" 'Because he's trash, that's why you can't play with him (Lee 225).' " This exposure to social prejudice struck Scout harder, because this time around, Atticus couldn't say, forget it. There was no one to tell her that it would be okay, the rest of the world may judge people by their social class and place in society, but we don't. When Aunt Alexandra leaves, Atticus and the children may not go by her social ideals, but Scout realized that this is the way much of her society thinks, and more innocence is lost by this revelation. .
When Atticus made his stand against the mob at the courthouse, Scout and Jem learned about some the group dynamics that affect many mobs and gangs; a different kind of dent. Scout knew Mr. Walter Cunningham to be a good man, one that her father approved of. Yet he was in the mob that was seeking to lynch Tom Robinson. As Atticus later explained to her, he was still a friend and a good person, but sometimes when you're in a group, you do things and make decisions that you wouldn't as an individual. " 'A mob's always made up of people, no matter what.Every mob in a Southern town is always made up of people you know.' " (Lee 157) A mob is simply a group of people that get carried away over an idea. It took nine-year-old Scout to bring that group of people to their senses, to realize what they were going to do in relation to their life. Until then, they had let the mob mentality carry them away, not once considering what was happening. Scout had been introduced to mobs, and !.
found that they could be even made up of friends she might otherwise consider level-headed and rational. .
Scout and Jem were surrounded by racism and prejudice as children, but until they matured more, they didn't see it for what it was. It was part of their environment at the time, and children don't question that. It was simply the way things were, and it wasn't challenged it until something enormously, obviously wrong occurred close to home.
