Essay, Research Paper: Fahrenhiet 451

Wow it s hot in here; look even those books are starting to burn. That means it must be around 451 degrees Fahrenheit because that s the temperature at which book paper catches fires and burns . In Fahrenheit 451 the nice old community fireman are changed into a futuristic squad of government policing. Their jobs are changed from stopping fires to creating them. There new job is to take books and the homes there are held in and destroy them in a huge bonfire. These book burnings are to keep people from reading the books and thinking of new ideas that may alienate some people causing them to be unhappy. The idea of keeping people happy is a good one but taking away everything that makes people in the first place wasn t. One fireman discovered this mistake before it was too late. His name is Guy Montag, and he was a fireman burned books for a living but never noticed the big picture until one girl showed it to him. She showed him that books are creative and have a bigger meaning. Also she showed him what the government was doing to keep control and he finally realized the greater picture. This was the censorship of ideas and the failure of society to walk to its doom. These two problems are what make Guy Montag decide to join the resistance and fight the book burning.
In the beginning Guy Montag believed everything he was told but he slowly started to realize that he was just another casualty of the censorship. Don t let the torrent of melancholy and drear philosophy drown our world, describes how people felt about the important things like philosophy, which hold today s society together. The censors also changed history to make it easier to believe. Established, 1790, to burn English-influenced books in the colonies. First fireman: Benjamin Franklin was put on Guy s Firehouse to show that people have always been burning books even though they haven t. This kind of propaganda was everywhere even on there TV to keep everyone believing what s happening around them. Even thought the censorship was bad society mad the biggest mistake by letting it happen.
Society watched as it went from a free society in the 20 century to a controlled society in the 24 century. Society had become a place were nothing was up to the individual anymore. The government chose everything and only what the government wants the people to see was seen. When Guy says, (I) hope I didn t do anything foolish at the party describes how he is paranoid that he may screw up and change societies views of him. This shows how societies views have become the most important thing in life. What does it mean? It doesn t mean anything! When they see the truth in front of them they still try to deny it because of all the censorship they were grow up on. Since there was so much censorship drilled into the peoples head it will be hard for Guy and his group of burning rebels to stop the censorship.
The censorship is a horribly thing to have to live though but it was society s fault for letting it happen. Ray Bradbury was trying to show the world this after World War two that if people weren t careful we would let the government put enough restriction on our lives thinking it was helping the people but at the same time take away everything we hold dear and what we take for granted. Bradbury s fears can come true one day and if the people don t fight it one are children will not have to worry about righting boo reports because there will be no books to read