Lorax and the Trees

In class, we began to watch the movie The Lorax. We are watching The Lorax because there are many examples that connect to our first unit of sociology.
The Lorax is based in the place called Thneedville. In Thneedville, there are no real trees. People use "blow up" trees. They like them because they don't require any work and they can change color according to the season. These trees in my opinion are Thneedvillians social construct of reality. Social construct of reality is what people define as real because of their background assumptions and life experiences. The people of Thneedville I believe have come to think that the "trees" are "real." Obviously the people know that the trees are fake but since almost all of them have never seen a real tree, they don't know what a real "tree" is and just assume that everybody has trees like they do. Ted, the main character is determined to find a real tree because a girl named Audrey, who Ted like, wants to make her happy. Ted risks his life in order to find out how he can get a tree. He disobeys Mr. O'hares (Man with all the power in Thneedville) order which were to not leave Thneedville (Barricaded in) and goes to see the Once-ler in order to find about what happened to the trees.
When Ted goes to see the Once-ler, the Once-ler tells Ted about what happened to the trees. As he tells him, the Once-ler mentioned a guy named the Lorax. The Lorax was there to protect the land, but especially the trees. When the Once-ler mentioned that he had chopped down the first tree and the Lorax was there to tell him to stop and he needed to preserve the trees. Here, the Lorax was being sociologically mindful. Sociological Mindfulness is to see and appreciate things unique qualities. The Lorax wanted to preserve the trees and saw the uniqueness in the trees.
Like the Lorax, there has been things in which I have tried to preserve, but in the end, I couldn't. Although this is a bit more extreme than the Loraxs situation, I am a dog lover. I love dogs. It breaks my heart when I see dogs in shelters and dogs that have been abused. I wish that I could adopt every single one but I know that is impossible. It doesnt matter how many dogs i adopt, there will always be dogs that don't get adopted and end up dying because of it.
When the Once-ler was cutting down the trees, he was not using his sociological imagination. Sociological Imagination is when one sees the connection between private concerns of an individual and important social issues. The Once-ler was using the trees to create sneeds. Sneeds were these things that could act as anything. As they became more popular, more trees needed to be cut down. In the end, all the trees had been cut down and all the animals had to leave. The Once-ler failed to see what his actions were causing to the environment around them.
Structural Functionalism is the idea that society is like a complex system that works together and everything is smooth. In the Lorax, a structural functionalist would see Thneedville as almost like a Utopia. Everybody works together in achieving a peaceful place and nobody fights. Although this is a movie, I don't believe this type of society is possible because in our world people disagree with others. In Thneedville, everyone get along to create this "happy place."
Conflict theory is the idea that in society, there arises problem and it really comes down to who has the power. In the Lorax, Mr. O'Hare is the richest man in Thneedvile and he has all the power. The people of Thneedville are almost under the control of Mr. O'Hares every word. In the end when Ted goes to plant the seed and people start to agree with him then once Mr. O'Hare says no, everybody agrees with him. A conflict theorist would see that Mr. O'hare has all the power and that's what I think our world is like today.