This week we talked a lot about gender and the portrayal of gender in “The Caves of Steel”. Really the only female character in the novel is Jessie and she is portrayed as a very bitter, weak and hysterical woman. She is constantly talked down to by her husband and I found myself becoming increasingly frustrated with her throughout the book. I just wanted her to stand up to her husband and say “No. tell me what is going on. “. Elijah is so good as just telling her everything is fine and hanging up the phone before she can say any more. As I talked about this with the people around me in class on Thursday, they brought up a very good point: it is not Jessie’s fault that she is so submissive, it is simply a product of the society that she is in. She does not know any better and you can’t act in someway you have never heard about or seen. She does not realize that she possibly has the option to stand up to her husband, or anyone as a matter of fact, and make the female voice heard in this society.
Going off of that point, for that reason, I do not think that Jessie should be prosecuted for any of her actions in the novel. She did attend meetings and become a member of the medievalist club but she never did anything wrong. It is not like in her spare time she decided to go out and destroy robots or intentionally hurt Daneel. She simply attended meetings where she was able to talk about her point of view and listen to others talk about theirs. Once again she just grew up in this society and she has an opinion and joined a club that shares that same opinion. There is no crime in having an opinion. She very much encompasses New York City as a whole where she herself is acting as a robot. She just goes through the motions of her life and depends on all this processed food and fake air. Theres nothing real or organic about the people of New York or the resources they use, and I feel that Jessie is a great character that encompasses all of this.