NCHS AP English Language

Pawn Chp 3 essay- lisa elizondo-author blogger-emily

A standard explanation for many people’s wrong actions is that someone else made them do it. Most of the time it is because they simply do not want to take responsibility for their actions, but other times there is a legitimate reason.
Some people are made to believe a certain idea (brainwashing) and sometimes people are threatened. However, in the case of Byron de la Beckwith, neither is true.
Bob Dylan tries to convince listeners of “Only a Pawn” that Beckwith cannot be held accountable for his actions because of the stress of being in two social groups, the “in group” and the “out group”. There is so much pressure surrounding his state between the two that he is not able to think clearly, and therefore is impaired in some way.
Bob Dylan characterizes this by saying that there is no distinction between Beckwith and the weapon he used to murder NAACP leader Medgar Evers. He was, instead, a pawn that the white supremacist movement used to make their point. Being a poor white man, Beckwith longed to avoid the stigma of the “out group”, and instead build on the race and gender that he shared with such white organizations as the Ku Klux Klan. However, I do not believe that this argument is strong enough to take away Beckwith’s accountability for his act of murder. Take for example the trial of Houston housewife Andrea Yates.
It was found that she was depressed, and therefore legitimately mentally impaired when she murdered her children. This theory was also upheld in the justice system when she was ruled not guilty by reason of insanity. It was still agreed upon that she committed the murders, but because of her mental state, she technically cannot be held accountable.
This is not the case with Beckwith, however. To our knowledge, he was never found legitimately mentally impaired in any way. He may have carried some emotional conflicts, but that does not justify him being a “pawn” in the murder of Medgar Evers.
It simply makes him someone who let his emotions get the best of him and acted irrationally. Therefore, Byron de la Beckwith is accountable for his actions in the death of Medgar Evers, and should be treated in such a way.

posted by NCHS AP English Language III @ 9:12 PM