How would Hester's scarlet letter compare to some of the scarlet letters of today? Would Hester's act of adultery really be considered as bad as some of the other problems that occur in our world today? Hester's actions today wouldn't have received the same attention as they did back in her time. People today are much more accustomed to issues such as adultery because they constantly hear about it and have really just learn to deal with it in a normal every day sort of way. We still see many problems with the actions of people in our society today; it's just that we have many different and more severe problems in our world. Contemporary scarlet letters are more serious than the ones in the Scarlet Letter, written by Nathaniel Hawthorne, but still relate to what Hester experienced.
Adultery was the theme of The Scarlet Letter it was seen as one of the most awful and disrespectful acts that could be committed at that time. All people back then were fairly religious, and the church played a key role in their lives; it gave them a set of morals and rules they had to follow to live a happy, respectful, and fulfilling life. Whenever some one broke the laws and morals set by the church, as in the case of adultery, they were severely punished, because they went against morals and laws that were higher than government, they broke the law of God, which was more important to people back then than government. .
People today treat adultery very differently. The idea of God isn't as influential as it was back in the 1700's, because not everyone shares that belief in God; in the United States, there is a very mix of religions and spiritual backgrounds, and that diversity makes it hard to compose one correct set of morals based on religion. Therefore, acts such as adultery aren't punished so harshly, because everyone doesn't see it as being wrong.
Scarlet letters today have a direct correlation with breaking the law.
