Peeta and the rebellion

January 16, 2013

Here are my ~~unsolicited~~ thoughts on why Peeta is as much of a rebel as anyone else in the books, if not even more. Peeta has been discussed, and to an extent has been defended, many times on how he is also strong and brave, but little on how he is a rebel or as someone who has contributed significantly towards the rebellion, especially compared to Katniss and Gale in Mockingjay.

(warning: it’s long, & sorry for any typos)

While Peeta might not be shouting out his aggression against the Capitol in the woods or choosing to have weapons on his hands and use them to fight in the war as his first recourse, he was still very much a rebel, and a very influential and effective one at that. With his words and his examples, whether big or small, obvious or subtle, he fought against Snow’s regime and Panem’s way of life.

In a society that actively encourages him to conform, to follow the rules, and to not think for himself, he instead challenged those norms and institutions. He followed his heart and did what he thought was right, even if they were against the rules.

His first act of rebellion was against his mother, his first direct contact to an authority. He gave bread to a starving young Seam girl on the verge of death, knowing he would face wrath from it from his mother, even if he also knew he would not get anything in return from Katniss. He saw a person in need and instinctively broke the rules to help her, even if he gets punished for it in the process.

His second act of rebellion was he dared to love Katniss. A Merchant boy falling for a Seam girl? Not only that’s scandalous, it’s against every social norm in District 12. Not just for any Seam girl also, the Seam girl whose parents also broke those social norms. Breaking away from societal norms is a big deal. Even in our own society today, people get harmed, shamed, condemned, ostracized, killed - you name it -when they deviate from society’s traditions and culture. Mrs. Everdeen was essentially abandoned by her family and her friends when she chose the Seam and shunned for life. No one from her family reached out to her and her children when Mr. Everdeen died.

With Peeta, not only he dared to love Katniss, he declared his love not just to his friends, or to his parents, or to the entire District 12, which would have been enough to make his life even more miserable, he did it in front of all of Panem, and under the roof of Panem’s highest authority. Panem, a nation that reinforces segregation, division among classes, actively separates the winners from the losers, and punishes anyone who crosses the lines the Capitol draws. And again, not knowing if the girl he loves also loves him back, or scared of possible retribution, risking to make his fate in the games even more miserable.

Analyzing this, his declaration of love could also be interpreted as a declaration of rebellion. In hindsight, his example became the first national call for people to reach across differences, unite with each other and stand by one another to people different from them not just those who are like them; because that was the only way they could break the system and change the game: together. That’s why I think Haymitch encouraged him to do it. As he said, it was the perfect or right touch of rebellion. Haymitch knew what a simple declaration of love, in a society of indifference, could spark.

In the movie, it showed that Rue’s death sparked the beginning of the rebellion in the districts and after Haymitch suggested the star-crossed lovers angle as a distraction for the mob to Seneca. Seneca then agreed to it, which was condoned by Snow. But in the book, the rules of the game were changed because of Peeta. It started during his interview with Ceasar and then his actions during the first half of the games. Not to discredit Rue’s death & Katniss’ actions in relation to her death, it was certainly a part of all of it, but Rue was not the first 12 year old to die in the Games, and Katniss might not have done what she done for Rue if it weren’t also for what Peeta said to her the night before about not being a piece in their games.

When he said that he wants to show them they didn’t own him, he followed through. During the interview, he did not just make a declaration of unrequited love that even the capitol people can relate to, as Katniss said, but Peeta shattered the rose-colored glass of the Hunger Games for the Capitol people. He made the Capitol people empathize with the tributes, made them root for the underdog. For the first time, Capitol people got to realize how horrible the Games can be and the tributes are not just celebrities for their entertainment, they’re real human beings capable of love & compassion.

This is why I don’t buy the idea presented in the movie that Snow reluctantly agreed to Seneca’s idea. I believe Snow micromanages the Games and does not leave it up to the Gamemakers to decide how the Games go. Allowing two winners from the same district had to be Snow’s idea because he had to give in to the cries of the Capitol people. He didn’t want them turning against him and sympathizing with the districts. He did not want to fully burst the “panem et circenses” bubble he had the Capitol people in.

One or two people rebelling against the Capitol is easy to control, as the likes of Lavina. But it would be very difficult contain all of the Capitol, and once the district people realizes that the Capitol citizens sympathize with them, they’ll be able to differentiate them from the tyranny of Snow’s Regime (like Katniss did with her prep team and stylists). If Capitol people and District people unite, then it’s game over for Snow. That’s why Snow had to change the rules in favor of the District 12 tributes, and Peeta played a large part in it, and this was gravely dismissed in the movie.

This is not to say that Peeta did not really love Katniss, nor he had a hidden agenda. He obviously loved Katniss, but this just goes to show that he was already a rebel by nature. Like Katniss, he was showing up the Capitol without being aware of it, at least up until after his speech in District 11. But even after he knew his actions were inciting a rebellion, did it stop him from going against the Capitol? No. At any point, Peeta could have thrown Katniss under the bus to save himself. Why couldn’t he? The girl doesn’t love him and in his mind she loved another, and she was putting his life and the lives of other people in danger. He could easily had been vindictive about it, but he didn’t. He stood by her side and played the part, but he still concluded that they might have been wrong to subdue the districts.

In Catching Fire, instead of standing back and let Gale get whipped to death, he stood in front of Thread and challenged him that if wants Gale dead, Thread would also have to go through him first. Gale, the guy who he is not even remotely friends with, the guy who he thought has Katniss’ affections. So why did he? Because he knew Gale didn’t deserved to be whipped, and Peeta never shun away from going against what is wrong and trying to help the helpless when he knew he can, regardless of how he feels about the person.

By volunteering for Haymitch for the Quell, even if expected, was still an act of rebellion. If Snow ever thought that this Quell reaping would finally break the trio apart, especially Peeta and Katniss, Peeta have proven him wrong.

By telling Panem that he married Katniss and they were expecting a baby, he wasn’t just trying to win advantage in the Games, he was defying the Capitol again. By saying he married Katniss already, he went against the Capitol wishes to dictate their marriage, their fate. By implying that Katniss is pregnant, he again showed how barbaric the Games are to the Capitol people. Not just to the districts, the Capitol people! He made them angry enough to want to do something, even if they did not know what to do.

This parallels his first interview, and not just in the obvious ways. Peeta recognized that it was Snow’s regime that was evil, not the entire Capitol. District people can protest as much as they want, but Peeta, in my view, knew that if there really was a growing rebellion, they could be more successful if they had the Capitol people on their side to help them overthrow Snow’s government (this was my biggest frustration in Mockingjay and where I had hoped things had happened differently, because Peeta, with Katniss, was so close to inciting a people’s revolution, not a civil war. They could have overthrown Snow’s regime without District 13, and without the same amount of bloodshed. But then again, if Collins didn’t go with the route she did, she won’t be able to show her readers what the nature of war is).

In Mockingjay, the culmination of Peeta’s rebellious actions were reflected in how Katniss’ conducted herself as the Mockingjay. And meanwhile, Peeta wasn’t stupid, he knew he was a Prisoner of War right after the Quell. He did not really know what happened to Katniss or her involvement in the rebellion. All he had to hold on to was that she was still alive, and that they had promised not to hide anything from each other after the events in District 11 during the Victory Tour. If Katniss knew anything about the rebellion, she would have told him.

So during his interview with Ceasar, despite repercussions, he told the entire Panem what the games were really like, and how horrible it was to kill a person. He came to Katniss’ defense to keep her alive, wherever she truly might be. He agreed to calling for a ceasefire after Ceasar mentioned it first, because maybe that’s what supposed to be the conclusion of the interview Snow wanted him to do and despite everything, he did not want to get Ceasar in trouble. But I think it is also could be because Ceasar did not really understood his feelings towards the war when he asked, especially when Peeta also had a condescending tone when he agreed to the ceasefire.

People will say Peeta was then being a pacifist or even impartial, not a rebel. But whether he was or not, being a pacifist did not exempt people from war. He in fact, as pointed out earlier, was a POW! Peeta did not readily advocate for violence and armed conflict, but he did not say that they had no reason to rebel against the Capitol. Katniss in fact, realized this and then agreed to be the Mockingjay.

So to that point, Peeta remains a rebel, because even if his call for a ceasefire was interpreted negatively by D13, people in the other districts still believed him to be on their side. That is because the people in the districts knew what a rebel Peeta truly is.

To top it all, despite days, WEEKS, of torture, he still chose to save the people who he never really knew and the people who he did know but could very well, in his mind, have already abandoned him.

Even when hijacked, Peeta continued to be a rebel. When he joined the Star Squad in the Capitol, he was a little bit better but not by much, he in fact had an episode that killed Mitchell, and felt deep remorse for it. However, he still made the most sense tactically, especially after Boggs died. He engaged Pollux and given him the trust and confidence to lead their way underground. He was also the only one able to think clearly while they were getting chased by the mutts (of course, right after, he broke down and Katniss kissed him to get him back). Katniss valued his opinion the most when she couldn’t decide what to do next.

Last and not the least, despite being the one who had lost and suffered the most among the surviving victors (yes, even more than Katniss imo), he still voted no for another Hunger Games. He never lost sight of what they were fighting for, til the very end. It took Katniss a while to make sense of them, but it was his words that Katniss realized to be the only thing that was true about the war, which made her vehemently refuse to no longer be a piece of anyone’s Games. A true rebel with a cause, not just someone fighting the power just for the sake of being against those in power.

So yeah, I can probably go on and on (and I already have), but Peeta is a rebel, even if not in the most obvious ways all the time. He was fighting for Panem also, not just Katniss. He did not give up everything to simply win her love, but he was also fighting for something that was bigger than him and Katniss. He was the one with the foresight to think about Panem’s future, not just what needs to be accomplished at the moment with the war. He always looked at the big picture, and did not get lost in the middle of it all. He is by no means perfect and did not always get everything right, but he deserves more credit in his part in the rebellion, a rebellion that might have not been ignited without him.

12:50am | URL: https://tmblr.co/Z3guZvbtpv2L
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(Notes: 170)