels like. So I thought that was a nice link from the previous discussion about the exaggeration of language. [00:28:31] Speaker A: Wonder how they control their weather. Do you think they're in like a biodome kind of thing? [00:28:35] Speaker D: That's what I imagine. That's why I also didn't think he was going to be able to spoiler alert, escape. I thought he was just going to run into an invisible wall like Truman Show or something. [00:28:45] Speaker F: Yeah, you can never get past but. [00:28:47] Speaker D: Then there's the planes in the sky. [00:28:49] Speaker A: But I mean, the Hunger Games. Whatever. [00:28:50] Speaker D: We have to suspend our belief for whatever reason. They can control that segment of area, but not so much that people can't run out of it. They would think of that if they really cared about control that much. I don't think they're serious, but they. [00:29:06] Speaker B: All just have bicycles, so maybe that might be like, no one's getting out of here. [00:29:10] Speaker D: How far can you really go on a bike? Goodbye. [00:29:12] Speaker A: Yeah, pretty far. [00:29:15] Speaker D: That's what I'm saying. This is a massive oversight of the controllers. [00:29:19] Speaker A: Not really, though. They get rid of everybody, they think that is going to be difficult to control. They try to get rid of them early on. Right. The babies that can't be controlled right off, they're gone. And if people do something against the rules, you're out of here immediately. [00:29:35] Speaker D: Released. [00:29:36] Speaker F: You don't need literal borders of protection. [00:29:41] Speaker D: Because figuratively, everyone is confined. [00:29:44] Speaker F: They're within the mind. [00:29:47] Speaker D: Sorry, I just wanted to play with. [00:29:49] Speaker F: Literal and figurative a bit more. [00:29:52] Speaker A: Like you apologize. [00:29:53] Speaker D: I'm sorry. [00:29:54] Speaker A: That's what we were talking about. [00:29:55] Speaker D: Sorry for appropriately joining the convo. That's just how conversations go. [00:29:59] Speaker F: It's actually in accordance. [00:30:02] Speaker D: You don't have to apologize. [00:30:06] Speaker F: That is the evolution of how people talk. [00:30:08] Speaker A: I came to this conversation willingly. What. [00:30:14] Speaker C: Do you think about that political thing with the release? Jonas realized that his dad was actually murdering all these know yeah. [00:30:22] Speaker D: That's crazy. I have a question. What about when the old man walked out a door? Did he walk to another man, stabbing him in the eye or whatever they did with the baby? Like, everyone got killed. Right. Like, release wasn't just like, try to walk to the next town? No. [00:30:36] Speaker F: You're killed. [00:30:37] Speaker D: Yeah, we were reading it and I was like, I have a suspicion that release might mean kill, but I don't. [00:30:43] Speaker F: Think they ever blatantly spell it out. [00:30:46] Speaker D: Only when Jonas gets to watch the video of his dad doing it to. [00:30:50] Speaker C: The baby did the dad realize they were being murdered? Or do you think he just was so caught up in this fantasy that they've created for him that he's just thought they were sleeping or they were going but he knew they were? [00:31:02] Speaker A: No, I think he no, no, he was killing them. [00:31:05] Speaker E: I think he genuinely thought he was doing the right thing. Like, he grew up thinking that's. Right. And was taught that's. [00:31:12] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:31:13] Speaker E: And I think the only reason Jonah knows that it's not right is because he has memories of death or pain and stuff like that. They don't have those memories, so they probably don't even know. Do they know what death is? [00:31:26] Speaker F: Yeah. Do they really know what death? [00:31:29] Speaker E: Because death is a sad emotion. Right. So do these people just go to their old folks home? They never see them again, and so that helps with not feeling that emotion of sadness. [00:31:40] Speaker G: Well, they have a celebration of their. [00:31:42] Speaker D: Release, but they don't know that the. [00:31:43] Speaker G: Release means, like, they cease to exist. [00:31:46] Speaker D: They think they just go through a door. [00:31:48] Speaker F: Yeah. That's like retirement. [00:31:51] Speaker B: Just the dad because of the babies special jobs. Yeah, the special jobs knows. [00:31:58] Speaker E: Yeah. [00:31:58] Speaker B: And they have rules with their jobs. [00:32:00] Speaker F: Right. [00:32:00] Speaker B: So they're not allowed to share that stuff. And if dad put it in the garbage, like, he knows. [00:32:06] Speaker D: Pretty cavalier, right? Like, were they banned, this book? I wonder why this book was banned. [00:32:12] Speaker A: Babies in the garbage seems normal. [00:32:15] Speaker D: No way. [00:32:17] Speaker C: But that's not why it was banned. [00:32:20] Speaker F: I think that was part of it. Oh, it was infanticide, right? [00:32:27] Speaker D: Yes. [00:32:28] Speaker F: Reading the book and looking at the context about what is the message that they were saying, it seems like they're saying it's bad. [00:32:34] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:32:36] Speaker F: It's not like the book was like and this is the appropriate next step. [00:32:40] Speaker D: On any level, there is a society to model yourselves after. Yeah. [00:32:45] Speaker C: Book should be a required reading for kids in school. Do you think the messages and the discussion is important? [00:32:52] Speaker E: The only reason I'm saying no is because I read it in middle school and it was so boring. [00:32:58] Speaker D: I was just going to say the same. [00:33:00] Speaker E: I thought it was so boring. I just wanted it to end like the last quarter of it didn't care. It just went on and on and on. Hey, he biked off. And especially because it's an open ended, we could have just left with he biked off, in my opinion. But I do think it is cool to have a society, because we always think, like, oh, what if we lived in a perfect society? So I think that's cool, but I think there's a lot more entertaining, educational books for me. [00:33:32] Speaker D: I agree. I totally agree with Ashley. I like the idea of introducing curriculum that will challenge kids to explore the themes that we're kind of talking about right now. But I don't think that this book is the best tool to accomplish that goal. I also thought the book was boring and terrible, and so did my son, who's not yet. Why are you forcing me to read this. [00:34:00] Speaker E: Very surface level? It didn't really go deep into anything, and yeah, so it never caught my attention. I had no idea what was going on in middle school, and even now that I know what's going on, I'm like, oh, my goodness. [00:34:14] Speaker C: Actually, I'm with you. The beginning of the book, and even the middle. [00:34:18] Speaker D: Interesting. It was really interesting. [00:34:20] Speaker B: And I was like, what's? [00:34:21] Speaker C: Going by the concept of it? And then, to be honest, by the end, I thought it was just total dog shit. [00:34:26] Speaker D: Totally. [00:34:28] Speaker C: I was mad because I took the stance that they didn't make it okay. [00:34:32] Speaker E: Yeah, that's how I felt, too, which. [00:34:35] Speaker D: Would be the worst, too. I just read ten chapters about this forest travel, and you die on the doorstep. [00:34:41] Speaker C: And then everything they'd gone through. Why would the author have them die like that after everything they've been through? Have it be more like something more interesting that values what they went through. [00:34:54] Speaker E: A chase or something. It just did. [00:34:57] Speaker F: They did a car scene because yeah. [00:35:00] Speaker B: The end was kind of boring, and it was super sad, the end. They were sharing heat by thinking about the sea, and so it was crazy, crazy sad. What kept me going was the assumption that there was a happy ending. That's why I'm like, I'm desperate for a sequel or something to be like, they lived. [00:35:18] Speaker D: I think the joke is on us then, because then the author is literally like laos is literally like, checkmate. Because the dissatisfaction with not getting an ending or thinking it was a sad ending or whatever is like, if you lived in the giver's world, you wouldn't have to even feel this. [00:35:37] Speaker E: You know what I mean? [00:35:37] Speaker D: Like, see the ultimate example. [00:35:40] Speaker A: She made you uncomfortable and be like, I don't want discomfort, or do I do I want discomfort or do I not want discomfort? And what is the price to pay? [00:35:50] Speaker E: Wow. What's a good point. [00:35:53] Speaker D: Yeah, good point. [00:35:55] Speaker F: Laos. [00:35:56] Speaker D: Eugene. [00:36:00] Speaker A: It'S even the part where you're like, the journey is going, oh, this is Arduous journey for me to read. But they're experiencing that, too, for the first time, too, right. Where they're just like, Will we ever make it? This seems forever. [00:36:16] Speaker B: Right? [00:36:17] Speaker A: But she's, like, trying to transport you a little bit. [00:36:20] Speaker D: Yeah, definitely. [00:36:21] Speaker A: Right here's. All the reasons the society is controlling all that, because the weather and the hunger and the stuff, like, look how bad it is out there. Illustrate it for the last bit of the book. [00:36:33] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:36:34] Speaker G: This is what you think you want. [00:36:36] Speaker D: Because the whole book, you're like, this is bullshit. You need to be individual. Feel your feelings. Yada yada. [00:36:40] Speaker E: Yes. [00:36:40] Speaker D: And then the feeling journey happens and it's terrible. And the ending is disappointing at best. And then she's like, that's what you wanted. This is what you've been asking for the whole time. [00:36:51] Speaker A: Basically, there's no utopia because you have to strike a balance either way. Anybody who strives for utopia will never have it. [00:36:58] Speaker D: There's always you have to sacrifice something. [00:36:59] Speaker A: You just sacrifice something. [00:37:01] Speaker B: So depressing. [00:37:03] Speaker D: Totally. Thanks a lot, Lowry. [00:37:07] Speaker C: I feel like Lowry got bored. [00:37:11] Speaker D: Writing. That's how I used to write stories as a child. I'd have a great beginning. [00:37:18] Speaker E: I'm so happy some of you felt that way, too. [00:37:21] Speaker C: I feel like you and I are jeans picks. [00:37:24] Speaker D: We talked about. [00:37:28] Speaker A: Reception on books. [00:37:29] Speaker C: We'll have to compare notes for book. [00:37:32] Speaker E: We should do that. That would be cool. Do you guys feel like with the sameness that they're striving for? Before you saw the movie, did you feel like the sameness they were all white in the society, or did you feel like they had more color to them? [00:37:49] Speaker F: That's a great question, because I saw the movie before reading the book, so this is impossible to answer. [00:37:56] Speaker E: Okay. [00:37:56] Speaker D: No, I think that well, they were black and white. [00:37:59] Speaker E: Oh, true. Okay. [00:38:00] Speaker G: I don't know if there was gradients. [00:38:03] Speaker D: Of skin tone, so that in the black and whiteness, you would tell that someone's more gray than the other person, but there was no color. So they were all whatever. Except the redhead. [00:38:14] Speaker B: He only knew she was a redhead when he could see color because he started he saw an apple and then he saw her red hair. But before then, he had no idea that she was redhead. [00:38:25] Speaker D: Right. [00:38:26] Speaker E: Yeah. [00:38:26] Speaker D: It's hard to say about color, though. But I think that if they didn't take into account the black and white, like, if she didn't make that a thing, it probably would have been all white. [00:38:37] Speaker E: Right? [00:38:37] Speaker F: Yeah. [00:38:38] Speaker E: Or all yeah. Yeah. That's kind of what I was getting just from the but, like, let's be serious. [00:38:44] Speaker D: It's probably white. [00:38:45] Speaker E: Oh, totally. Right. Like low key white supremacy. Because they say that they got rid of right? Yeah, they got rid of the differences. But Jonah could see the red in certain people's cheeks as well. But some people had more red than the other. And the giver was saying they couldn't take away all of the differences. Genetics haven't been caught up to that. So that's why some people had more red cheeks. And so that kind of made me wonder are these people all supposed to be Caucasian or not? Because typically that's where you can see red in people's. [00:39:22] Speaker B: Gabriel had blue eyes and then the other girl had red hair. [00:39:28] Speaker D: Maybe that's pretty white supremacy. [00:39:33] Speaker F: Fair skin. [00:39:35] Speaker D: But we don't know because we only have three samples from the whole community. Yeah, that's true data. [00:39:44] Speaker F: It wouldn't make any sense though, reading the book for there to be too much diversity, I would think, in race. I don't even think there'd be any religion that would be too potentially corruptible to their control point though. [00:40:01] Speaker A: Are they all black? [00:40:02] Speaker E: Yeah, I agree. [00:40:03] Speaker D: Well, it would be interesting to see if they thought that that mattered because that would be a really cool exploration that would know the answer. Because in truth, skin color doesn't matter to the personality until you add in life experiences, et cetera, and it has a large impact. But in this weird society, do they see that as something that needs to be controlled? Like they didn't kill everyone with red hair. You know what I mean? Those diversities are there and there's brown eyes and blue eyes. So those diversities were there. [00:40:35] Speaker F: Where did they draw the line? Exactly? [00:40:37] Speaker D: Was it like everyone yeah. [00:40:38] Speaker E: What's the cut off? [00:40:39] Speaker D: Yeah. [00:40:40] Speaker F: We know that they want emotional and mental and psychological sameness. What about this physical aspect? [00:40:48] Speaker D: Because the only example for a physical aspect is killing twins. [00:40:51] Speaker E: See, all these options could have been included in the book to make it more interesting. [00:40:55] Speaker D: Totally. Or at least the thing too is teachers should be doing what we're doing and drawing out the conversation. Yes. Just read this book and we'll never talk about it again. Probably not, but read this book and we're going to do an in depth kind of exploration of it. It could be valuable, right? [00:41:13] Speaker E: Yes. [00:41:13] Speaker A: It's nice when it's short because then you have spend more time with the conversations rather than with the book. [00:41:19] Speaker D: Totally. [00:41:20] Speaker A: With different reading rates. [00:41:21] Speaker C: Depends on who reads it. As to how they perceive the society too. [00:41:27] Speaker D: Absolutely. Which is interesting too, because the book about the sameness or whatever the uniqueness is exhibited by way of people all reading the same book about the sameness and having different experiences of it. Because we don't take those pills. [00:41:41] Speaker F: The boner pills. Yeah, we don't take them. [00:41:45] Speaker B: So the giver is giving the receiver information about all of history and we were just talking about different races and histories and that would be included in the things he's giving him. So it should have been a topic, I think, if what was that community looked the same. Right? Exactly. That would be a topic. If all of a sudden he had all the memories of history since the beginning of time, and then he looks at his community because he can see them in color now, if they didn't look what he now has the knowledge. [00:42:15] Speaker D: Of, maybe that's more evidence, though, that his community is diverse because he didn't ever note that in his memories. Like, oh, and there were people there that I've never seen before. [00:42:27] Speaker E: Right. [00:42:28] Speaker D: Maybe we'll never know. [00:42:30] Speaker A: Couldn't put it all in, I guess. [00:42:32] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:42:34] Speaker A: I didn't experience the book like everybody else. I didn't find it difficult to read or anything. I just sat down. I read it all at once. I wanted to get to the end of so it was going on. So for me, it didn't drag or. [00:42:44] Speaker F: What were your feelings at the end of the book? [00:42:47] Speaker A: I like it ending like that. Yeah, because then it makes me think about all the possibilities and what the author wants you to think about, because it's so, like, up in the air. You really start thinking about the sled memory that he received. [00:43:04] Speaker D: Is it real? [00:43:05] Speaker A: So at the end, is he just re experiencing this memory because the baby's releasing it to him because the baby's dying? Or in my mind, I was like, did the baby die because he'd given all these things to the baby to help it get through? As we know, when Rosemary died, all of the things she had received went out into the community. Did that mean the baby died? And if the baby died then or the sledding wasn't real, it was a memory. But if they survive and they're sledding down in the same way as the memory, then what does that mean? Was somebody looking into the future and that's where that memory came from? Is there something else going on? Trying to tease out, is it real? Is it not real? And what does it mean for the rest of society and the rest of the memories that the giver was giving him? Are they present memories? Are there future memories? Is it just history? Or, like, more than that? [00:43:57] Speaker F: I never thought of those layers make. [00:43:59] Speaker A: You thinking back to all these things. [00:44:02] Speaker F: Yeah, it really sounds like that type of ending, at least with this book, allows you the opportunity, Meredith, to consolidate all of your learnings from that book, to come up with potential predictable patterns of what the next steps would be, what future chapters would be. [00:44:20] Speaker E: Right. [00:44:20] Speaker A: I like to think about what the author is trying to say. Art is a way of showing expressing ideas and stuff. What is she saying? What's the commentary on our current world because of that? And so this book, I think, is very relevant now, even though it was written before, because we're at a point in history where overpopulation is a huge thing. Maybe not right now, but there's going to be societies thinking about some of the themes in this book. [00:44:47] Speaker F: Really, I think it's so relevant to today. [00:44:49] Speaker C: I agree. Especially there's so much around the deny stuff about everyone being authentic to themselves. And so not conforming. So I like that parallel you just drew. [00:45:03] Speaker E: It can totally be compared to colonization with Indigenous people and how if you are colonized and you come into this community and you assimilate into it, you're not going to go starving, you're not going to be poor. All these things are kind of like granted, but you lose that history, you lose that feeling of community. You're losing all of that stuff, kind of that this community has taken away from all of their people, all of their feelings. [00:45:32] Speaker F: You're even losing your own Native language and having it replaced with very clear. [00:45:39] Speaker D: Precise language, at least, and being sculpted. [00:45:43] Speaker E: For not saying it properly. Absolutely. So you can totally see the parallels. I don't even know if that's on purpose, but I mean, a good book, you can compare it to so many different times in history. [00:45:56] Speaker C: Like the residential schools that would be yeah, totally. [00:45:59] Speaker D: Big example of that earlier, I believe. [00:46:02] Speaker E: Kim was saying she thought that being the giver or receiver would be one of the best jobs. Do you guys have a job? When you were reading that, you were thinking, oh, I would like to do. [00:46:13] Speaker F: That giver or receiver, just like Kim. Nothing else will do. [00:46:19] Speaker D: No, for like I can see the power there as well. Like you get to turn off the speaker and it's the knowledge keeper if you want to draw back another parallel to Indigenous culture. Right. Like it's the ultimate elder with all of the stories. You hold the key to the past. And just to your point too, Ashley, that assimilation. We see how well that works out. Like it kills people, you know what I mean? Their spirit, it just really is destructive. So the idea that this is a utopia is actually one again, Dystopian novel is all like it's actually a nightmare. [00:46:58] Speaker B: Well, think about the parents, too. So after the parents get paired, then they are allowed to have two children. And then once they get old, they're sent separately to old age homes. [00:47:10] Speaker E: Totally. [00:47:12] Speaker B: There's no connection there's. 25 years this person, and you're like, see ya. Now I go to an old age home where eleven and twelve year old. [00:47:19] Speaker D: House of the old, right? [00:47:20] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:47:20] Speaker B: And then eventually they kill me with a needle. Like horrible, just a horrible existence here's. [00:47:26] Speaker A: On the flip side, the other question is there anybody who, if they had the choice, wouldn't be the giver receiver and would choose a different one? Because I think a book is making you want to be the person who suffers. [00:47:37] Speaker F: Okay, Ashley, let's hear it. [00:47:38] Speaker E: What would you be? I would want to be a birth giver, mostly because I think they're the only people that have sex. And I would be pretty sad in life if I couldn't do that. And they seem to be treated really they seem to be treated really well. They got like a three year vacation after giving birth. Are you kidding? [00:48:01] Speaker D: They're the hard laborers after that. [00:48:03] Speaker B: Yeah, they're hard laborer. [00:48:05] Speaker E: Good. That's fine. [00:48:06] Speaker D: That's fine. [00:48:07] Speaker F: Because she's having sex and going on vacate. [00:48:12] Speaker E: That's all I wanted. [00:48:14] Speaker D: Gym, can, laundry. Do you have the same criteria? [00:48:18] Speaker B: Okay, but are we sure they're actually having sex? Maybe it's just all artificial. [00:48:22] Speaker A: It is artificial. [00:48:25] Speaker B: I don't think you're having any sex. Oh, really? I don't think so. [00:48:31] Speaker D: No. [00:48:31] Speaker A: They don't allow sex against the rules. [00:48:33] Speaker E: If I found out that it was insemination, I would go over the bridge. That's what I would do. [00:48:41] Speaker D: I would release myself. [00:48:44] Speaker E: I would have applied for. [00:48:49] Speaker D: How did. [00:48:49] Speaker F: We lose that one? Oh, she couldn't have the sex. We lose so many that way. [00:48:55] Speaker D: We lose so many. [00:48:57] Speaker A: She wanted a different kind of release. [00:48:59] Speaker E: Yes, exactly. [00:49:00] Speaker A: I need some kind of. [00:49:07] Speaker D: Release. [00:49:08] Speaker B: It would have to have the person who gave birth, and one of the jobs would be, like, a scud or whatever. [00:49:15] Speaker D: Yeah, it would have to be ashley. [00:49:18] Speaker F: Would only get the best. Only the best dick. [00:49:21] Speaker E: Look at this. See? Thank you. That's what I deserve. [00:49:26] Speaker D: So that's what I would want to dick over here. [00:49:31] Speaker E: Oh, my gosh. Yeah. I mean, the giver receiver, awesome job, too, but I think a birth giver is probably top tier for me. [00:49:39] Speaker D: Wouldn't you feel, like, just sad? Well, you feel sad because you gave birth to a baby and then they take them from you three times. [00:49:47] Speaker A: No, that's immediately. [00:49:48] Speaker F: Yeah, I couldn't do it, and then I kill it. [00:49:51] Speaker E: Yeah, okay, fair enough. But you don't know that they kill it. [00:49:55] Speaker D: And you have to do the labor. [00:49:58] Speaker E: Okay, true. [00:49:59] Speaker G: The labor. [00:50:00] Speaker E: Maybe because I've never been through labor. [00:50:03] Speaker D: There's probably no epidurals. Although maybe there is, because they're, like, don't feel anything. They don't feel pain. Maybe you're okay, never mind. [00:50:12] Speaker F: It would just be C sections all the way. [00:50:14] Speaker E: Do you think so? Maybe I go into labor and they put me to sleep, and then I wake up with no baby. [00:50:19] Speaker D: Yeah. Sold. [00:50:20] Speaker C: Sold. [00:50:22] Speaker D: Sold. No. Horrible. [00:50:25] Speaker B: No, you would hate it. [00:50:27] Speaker C: The part I didn't love about the birth mothers is that you know how they were saying that there's no value in that and they're lazy from the community? [00:50:36] Speaker E: It reminded me of how we treat sex workers in our community. We totally think they're bottom at the bottom. We treat them like shit, like they don't deserve health care. And that's just not true. Well, birth giving is such an important part of the community and also sex work that's our government driving people to do that. It's not so many times it's not their choice. [00:50:57] Speaker A: And as if they're not working, people act like it's not real work. Like, people are working, my friend, and they get situations. [00:51:05] Speaker D: Danger pay, too, should be included. Yeah. [00:51:07] Speaker B: And they're traumatized, potentially for the risk of murder. [00:51:12] Speaker E: Being a sex worker is so high. It's really like they have such a dangerous job. [00:51:18] Speaker F: Violence, murder. [00:51:20] Speaker E: Absolutely. [00:51:21] Speaker F: I think it's a really hard cycle to get out of as well. [00:51:24] Speaker E: Oh, God. Yeah, for sure. There's just no support for it. Right. [00:51:29] Speaker B: But also the fact that in the book, they're saying even being a mother has no value giving birth to another human labor, all of that. [00:51:38] Speaker E: You're creating life. You can't do that without women. And it's so ironic that that's also how society can see women as well. You're just here to give birth, but you mean nothing to society or this human being that you gave birth to. And it's how could you not? It's men. It's men that think that. [00:51:57] Speaker C: And it's funny that Lois is a. [00:51:59] Speaker D: Woman, right, that wrote that pronounced yes. [00:52:05] Speaker C: On her pages. [00:52:05] Speaker B: It's the patriarchy again. [00:52:08] Speaker E: Always. I'll bring it back to the patriarchy every time. [00:52:10] Speaker F: Do it every time. [00:52:12] Speaker D: Patriarchy. Ugh. [00:52:14] Speaker F: Remember, Ashley, we read another book that if you listen to it on audio tape well, even if you read it after every time they put patriarchy, it. [00:52:22] Speaker D: Was always, oh, I love that. [00:52:25] Speaker E: I love that. [00:52:27] Speaker F: All right, my friends, I'm so sorry, I need to bail a few minutes early here to go be a taxi driver. [00:52:34] Speaker A: Before you go, if you would recommend. [00:52:36] Speaker F: The book, I would just because even for all the reasons that came up, some people couldn't get into the flow of the reading it, or some people hated the leaving you hanging ending. What it did do for me was create many pockets of opportunities to just think about things and reflect both within the book, but parallel it to what's going on in the world. And that's a gift that the giver gave to me. [00:53:03] Speaker D: I like thinking about those things. [00:53:08] Speaker F: Yeah, I would recommend it. All right, bye. [00:53:15] Speaker E: You are released. [00:53:18] Speaker D: I love it. Okay, I'm being released. Bye, Kara. [00:53:23] Speaker B: All right, everyone else, who else recommends it or not recommends it? [00:53:26] Speaker E: I don't recommend it, and it's just my personal bias. I didn't like it in grade eight, didn't like it now, but I can see younger people, even people close to my age, liking it. It's just not the type of book I enjoy, so I would have a hard time recommending it. What about you guys? [00:53:43] Speaker D: I feel the same way as Ashley, but I will say that our conversation today was the thing that brought me the most enjoyment out of this book. Before, I was like, whatever. But talking about it today made it slightly more interesting for me. But the actual act of reading the book no. And the story itself, whatever. I think also the same as Ashley. It's not my kind of book. I have a problem with dystopian novels, and science fiction is not my genre of choice. So a couple of stars have to align for me to actually really like books that fall into those categories. This one didn't quite have whatever that extra thing is that actually makes me develop some kind of what's the word I'm looking for? Positive feelings. Any positive feelings toward it. I wouldn't recommend it. It's just a personal thing, though, I don't think. Now I'm just going to end it. There no no recommendation here, Virginia. [00:54:42] Speaker C: It's a hat trick. I would not recommend this book. However, I do think that there's some really great points here. I would love to see it rewritten, almost with some of the concepts that I'd like. I feel like the Dystopian world was kind of messy, and I know it's not supposed to make sense, but just some of it just was too out there, like removing color. Like, how would you do that? You know what I mean? And it's just some stuff was just too far that I just couldn't really get on board with, even if it's fantasy dystopian world. But I liked part of it, right? Like I mentioned already, I love the concept of it. I love the conversation it would bring up with the beginning of the novel. If halfway through, when they start describing more of this Dystopian life, like we said, the color and that kind of thing, then it was just like, okay, I'm out. So it's a hard no for recommending it, but I do think it would be an interesting rewrite. [00:55:40] Speaker D: I love that your recommendation is rewrite the book. [00:55:44] Speaker C: Get yourself busy and go rewrite this. [00:55:49] Speaker D: I recommend a rewrite. [00:55:51] Speaker E: Yeah. [00:55:51] Speaker C: And there's so many other great books, like other band ones, like Catching the. [00:55:54] Speaker A: Rye and stuff like that. [00:55:55] Speaker C: Those are really great. [00:55:57] Speaker E: The Hunger Games. [00:55:58] Speaker C: The Hunger Games. I think this one can get on the shelf. [00:56:04] Speaker A: I'm like the opposite of Kim. I love Dystopian novels and like, a little bit of Sci-Fi in there. Love it. Would I recommend the book? I like the book as, like, a book club book. Honestly, sometimes you have a book in a book club, and the book was really enjoyable to read, but everything was laid out there. You didn't have to think about it. And you get to the book club and people are like, liked it, didn't like it, and that's it. There's no conversation. That's what I like, is like talking about reading a book, talking about it, coming up with these ideas and seeing what other people think, right? That kind of deeper dive. And for that reason, I think it is a good choice for school, even if some people might find it boring to read because it's the conversations that are very interesting. I didn't find the book particularly boring either, actually. There was a kid who had to pick a couple of books for school, I think band books. They're doing band books. And he had a list, and this one was on the list. I'm like, oh, I'm reading it. He's like, Would you recommend it? I was like, yeah, because if you're doing it for school, there's so much to write about. So I don't know if he ended up choosing it, but it's also short. [00:57:04] Speaker C: Did you give the the Cole's notes? [00:57:05] Speaker A: Did you tell him I said, read it, come talk to me about it. [00:57:10] Speaker D: Give me the cole's notes. Right. [00:57:14] Speaker A: Yeah, maybe. I guess I kind of did. It's nothing to write home about. [00:57:17] Speaker B: I guess I would recommend it. I thought it was really fast read. I liked it enough. I hated the end because, unlike Meredith, I was willing to go through the boring they're suffering to get to this happy ending. And then when they didn't, I was super disappointed. So I would recommend it. But I didn't love it. I thought it was good enough. Like, I read through it, I liked it enough. I hated the end so much. I'm going to read the sequel to See. And if the sequel is super disappointing, then maybe I write off. [00:57:50] Speaker D: I may withdraw my recommendation. [00:57:54] Speaker B: If both kids don't live and they. [00:57:56] Speaker A: Don'T have a happy Christmas with grandparents. [00:57:58] Speaker B: I might write off the whole thing. [00:58:04] Speaker E: Expectations. [00:58:05] Speaker B: Well, that's why I read Jane Austen happy ending every time, happily ever after. [00:58:10] Speaker A: You always know that's the end, right? [00:58:12] Speaker B: And most Jane Austen spinoffs always have the happy ending. That's all I want, is, like, knowing that it's going to be fine. They can struggle, but it's going to be fine. Yeah. So I hated the ending, but I'd recommend it, and it was super fast read that's. [00:58:25] Speaker E: What I really liked about it, too, was how fast it was. Just even in an afternoon, I was halfway done the book. But I do agree with you guys. It's such a good conversation book, so yeah, maybe for a book club or something. I could see it being recommended for that. [00:58:42] Speaker D: By you. [00:58:42] Speaker E: Yeah, not by me. [00:58:47] Speaker D: Not by me. [00:58:48] Speaker E: But I could see it being out there. [00:58:53] Speaker A: Oh, boy. [00:58:54] Speaker B: Any last thoughts? And then we'll move to the next book, which is something diary of Absolutely True. Yes, absolutely true. Diary of part time Indian. [00:59:06] Speaker A: Thank you. [00:59:09] Speaker E: Great. [00:59:09] Speaker B: Thank you. [00:59:10] Speaker A: Is that a graphic novel? [00:59:11] Speaker B: It is a graphic novel, yeah, but. [00:59:13] Speaker A: It'S not have it yet. [00:59:15] Speaker D: It's not as graphic as previous graphic novels. It's not like a comic book. [00:59:19] Speaker C: Oh, no, I haven't got my by. [00:59:22] Speaker A: Not as graphic, were you referring to, like, the naked cadaver picture? [00:59:26] Speaker D: Well, unfortunately, that's the only graphic novel we've done before this, so I guess by default, I am. But I'm also referring to graphic novels that I've read with Fred, and I just mean it's not set up like a comic. As far as graphic goes, it's pretty. [00:59:43] Speaker C: Like when you were reading that. [00:59:46] Speaker A: Pretty graphic, but not graphic. [00:59:49] Speaker D: Not literally graphic. Really. Not literally graphic. It's figuratively a little graphic, but not literally. [00:59:57] Speaker E: I like that. [00:59:58] Speaker A: Wrap it up. [01:00:00] Speaker B: Book interrupted. [01:00:02] Speaker A: I traveled internationally, and my bag did not make it to my final destination. I wasn't too worried about it because it's happened before many. Times before and usually the bag is delivered to me in a day or two or at least a couple of weeks. But this time it was not. I've been on the phone a lot with the airline I bought it through and also with their affiliate airline that my trip got transferred to and airports and really just want to get my stuff back. It's not like it's that nice of stuff, it's just that it's my stuff and I don't want to have to replace it. Anyway, hopefully one day soon I'll have an interruption saying that I got a call from the airline and they found my bag. But until then it is interrupting my life. Kind of on the daily just trying to get answers. [01:00:53] Speaker F: Oh well, book interrupted. [01:00:57] Speaker B: It's book report time. We're going to find out from each member their final thoughts and do they recommend the book? Let's listen. [01:01:04] Speaker F: Hello. Hello. I am here to give my final book report on the book, The Giver by Lois Lowry. I have to admit I saw the movie first before reading the book. That would be a classic kara move, watching the movie before reading the book. Just because if the book is really good, I don't want it to be spoiled by the movie afterwards. So I kind of like to do things in a reverse order. The book wasn't bad. What I mostly enjoyed about it was the themes that were played with just around like emotions, control, as well as what does storytelling and memories. How does that impact a society or a community or when those things are missing, what happens? So I was really interested in that. I didn't find that reading the book, it didn't seem to like, I don't know, you know, some books you can just get into it and the language and the writing, like everything really flows. It felt a bit more choppy to me. So I appreciated the movie a bit more because it seemed to have a fluidity and flow to it. I also really enjoyed how the main character was a teenager. It was really nice to by having the main character as a teenager, he was able to in the movie have a love interest and that added another layer. It was kind of like more of a hook actually, in the storyline. It allowed me to become a bit more invested in the character. The book wasn't bad. I absolutely would recommend it. I just appreciated and liked and connected with the movie a bit more. But what I would love to share with you is just some of my thoughts that I'm processing like a utopian society. And the idea that this group of people, the elders or the ones in charge kind of thought like the way to go about creating this utopian society is obviously the removal of our past, our histories, our stories, erasing those memories, those are all housed and held within The Giver. And the receiver. Only no one else outside of that dynamic is privy to that. And it just kind of got me thinking a lot about one of my latest areas of interest is looking at the hierarchies in our educational system and wondering about, well, what would an alternative learning model look like? And just that whole decolonizing education has led me to start to do a lot of research on my own around the importance with any given community how important it is to have those histories, to have the oral storytelling traditions, to hold those memories, and to not forget. You see that a lot in Jewish culture and indigenous ideologies, how important it is. Those are guiding principles. And the essence of part of that is so that we don't repeat mistakes, so that we learn from our past, so that we can collectively grow into being the highest versions of ourselves. I just thought it was so fascinating because of this book, to be able to reflect upon how important it is to have our memories. Like, what purpose does an individual's memory serve? What purpose does a communal or a collective memory serve? How does that tie into collective consciousness? What does it mean to be human and what is humanness? So it was just really fun to not even arrive at any answers, but to be walking away with a lot of really interesting and jampacked questions. So for a wanderer like myself, someone who thoroughly enjoys reflecting more so than they do, producing or doing things, I would say those are like the main reasons why I enjoyed this book and why I liked the movie. Because of all the ideas it started to generate within me, all the curiosities that came about, what happens when groups of people get together. That's why I'd absolutely recommend it. If you do read the book, I would love to hear from you. What were your thoughts, what did you like, what didn't work for you? And what kind of new questions came about as a result of reading this book? [01:05:22] Speaker G: Okay, so we are going to do what would we call it? Book report for the giver. And I want to know if you can ban a book for sucking. Because this book did. Honestly, it was boring. I didn't like the way it was written. I found the language literally hard to say. It was choppy. Maybe it was supposed to be like. [01:05:42] Speaker D: That robotic, like how the whole life. [01:05:45] Speaker G: Is all super controlled or whatever. But I did not like the book. I forced my son to read it with me. He didn't really like it either. Small positive note and spoiler alert, I did like that at the end. They kind of get away or whatever. But that book was just I don't even know. I didn't like it. I wouldn't recommend it. I also don't really like science fiction, usually, so it's got to be a pretty good science fictiony novel. To get me. And I wonder what's going on here, because I also didn't like Handmaid's Tale, kind of for the same reason it takes so long to get to where you want it to go that when it finally gets there, it's the last page or whatever. And so you're like, well, that was a waste of time. I guess I should have just waited for book two. And I also wonder if what I just said is true, then perhaps the way that I should handle these kind of stories, if it's possible, is to read book two so that I can develop enough curiosity about what happened before. And then we might have a match made in heaven. And I might actually say I liked a book. [01:06:51] Speaker D: But yeah, the giver was lame. [01:06:53] Speaker G: I mean, maybe it was just because the world that it was describing was lame and so I felt all the lameness like I was supposed to. Maybe the author wanted me to feel lame, unclear. But anyway, do not recommend. Don't waste your time. You have been released. [01:07:13] Speaker A: So we just finished the book. The giver by Lois Lowry. It was a really long time ago. When I read the book, it seems I read it in a single sitting, so it's kind of hard to recall what I thought about it. Although I'm going to say that I liked it because I read it all at once. I just needed to know what happened. I needed to get to the end. And if you've listened to the rest of the podcast, you'll know that it's not a satisfying end. It's really open ended. It's open to interpretation. A lot of people don't like that. I like that makes me think. So I did enjoy the book. I don't see any reason not to recommend it. It wasn't life changing for me. But I liked the book. It was really short, so why not? It talks about a lot of things that we're going to be dealing with or are dealing with already, with climate change and all that stuff. So very interesting themes in this book go along with something else that I'm currently interested in, which is longevity research, which does seem not related. But I'll tell you why. There's a researcher called Dr. David Sinclair and he does longevity research and he has coined this term adversity memetic. So he's saying that things that mimic adversity to our bodies make us stronger. So the whole idea of what doesn't kill you makes you stronger. And his argument is that we live in a world of comfort, and all these abundance memetics we have, I guess, or all this abundance we have is actually not good for our health because we evolved in a world where we had adversity and our body evolved to repair itself when it was presented with this kind of adversity. And I think that this book is looking at stuff like that. So they're trying to control the society and they're trying to make it very comfortable. There's no conflict and everything is very controlled. What a seemingly nice place to live for people who are conflict avoiders. There's just very strict rules everybody has to follow. But in the end, when you try to make this very comfortable world, it doesn't work. It's not good for the people. And whether the book ends happy ending or bad ending, I think it becomes clear that the society, the community that was left behind is going to suffer because they really couldn't control everything. They put all their eggs in one basket. In a way, by putting all the history into one or two people and losing that person now shows that all their efforts made them a very unhealthy society. They won't be able to handle the loss of the receiver or ultimately, when their giver dies, the loss of the giver. So it makes you think it's nice to have comfort in life and to be able to relax, but maybe not too much. You can't relax your whole life away. [01:09:51] Speaker D: You got to do a little bit. [01:09:52] Speaker A: Of exercise or your body's going to not work very well. Just like you need a little bit of feelings or your community maybe doesn't really act like a real community because nobody cares for each other. That's all I have to say. Read the book. Don't read the book. I think it's great for a group discussion. So I think it's nice that it's used in schools to spur these discussions because isn't that what reading books in schools is all about, is learning how to read a book and really think about what the author is thinking and dissect it and see what you think. [01:10:23] Speaker G: About the world or the world they created. [01:10:26] Speaker A: That's it for me. [01:10:27] Speaker B: So I would recommend this book. It was super fast. It's a really short book. My book has 224 pages. It's meant for like a young audience again, like either young adult, youth, juvenile book. It kept you engaged the whole time. It wasn't complicated. For instance, when people are released, it was clear for me from the beginning that released means that they probably killed them. I really liked the book. I liked the concept of if you take away all obstacles and all memories of anything that was struggles, that not peace. But people just kind of go through their routines. No one's really happy, no one's really sad. They're neutral, they're colorless. So I thought that was an interesting take. I kind of like how the giver shares their memories. That was a kind of cool thing she did, how they place their hands and then the memories can be released. What I didn't like about this book, which is a definite spoiler if you haven't finished it yet, is I hate that just ends, that we don't know if it's a happy ending. I really needed it to be a happy ending. Like I wanted it to be a happy ending. I don't know if it's going to be like the Handsmaid's tale for me, but I'm just going to pretend it was a happy ending and that that Christmas scene was legit it and he and the little guy that he took with him have a happy family now and live in a different world where there's colors and that they actually escaped. It was really sad, the end of the book when they're like, sharing memories of warmth and stuff. Yeah, the end of the book was super sad. Just so sad that I was hoping that the finale would be of all that sadness, something good or a sequel. [01:12:06] Speaker D: I don't know. [01:12:07] Speaker B: Maybe there is a sequel. I'm not sure. I didn't look that up. Maybe there's a sequel to this book. I guess I'll ask the other people in the club if there is. Anyway. I really like how it's like he's left his youth behind and his almost his culture behind, when he gets all these memories and all this knowledge of the way the world is other places and has been in the past and how angry he is at them for not caring about releasing people and that kind of thing. So I like how the author painted that conflict within himself, that he kind of grew past this neutralness with understanding and knowledge and then how the giver was trying to set him up for it. I'd also like that they made a plan to slowly give back some memories, help the people be able to have color and sympathy and something other than these strict rules of either here nor there without connection, really. Anyway, I really liked it. I just really wish there was a sequel or a happy ending because the end of the book was super sad. All right. Can't wait to talk to everyone else about it. [01:13:15] Speaker E: Hey, everyone, this is Ashley, and I'm doing my personal journal for the end of the giver. And how I feel about the book is pretty similar to when I started. I really don't enjoy this book. I think it's boring. So much of it is surface level. You don't get enough detail, in my opinion. There's this very unique Dystopian world where people are considered same, and I don't think we get enough background onto how we got there or how they got to remove people's color or what the pills that they're taking really do, in my opinion. But I did switch from reading the physical book to the audiobook, and if I had to recommend the book, I would recommend the audiobook, because when Jonah is experiencing new things, the audiobook actually plays sounds. It starts playing before Jonah really even tells the reader what he's seeing. You actually start to get excited. And I think that's the point is to get the reader to experience kind of what Jonah is feeling to make you feel the same excitement or curiosity kind of like what's coming up. So I really enjoyed that. The audiobook was a lot better for me than the actual book. The ending, I don't like open endings like that. So the ending was open. I don't super love that. To me, what I think happened in the end is I don't think they made it. I can't wait to hear what the other girls think. So I just think the book needs to be expanded on, really. There's so many things that I think could be taken out and replaced with something more interesting. I guess I kind of understand why it's in the school curriculum or it was 1015 years ago. I don't know if it is now because it's a banned book. I would also like to know why it's a banned book. I'll have to look that up myself. But it's not my favorite book out of the books we've read for the podcast so far, I think this is my least favorite and I feel kind of bad saying that. I think I also came in with a negative point of view to begin with and that may be impacting how I feel, but I'm most just excited to talk to the girls about it and then hear what my other friends think. Although I do want to give a shout out to my friend Sienna who did spoil part of the book for me. But that's okay. That's totally fine because I did read it when I was in grade eight. I just didn't remember everything. So, yeah, shout out to her and I can't wait to hear what the other gals think. [01:15:56] Speaker H: I am filming my final book, report from beautiful Prince Edward Island. So the question is whether or not I would recommend the giver. [01:16:06] Speaker B: Spoiler alert. [01:16:07] Speaker H: I'm going to be talking about the spoiler at the ending, so switch it off if you don't want to hear it. I guess it all depends on what your perception is on the finale of the book, if you think that Jonas and Gabriel survived or not. I would say I would 100% recommend the beginning of the book and the first half of it. I really liked what the author did with the concepts of it and it really made you think about whether or not you'd want a certain dystopian community. I imagine you could make parallels to it with any part of future generations or past generations, almost like you can with 1984. George orwell 1984. So I think that was really great and especially for kids to really be able to dive in and dig into the concepts that they present in the book about sameness and not having individuality and people picking your careers and your spouses and your families. So I think that's really interesting and thought provoking. So I was really invested in the characters and this journey of Jonas and Gabriel. But by the end, again, like I said, the perspective I took wasn't that they made it. And so I literally threw the book and swore. So I'm going to say no, I do not recommend this book. But the other women in this Book Interrupted podcast, they took it a different route. So a couple of them thought that they did survive. And my understanding is that there are sequels that also allude to a more concrete ending. So if I took it in that regard, perhaps, but I still only give it like a six out of ten. So I think there's other books out there that if you're looking for a band book that might be more worthwhile, that's it for me. [01:17:58] Speaker B: Thank you for joining us on this episode of Book Interrupted. If you'd like to see the video highlights from this episode, please go to our YouTube channel, Book Interrupted. You can also find our videos on www.bookinterrupted.com bookies. [01:18:15] Speaker G: We really want to hear from you. Go to www.bookinterrupted.com to find out the variety of ways you can get in touch, give us a call and leave a voicemail and we will play it on the podcast or write us an email and we can read it on the podcast. Or better yet, leave us a review on itunes. Anything bookies. We want to hear from you. [01:18:39] Speaker B: Pretty please. [01:18:41] Speaker G: Tell us what you like. Tell us what you don't like. Tell us books you think we should read. Tell us about your favorite moments. Tell us anything, please. We want to know what you think. So don't forget that's WW bookinterrupted.com or itunes and leave us a review. We will love to hear from you. Talk to you soon. [01:19:01] Speaker B: Bookies. Book interrupted. [01:19:05] Speaker G: Never forget. Every child matters.