Letty's Short Story Dog Eat Dog
Letty’s Story
As children, people look at the world with unbiased views; their thoughts are not yet concrete in opinion. Young minds ripe for influence, children become easily shaped by factors around them. Generally, parents leave a greater impact on their children than any other thing in the child’s life. How parents speak, make decisions, and interact with one another has the potential to shape their child’s behavior and thoughts. While parental influence is essential for children to develop morals, opinions, and self awareness, in some cases parent involvement will hurt rather than help. Children who grow up with unhappy or harmful parents become negatively affected in a way that is displayed through their character, and affects them throughout life. Such is the case for Letty, a fictional character in Leslie What’s short story Dog Eat Dog. In this short scene, What gives the …show more content…
Seeing her mother abused by her father, Letty believed from the beginning that this was normal. Because her mother simply received that treatment, and passed her anger onto Letty, Letty’s views of the roles women and men play became warped. She does not understand how a good relationship should work, resulting in staying in her abusive one with Joshua. From the beginning of the scene, Letty’s gender plays an important part. She is stuck “babysitting” her parent’s pets, a stereotypical burden often taken on by women (lines 10-13). Her ‘knowledge’ of how a female-male dynamic works is incorrect, a product of her mother going through many partners, and her parent’s barely patched together love,
“She knew about hoses and fittings. Knew when plumber’s tape was enough, or when the female fitting needed a clean cut and a new male part, knew when the damages were too great and you had to chuck the whole thing” (lines
As children, people look at the world with unbiased views; their thoughts are not yet concrete in opinion. Young minds ripe for influence, children become easily shaped by factors around them. Generally, parents leave a greater impact on their children than any other thing in the child’s life. How parents speak, make decisions, and interact with one another has the potential to shape their child’s behavior and thoughts. While parental influence is essential for children to develop morals, opinions, and self awareness, in some cases parent involvement will hurt rather than help. Children who grow up with unhappy or harmful parents become negatively affected in a way that is displayed through their character, and affects them throughout life. Such is the case for Letty, a fictional character in Leslie What’s short story Dog Eat Dog. In this short scene, What gives the …show more content…
Seeing her mother abused by her father, Letty believed from the beginning that this was normal. Because her mother simply received that treatment, and passed her anger onto Letty, Letty’s views of the roles women and men play became warped. She does not understand how a good relationship should work, resulting in staying in her abusive one with Joshua. From the beginning of the scene, Letty’s gender plays an important part. She is stuck “babysitting” her parent’s pets, a stereotypical burden often taken on by women (lines 10-13). Her ‘knowledge’ of how a female-male dynamic works is incorrect, a product of her mother going through many partners, and her parent’s barely patched together love,
“She knew about hoses and fittings. Knew when plumber’s tape was enough, or when the female fitting needed a clean cut and a new male part, knew when the damages were too great and you had to chuck the whole thing” (lines