The Hunger Games "Conspiracy"

I'm an elementary teacher, and I work with gifted kids. When the Twilight series came out all of my 5th graders were reading it and my son (in 6th grade at the time) wanted to read it, so I read them to see what all the fuss was about. Yawn. I am not a fan.

But with The Hunger Games, I can say that this is truly a fantastic series. It's well written fiction, and I read the entire trilogy in one weekend because I couldn't put it down. Now my 12 year old is reading it, and he HATES to read. He resisted reading it, but once he started, he was hooked.

So to those of you who are avoiding it just because it is "popular", you should give it a try. Yes, there is violence, but overall it is a heartwarming story of good overcoming evil.

I can't WAIT to see the movie. I'm not enough of a night owl to brave the midnight showing, but my son is upstairs right now racing to finish it by tomorrow so we can go to see the movie tomorrow night.

Sometimes things just aren't a conspiracy...

reply to post by Nephlim


again not a popular book compared to hunger games.

Originally posted by ImmortalThought
reply to post by Nephlim

 

again not a popular book compared to hunger games.

actually organic gardening books are definately the most popular gardening books, and gardening books do get bought alot. definately not as popular as hunger games but that is a very weak argument. ur saying the government controls all books, now your saying they only control popular books..
the government has no control over what is a popular book. hunger games the book became popular because it is an extremely well written book. it is a work of art. the government can not pay someone to write something that good. no one can.

i don't like admitting this, i've read probabbly 4000ish books, off the top of my head. use to be a book a day now i'm more around 3 or four a week.
hunger games is one of the best books ive ever read and the only book that has made me cry. it is the only book i own two copies of. i don't know why. its that good. read it. don't give in to what others say. form your own opinion. don't be lead like the masses.

and of course it is like other books in some ways because with the millions of books out there i can't think of an original book i've read ever. Even stephen hawkings the universe in a nutshell has ideas that have been expounded in countless books.
if anything it is original in that i can only think of one other book similar(in some ways to it)
the only people who are saying it is exactly like battle royale haven't actually read the hunger games if you look at their post. it has similarities yes.

I remember when Battle Royale came out, people were saying it just ripped off other movies with similar plots.

The Running Man with Arnold Schwarzenegger, being one.

It's not really a new idea; forcing people to kill each other for entertainment.

I don't think that lowering our vibrations is going to be what happens - in fact, to me, the book is more about class struggle and political struggle.
When I read it, I thought it could ignite Occupy again, and/or political dialogue again.

You've got this big tick government and the people are poor and starving and being made to sacrifice their kids.

I don't see how tptb would like it, or it could be good for them in any way.

I thought it was a good book. I wanted my son to read it but he thought b/c it had a strong female character, it was for girls. I'm going to drag him to see it though.

For whoever is interested ....
discussion ... are the 'hunger games' appropriate for teens?
Contains a few clips from the movie as well ...

reply to post by elliotmtl


The only conspiracy is that a group of people got together and figured out how to squeeze a love story into "The Long Walk" and twilightit up.

I know when everyone that talked about how great twilight was (pre craze) started telling me to read this that I wouldn't touch it. Then I find out it's just a rip off of one of my favorite Bachmann books and a COMPLETE rip off of Battle Royale.

I had never heard of it until clicking this thread.

Adblock FTW

Also, turn off your TV. Your brain will thank you.

I only caught the previews of this film and it isn't one that I can not understand why teenagers are so enthralled with it at all. This film strips away the very core of what it is to be human. It celebrates evil and it says that it is ok to forget about your morals and values and it says it is ok to watch humans die. I am not sure but, is it the government in control in this movie who is making these people fight for their lives?

This film is definitely another procedure of conditioning the human people into submission. I would not allow my child to watch it and If I had a child I would sit him or her down and explain how this film destroys morals and values that we were raised upon in order to survive.

The conspiracy in this film as I see it is conditioning the world for the way things will be in the future. That is why it is being promoted so heavily.

Also, are all those teenagers, who they show screaming their heads off toward the stars of this movie, paid to scream and act crazy like that? Have those teenagers ever seen these people before?

Seems like TPTB have bet again and this film is a winner.

I use the Internet every day, as it is a prime vehicle for my employment.

I have not been bombarded by advertisements for this film.






Adjust your ad-blocker.

Sounds to me like another slice of dystopian lit.

Except this book is geared toward teens, which I find interesting for several reasons. Mainly, the fact that teenagers have always been aware of these issues and books like these highlight something very real and primal that teens understand in their hearts.

Basically.......The world is a terribly cruel and vicious place and not everyone is going to be kind to you, mom or dad may not be able to protect you from the big, bad world and you must learn to fend for yourself, even under, especially under the most horrorific conditions.

Teens struggle with this reality, and it is a essential phase of psycho-social development for young people. This book sounds like it taps into this and exaggerates the fears of teens as they struggle to transition into adulthood. It also taps into the eternal hope of teens......namely that THEIR generation will be the generation that will CHANGE things......every generation thinks this when they are young.....

Truly there is nothing new under the sun........these are classic themes that humans have been fascinated by since people first began telling stories.

Books are considered classics or wildly popular only when they tap into a fundamental component of human nature, something that is timeless and crosses all boundaries and divisions.....

Seems to me that is why people are so hung up on the books.

The twilight books did this exact same thing except the fears they focused on were of a sexual nature. I hated the writing style of Stephanie Meyer.....I thought she could have made those stories so much more......her storytelling was mediocre at best IMO.

These books I plan on reading, but I am not rushing out to get them anytime soon.

As far as a conspiracy, I guess writers like Huxley, Orwell, C.S. Lewis, Burroughs, H.G. Wells, Burgess, and Philip K. Dick are all in on it because they have wriiten this type of lit for many years.

I think people write what the world around them reflects.....there is no conspiracy except the ones we create for ourselves.

Reply to post by elliotmtl

Thats because the people who are marketing this thing have had it planned for years everything was done to get it as much attention as possible. Fun fact, Lionsgate brought the rights to the film in 2009 and did things to boost book sales before the movie was even in production. In short, they are good at what they do.


Posted Via ATS Mobile: m.abovetopsecret.com

Originally posted by Nephlim
Hunger games is a story of REbellioN against a CORRUPT GOVERNMENT!!!! it is one of the most well written and emotional young adult books. the language is simple enough for a 10 year old to read but it is still a good book. It is on the surface very similar to battle royale but if you actually read the book it is nothing like Battle royale.( haven't watched the movie)

has anyone actually read the series that so easily compares it to battle royale? they overthrow the corrupt government because of the forced hunger games, so it ends up being vastly different.

so no conspiracy theory.

Im sorry, but ive read this book, and if this is what passes as a great book in literary terms for our younger generations, then its no wonder we are seeing the dumbing down that we are seeing now......

People need to be reading more of the old books that require you to think more , that require you to use more imagination and critical thinking..........

There are plenty of old literary masterpieces out there, that teach volumes more then some of this garbage floating around out there our teens our reading.......

We dont need books simple enough 10 year olds can read it, thats part of the problem.............we need material that challenges them

reply to post by elliotmtl


Oh goody, a new conspiracy.

I was getting bored with the same old end of the world ones.

On the other hand it could just be something called advertising.

A few points....

-Some of the "ads" for this film were not in the form of advertisements and thus would not be blocked by an ad blocker. Like the article on the Weather Channel website. What on earth does this film have to do with the freaking weather? lol.

-I'm an avid reader and I didn't think this book was very well written. It's better than Twilight but that's about all. The story is cliche and predictable, and time it could have used for deeper character development and exploring its own moral paradoxes, is instead used for gruesome violence. I'm highly empathetic and some of the painful images in this book will stick with me for the rest of my life. If that's what "well-written" means to some people, then fine, it was, from that point of view. But I read novels expecting them to be art, expecting them to ask questions about life and people and situations...not violence porn set in a clearly unoriginal fantasy world.

-How the kid characters in the story handle the situation is part of what disturbs me about the message being trumpeted. Why do the kids go along with this? Reading the first book, the whole time I'm expecting the kids to band together and rise up and at least TRY to escape the arena together. Instead, they willingly consent to kill each other, even our "hero" characters, seemingly without a pang of conscience, and the reader is made to feel as if its ok because #1) we have no choice and #2) the fellow combatants we're killing are bigger and stronger than "us" so our killing is in self-defense and thus justified.

-Anyone can publish a book these days, but absolutely no one can control the success of their book. It is utterly undeniable (IMO, from seeing how the industry works) that "they" control the perceived popularity of books. Who "they" are, is another question entirely. "They" could simply be the bigshots of the publishing industry, having no connection to a wider conspiracy to control our entertainment and media. But they are certainly in control. There are no "grassroots" publishing successes, there is simply the appearance of such. Who do you think decides what books are put in the front of the bookstore? Who do you think decides what books will be required reading in school and library and literacy programs? How do you think Harry Potter and Twilight became popular, did it just "happen" or was it because of deliberate prime placement in the bookstores, advertising focus (at the expense of every other book) by the publishers, and media coverage over the "controversies"? This is how it works: they say they are putting a book in front of your face because its popular, but in reality, it becomes popular because they repeatedly put it in front of your face to make it popular.

I understand why this story is appealing to many people, it's the classic little-band-of-rebels versus evil-empire story that is always being promoted in mainstream entertainment. While you're in the world of the story, it makes you feel like you're part of something important and portentious and heroic. It gives you the powerful cathartic effect of getting to the end and realizing that you survived, that you (and/or your friend(s)) are the only ones that survived, and for that you feel good even though everyone else died. And it's the fact that we the audience feel good about our survival, at the expense of the lack of survival of everyone else, that disturbs me.

reminds me of that scene in resident evil: apocalypse when the t-virus was taken away from the doctor who invented it to cure his daughter's disabilities, only to be turned into a doomsday device that decimated humanity.

i think the author was trying to accomplish 2 things: to warn the masses of what may happen if we don't stand up for ourselves, and also to conjure the spirit of "righteous rebellion" in us.

but the MSM took it away from her and turned it into a powerful piece of predictive programming propaganda (sorry for all the p-words), to get us ready and accepting of what they want to do to us.

reply to post by elliotmtl


Eliot

Thanks for responding, I am interested in what you wrote.

You mentioned how the kids go along with murdering the other kids, as if they had no conscience at all.....

But, at the end this changes right? The kids realize they are pawns in a game and they develop a conscience and decide to go after those that created the game.

So, could it be argued that these kids represent a transition of a child from a "unaware" individual who questions nothing and simply "goes along" with what ever society says, because it is tradition, or socially acceptable.

They go along with "survival of the fittest" but in the end realize it does not have to be that way. They grow as people and transition from a state of "unawareness" like sheeple, to realizing a "deeper truth".

They experience terrible suffering in this transition, which to me is the crux of the entire book....the amount of suffering is the catalyst for their change and rebellion.

I have not read the books, but my friend has and I have heard about them from her, and we have discussed them several times.

Do you think this is a possible interpretation of the story?

reply to post by g146541


On a serious note as I do not truly believe in conspiracies to the extreme some people do, I am quite concerned abouth the world we live in and how it is on a fast track to moral and economical decay. Everything we valued once is under attack or under control. If you haven't noticed but food supplies are increasing in cost, fuel is at an all time high, ammunition once common and plentiful is now in shorter supply. It seems the control is gradually being tightened. My suggestion is to protect yourself, buy a gun even if you despise them. If society breaksdown those who cannot protect themselves will be the first to go. I am not a nut, but too many things do not make sense, that feeling in the pit of my stomach gets abit stronger everyday.

reply to post by Mijamija


I only read the first book, and at least for the next couple of years, every non-reader who is exposed to the story through this film will only experience the first story, so I am analyzing it from that point of view. There is no character transition in the first book/film.

However, from what I have heard about how the story works out over the course of the trilogy, you may very well be correct. I think the author had a positive intent and message, most of them do. I would only wonder what the catalyst of suffering ends up being a catalyst for. Rebellion against an oppressive government, in and of itself, is not necessarily a good thing. You regularly hear about African nations rebelling against a dictator only to have the new rebel government behave just as badly as the old one.

From a spiritual perspective I think internal, heart rebellion (committing to behave lovingly towards both your oppressors and your fellow oppressees) is a better lesson to learn than external, violent rebellion. That is what I wish stories like The Hunger Games would show. In fact....

Originally posted by DOLCOTT
It seems the control is gradually being tightened. My suggestion is to protect yourself, buy a gun even if you despise them. If society breaksdown those who cannot protect themselves will be the first to go.

...wouldn't it really be easier and better to simply let yourself be one of the first to go? Unless you are an atheistic/agnostic, wouldn't it be preferable to submit to being killed, take the first flight back to your heavenly home, rather than continuing to be forced to play the animalistic game of survival?

What would have happened if Katniss just stood there, never picked up a weapon, let them kill her if they really wanted to? Worst case scenario: she gets her death over with right away and goes home without having anyone else's blood on her hands. Best case scenario: the other 23 kids get the message and lay down their weapons and just like that, the control matrix is broken without a drop of blood being shed.

TPTB can only control you by making you afraid of things.
If you're afraid of nothing, not even death, you win.

I think anyone avoiding The Hunger Games is ridiculous. If anything, you would think the government would be the ones trying to PREVENT people from seeing it and if someone is pushing it on us, it is another entity.

For those of you who compare the story to Battle Royale, I get the comparison, but it is a ridiculous one and it is hastily made by whiners of Japanese film fans. The only similarities it shares is a life and death tournament between kids. THAT IS IT.

*Possible spoilers below.*

Does anyone else here know that The Hunger Games is the opening book to a trilogy of books that is about a revolution taking down a corrupted government, a government that is eerily similar to ours in many aspects? I don't want to spoil the story for anyone, but after the first book, the series becomes anything other than a "Battle Royale" rip off as some people like to throw around, but a look at hope for a revolution taking place in a society where nearly all hope is lost and government has supreme control over the masses, yet most of the people are too blind to even see it.

It goes to show that all it takes is one symbol of hope to rally the people behind it and lead an uprising to attempt to take down that government, and, that when pushed into a corner, a group in power will stop at nothing to try to maintain that power.

Not only that but it shows that even those who seem to be fighting for a better future and perhaps in the guise of freedom, may in fact only be searching to gain their own foothold into power and become their own leaders of tyranny in the place of the machine they work to take down.

In the end, the series does not have a happy ending. It is very bitter sweet and disheartening because it is a picture of our world. It is a picture of the United States today. Does the government choose 2 kids from each state to go off and kill themselves in tribute each year? No. But it manages to convince hundreds to thousands of them to go off and get themselves killed so that the people in the "capital" can live lives of luxury. It convinces the lower class people to continue to work to try to get a meager life while the pompous consumers at the top look down upon us and reap the wares of our work.

Hopefully, people can look at The Hunger Games as a little bit more than just some "scholastic violence fest" and realize the true literary value behind it, especially in today's modern world.