Mistreatment of Lennie

The argument

While George is Lennie's best friend, he still mistreats him a great deal, and the fact that the mistreatment comes from the person closest to him is what makes it evidence of prejudice rather than mere unkindness. George often speaks to Lennie about how much easier and better his life would be if he did not have to take care of him. He also admits to playing hurtful pranks on Lennie in the past, which would often cause Lennie to be injured, or cause him to do something ridiculous. And George belittles Lennie by expressing his relief that they are not related — a remark that treats the connection between them as a burden accidentally acquired rather than a bond chosen. George does not fully understand Lennie's disability, which is why he falls into the pattern of mocking and belittling him. The point is not that George is cruel by nature; it is that in the absence of any framework for understanding how Lennie's mind works, George falls back on the only interpretation available to him, which is that Lennie is an obstacle. This also shows that other characters define Lennie as a product of his disability rather than as a person who has one, and that habit of definition promotes a culture of misunderstanding that extends well beyond George. Some view Lennie as a child-like, harmless man, while others view him as a dangerous and unintelligent man. Both readings are prejudices in the strict sense: each is a judgement formed in advance of any attempt to know him, and each denies him the standing to be understood on his own terms. The two are also the same error in opposite directions, since a man who is only ever seen as harmless will not be watched, and a man who is only ever seen as dangerous will not be helped. These two views, and the ways in which those on the farm do not seek to fully understand him, lead to his isolation and to the eventual killing of Curley's wife — a tragedy produced by misunderstanding, which is why Of Mice and Men is a novel about prejudice.

Premises

Counter-arguments

George's treatment of Lennie is better read through the novel's dominant themes of friendship, loneliness and the doomed dream than as prejudice. His sharpness coexists with real devotion — he travels with Lennie, protects him, and the book frames his final act as an agonising mercy born of love, not bigotry. Reading their bond as 'mistreatment' mistakes affectionate exasperation for prejudice. The clearer instances of prejudice in the novel attach to Crooks' race, Curley's wife's gender and Candy's age; prejudice is certainly a theme, but the George–Lennie relationship argues most strongly for friendship.

Rejecting the premises

[Rejecting P1] George's harshness sits alongside loyalty and self-sacrifice, so it reflects the strain of a loving friendship rather than prejudice against Lennie's disability.