Stop the Silence!

Speak up

Sam Hamill’s essay made me think a lot about what really goes on in society. In “Necessity to Speak” Hamill wants issues to be put out in the open because silence can results in violence. In the essay Hamill says that someone once said that “a true poet is often faced with the difficult task of telling people what they already know and do not want to hear” (Hamill 547). This statement and the ideas that Hamill presents in the essay are so true. People see different forms of violence all around then but don’t speak up. Most of the time they think they shouldn’t speak up because it is not of their business, they don’t want to interfere with other people’s business. Not speaking out is pretty much like ignoring it. They don’t want to see what is going on around them so they ignore it or try to block it out.

Hamill also talks about how our society has set an acceptable level of violence. We promote going into the military where you are trained to kill. How parents use a certain level of violence to help discipline their children. Every time we turn on the television we have the chance of being exposed to violence that is within the set boundary. He asks how we expect to change this when we view a set level of it being alright. Allowing this level of violence to be alright can lead to more violence. When a belt is ok why wouldn’t a stick be alright? And if a stick is acceptable then what is to say that a bat wouldn’t be? Being abused as a child usually leads that child to grow up into an abuser. The go from being the victim to the executioner.

We hide our children from the truth about violence. By trying to hide our children from those truths we are ultimately helping people committee acts of violence. Poetry can be used to help end the silence and violence. People may not want to hear about the problems but we can’t keep ignoring them. We have to speak up about things we see. Being silent isn’t helping anyone.  


For more information on abuse and violence go here
For more information on Sam Hamill go here