Casualties Of Love & War
“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that,” is a very powerful quote told by Martin Luther King. In this essay, I will express how parental views can often be different than their children’s views. This can often be; political views, racial aspects, gender-neutral agreements, friendships etc. An independent thinking person may face challenges in life but they usually are aided by there parents, however, if there ego’s and opinions clash the result may be ruinous for their relationship. In the movie, Maria and her father fought numerous times, she decided to see P. K when her father disobeyed, she taught an all Native school and she had a huge argument that leads to her death for something that she believed in.
During a scene in the movie, P. K was in a high school boxing match with a fellow rival. Out of the corner of his eye, P. K saw Maria glancing at him and immediately fell in love, after the game the two of them confronted each other and wanted to start seeing each other but; her father disapproved. Maria instead disobeyed her father’s wishes and began to see P. K once again. During this endeavor, Maria decided to follow P. K on his journey of being the so-called “Rainmaker. ” A fictional character name was given to P. K by Gill Peet; which stands for uniting the tribes to stand and to fight the Afrikaner government. Moving on, Maria, P. K, and Hoppie decided to make a school for the Natives. This was deemed illegal and can put all 3 of them (including the school) at risk including her future with her father. Furthermore, during a dinner with another family, Maria and her father started arguing. Her father was explaining to the people at the dinner table that he was running for cabinet and his main goal was to cause apartheid in South Africa. Maria decided to argue with her father saying it was unfair to the Natives to suffer for such a stupid action/mistake.
The two of them began to cause a riot which led to Maria storming out of the house and to meet up with P. K at the school. Later that night police officers stormed into the school trying to arrest P. K and while the huge fight was occurring, Maria was running towards P. K and a police officer swung at him but instead hitting P. K (SPOILERS) the police officer hit Maria in the forehead which leads to her death on the spot. Imagine the guilt her father had when he heard the terrible news that his baby girl died for what he thought was a simple argument they had over dinner. In conclusion, life is too short, Maria died for what she believed at such a young age. She died for something that she thought was fair and right, she tried to give the Natives the chance to learn English, to be educated. But cruel parents, governments and laws basically killed her. As a teenager we often get misguided, that could be from our parents, friends, role models etc. They expect us to follow in their footsteps but we shouldn’t, we have to be who we are and believe in ourselves even if it ends up killing us.
