The Price of Silence…

I’m dumbfounded by the short story The suit by Can Thembe. The story is a hard but captivating read exploring mind altering themes, it shows the character Matilda who represents a painful but powerful example of how psychological punishment can cause someone to stay silence. After her husband, Philemon, discovers that she has cheated, he does not react with physical violence or divorce. Instead, he chooses a far more humiliating punishment. He forces Matilda to treat the suit left behind by her lover as a guest in their home. The suit must sit at the table, join them on walks, and  stays constant reminder of her mistake.

 For months, Matilda endures this torture. What is interesting is not only the punishment but the fact that she does not leave her husband. This raises an important question being why do victims remain silent in oppressive systems?

Matilda’s silence can be understood through the power dynamics within her marriage and the society around her. In many relationships, especially in the time in which the story takes place, men often hold social and emotional dominance. Leaving a husband could mean losing security, reputation, and social acceptance. Matilda may have felt that experiencing humiliation was easier than facing the shame of being rejected by society. Today, many people in abusive relationships remain silent for similar reasons. Fear, financial dependence, emotional manipulation, and the hope that things might improve keep victims trapped. In cases of gender-based violence, survivors are often blamed or questioned about their own actions, which discourages them from speaking out.

Victim-blaming is one of the most powerful factors that influence silence. When communities focus on what the victim “did wrong” instead of blaming the abuser, victims may feel that they deserve the treatment they receive. Matilda’s punishment is built entirely on the  idea that her mistake becomes the justification for endless humiliation.

There is also the fear of social exclusion. In many communities, speaking out about abuse can lead to gossip or judgement, this makes people feel remaining silent is only way to keep their dignity 

Matilda’s story reminds us that silence isnt always a sign of weakness but can be the result of powerful social pressures. By recognising these pressures society can begin to create environments where victims feel safe to speak and where humiliation and abuse are no longer tolerated.

The reality behind the madness

The Yellow Wallpaper reads like a slow psychological breakdown, but in all honesty, it follows a woman, isolated in a room, obsessing over ugly decor until she completely loses touch with reality. But if we look at it through a feminist lens, something far more extreme is happening. 

The narrator’s husband, John, is not just her partner; he is her doctor. He prescribes the infamous “rest cure,” Which caused women to stop working, writing and thinking clearly. In other words, don't think, don't create, don't speak. The narrator knows that writing helps her. She feels it. Yet she must hide her journal like it’s illegal. Her literal voice on paper is treated as dangerous. 

This reminds me of something all too familiar...For much of history, women who spoke out were dismissed as hysterical, irrational, overly emotional. Their anger was treated with medication. Their frustration was labelled as illness. When women pushed back against systems that confined them to domestic spaces, society often responded by calling them unstable. The narrator’s descent begins when she is silenced. Her “madness” grows in the vacuum created by enforced obedience. 

The yellow wallpaper becomes more than decoration. It becomes a prison. The narrator sees a woman trapped behind its pattern, shaking the bars, trying to get free. That image is symbolic a woman imprisoned within a suffocating structure designed by others. And here’s the turning point...instead of accepting the pattern, she tears it down. though she suffers psychologically but symbolically, she commits an act of defiance. She destroys the room. She rejects the rules and refuses to stay still. By the end, she is creeping over her fainted husband, literally stepping over patriarchy. That moment was chaotic and disturbing. Which resistance can often portray.  

The narrator’s descent is tragic but it’s also revealing. When women are denied freedom, denied creative expression, denied authority over their own bodies and minds, something will snap and by tearing down the wallpaper, she symbolically tears down the narrative that defines her as weak, fragile, and obedient. She chooses chaotic freedom over a controlled sanity. 

So no, the Yellow Wallpaper is not purely just a coincidental tragedy. It is about what happens when a system refuses to hear women until they scream and even then, calls the scream insanity. Sometimes the reality of an acceptable cry for help is blocked tearing the pattern down is the only real way out. 

The Crisis That Breaks Character.

 When I read the story poison by Roald Dahl I questioned the title, Why the use of the word poison what impact it is supposed to leave the readers with. Was it the fact that the snake was venomous? Or maybe it was the chloroform the Dahl was referring to? But then it hit me like a truck. Oh, it was the sudden slip of Harry’s character towards the end. His behavior was sudden, sharp, and harmful, mimicking the effects of poison.  This made me want to dig deeper into the roles of prejudice, entitlement and power dynamics in people like Harry’s lives and how much pressure it takes for the surface to crack.  

In society one would think that times have evolved and that a person would accept another based on personality and morality but it would be ignorant of me or anyone else to think this, because in reality the human mind if far too cruel to simply accept a person for who they are.  

Yes, times have changed and yes, the world has evolved, but I find myself struggling to believe that people have changed. We are told in the short story that Dr Ganderbai was a small, Indian man and his main role was to help Harry get the snake off him without biting him and assisting if it did, but even though the dr did his job and waisted his time as there was no snake there he still became a victim to Harry’s racism.  

In these times prejudice was often accepted, and it was seen that a white man had more power and superiority over people of colour but as times have changed these views have been publicly deemed as unacceptable. This is why people know it is important to wear a high mask, shielding the world from their true views. White people who previously has undeserved power teach their children to hate other race groups by introducing prejudice terms and making them feel entitled to an authority they are not owed  

To keep the facade up people, hide their true feelings to make themselves seem respectable, but the question always will be: To what extent does a person need to be pushed for that mask to crack? It is honestly impossible to say... it varies from person to person, but one thing that is clear is when a person of a different race group threatens a masked individual intellectually it won't take long for that mask to falter. Even if it's just a dent. 

Now that's an ending!

 My mouth is still hanging open. What do you mean, it was his brother!? My head is buzzing with so many questions about O’Flaherty’s story ‘The Sniper’. Most of all I want to know how the Republican sniper felt in that moment he realized he had killed his brother and if it has changed his perception on war or just life in general.  

 

This story showed me just how important a twist ending is, yes without the ending it made for an interesting story, but that ending tied everything together perfectly with a bright red bow! The twist not only made it more interesting for me as the reader, but it also reminds us of reality and how not every ending can be picture perfect. It reminds us that video games really are just games and movies are made purely for entertainment and the violence that they depict isn't how things are in the real world  

 

These games and movies often portray brutality and war as something that is cool and impressive, and the news portrays it as a casual thing that just happens all the time. This view makes people lose their humanity and compassion. People lose their lives daily and are simply forgotten because people don't take these issues seriously anymore. War isn't seen as something that tragically happens from time to time but is rather a glorified act that people encourage. When backtracking to the republican sniper staring into the face of his dead brother it helps us realize that he had gotten to use to casual death, making the victim his brother would have made him question if his acts have truly been heroic or if that was an excuse to glorify his actions.  

 

The power of twist endings should be spoken about more often. Why? Because I know for a fact, none of this would have even been a thought in my head when reading this story if not for the ending. This story needs to reach more people, especially in times like this when violence and war have become so normalized in everyday life. 

The Little Match-Seller is not gone.

 Today I read one of the saddest little stories, it pulled at my heart string the same way it would if I read an article about a child who was left orphaned or their slim little body being covered with blue and purple bruises instead of getting to experience what it's like to roll down a grassy hill on a warm summers evening. This made me ask myself a question, why did it make me feel this way? 

The story I'm referring to is 'The Little Match-seller' by Hans Christian Anderson which follows the story of a little girl left out in the cold with nothing but a box of matches to keep her warm fearing to go home without any profit incase her father would harm her. This story was published all the way back in 1846, but it still has much relevance in society today just not in the same way that it did all those years ago. 

In the story, the little girl isn't directly harmed by anyone however throughout the time that the child spent outside she almost got knocked over by two carriages and was never offered a single thing by anyone crossing by. Not food, not water, not warm clothes or a place to rest eventually resulting in her death. This represents the countless children who have no home to run home to when the streetlights turn on and are instead forced to make themselves comfortable on a suitable grass patch to sleep on with no warmth other than the clothes on their back. 

 Society offers these helpless children absolutely nothing not even a thought as you pass them on the street or the leftovers from their dinner that they'll land up throwing away anyway, every child deserves a loving home with a fresh cooked meal to fill them before they close their eyes for the night, just how the little girl didn't deserve to be ignored by all those people who passed her in the streets without a worry in the world to self-absorbed with their own lives to notice the poor child next to them. 

I couldn't even begin to imagine what these poor children must be feeling other than being scared, hopeless and alone. The idea that society has the capability to be so harsh on the purest souls on earth is disheartening, and it makes me question the idea of humanity entirely. 

Another main reason this story is deeply heart breaking is because it lightly touches on the topic of child abuse which is now more than ever a serious issue. Abuse on its own is already a harsh reality that no one should have to endure, so the fact that innocent children who are dependent on others for their development and well-being are being harmed by their own parents is mortifying. This is represented when the little girl is too afraid to go home because her father would beat her. Child abuse is often overlooked because as long as a child is covered by a roof, they must be okay, right? WRONG.  

Society chooses to ignore a large reason that children land up homeless is because they'd rather be sleeping on the cold cement or under busy bridges than be hurt by the people they know should be loving them the most. This short story by Hans Christian Anderson did exactly what it was supposed to do to me and everyone else who read it. It made me reconsider small aspects of life and made me think about all the young children who don't get the same privileges I and many others do, like going to sleep in a warm bed and being able to wake up and get a private education. I hope this story reaches out to other people as it did for me and encourages them to take action even if it is as small as just writing a blog.