“Hundreds of us – all the shadow children I could track down – are going to march on the Government in protest. We’ll go right to the president’s house. We won’t leave them alone until they give us the same rights everybody else has.” – Among the Hidden
In July 1942, during the Nazi persecution of Jews in Europe, a 13-year-old girl, Anne Frank, and her family disappeared behind a bookcase and began living their lives in secret. Abetted by friends, the Franks survived for two years before the Gestapo, tipped off by a relative of one of their benefactors, arrested the family, and sent them to a concentration camp. Hiding was the only option available for Jews who were relentlessly hunted during the extraordinary genocide by the Nazis and their sympathizers. By the end of WWII, over six million Jews would be dead.
In Margaret Peterson Haddix’s 1998 book, “Among the Hidden”, Haddix begins her Shadow Children series with a story about a country suffering under a totalitarian government, brought on by food shortages resulting from drought. First in a series of seven stories, Luke, the protagonist, is a mere child of 12 when his fight for freedom begins. Within a year, he will lead the resistance for illegal third children born under draconian laws that banned their existence. Appropriate for children ages 9-12, Haddix’s opening volume won best book for young adults from the American Library Association in its year of publication.
The story begins with famine and drought conditions made worse by the central planning of an authoritarian government bent on population control. Aiming to rid the country of illegally born children, the regime blames the nation’s lack of food and ongoing recession on these illegal offspring and the people who support them. Without providing a specific location or era for the story, Haddix suggests that what happened to these citizens could happen anywhere and at any time. Indeed, it already had.
Like China’s one-child policy, the totalitarian government in Haddix’s fictional book implemented a harsh two-child law to limit family size due to an environmental catastrophe, applying fines and imprisonment for violators. In Communist China, the birth control project began in 1980 and continued for 35 years until 2015, when restrictions were finally lifted. While the project prevented an estimated 400 million births, other problems ensued. Women were regularly subjected to forced sterilizations and abortions against their will, while government planners monitored women’s menstrual cycles and required IUD use for families that had already met their quota. Parents of excess children were demoted or fired from their jobs, fined, and required to pay higher prices for food. Children who survived, faced education and work barriers, as they were considered undocumented.
Both the totalitarian government in the book, and China, planned their economies by rationing food after seizing control of its production and distribution, leading to even worse outcomes. Not just through incompetence, but by deliberate evil, the government allocated food based on compliance. At times food was allowed to rot so people would starve, knowing that hungry people are easier to control. And like the green movement of today, Haddix’s government would also recommend a shift to vegetarianism as raising animals required too much land.
There were three classes of people in Haddix’s tale: the government, the wealthy barons, who used bribery to obtain favors, and the majority who subsided in poverty. Unsurprisingly, there were no signs of famine in the homes of the barons. And as is so often the case, government officials had no limits and were the ones most likely to break existing rules without repercussion, while police were rewarded handsomely for catching violators. Those identified as dissidents were subject to constant attacks and abuse. Labeled enemies of the people, they were deliberately pursued to serve as examples for the rest of society. Third child activism was borne when those in the shadows united, daring to have their voices heard.
Modern governments are keen to pacify their people with the proverbial bread and circuses. With their bellies full and their leisure time occupied, their ongoing dependency causes them to forget about their freedoms. And while physical hiding is no longer a necessity in much of the world today, the need to conceal one’s opinions against prevailing dogmas has created a new form of oppression.
Every human has a right to not just survive but thrive. History is a great teacher. We must never repeat the sins of the past.
Comments