The Fallacy of Composition is when someone assumes that what is true for the part is also true for the whole. In the story ‘Desiree’s Baby’ by Kate Chopin, Armand
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- The Fallacy of Composition is when someone assumes that what is true for the part is also true for the whole. In the story "Desiree's Baby" by Kate Chopin, Armand believes that because he is part white and part black, he must be completely black. He does not think about how he looks in comparison to other people, he only looks at himself. This causes him to judge Desiree based on her appearance, and he assumes that she is also black.
- Armand is not the only person in the story who suffers from the Fallacy of Composition. Desiree also assumes that because she is part black and part white, she must be completely white. She does not think about how she looks in comparison to other people, she only looks at herself. This causes her to judge her baby based on its appearance, and she assumes that it is also white.
- The Fallacy of Composition causes people to make false assumptions about others based on their own appearance. It is important to remember that just because someone is part of a group, it does not mean that they are the same as everyone else in that group.
- The fallacy of hasty generalization occurs when someone draws a conclusion about a group or situation based on insufficient evidence. In Kate Chopin's "Desiree's Baby," the protagonist, Desiree, makes several hasty generalizations that ultimately lead to her downfall.
- For example, when she first meets Armand, she immediately assumes that he is a good person because he is handsome and comes from a wealthy family. She does not take the time to get to know him or see him interact with other people; she simply assumes that he is a good person based on her own limited experience.
- As the story progresses, Desiree continues to make hasty generalizations about Armand and their relationship. She assumes that he will always love her and that their life together will be perfect. She does not consider the possibility that he may one day grow tired of her or that their relationship may encounter difficulties.
- Ultimately, Desiree's hasty generalizations about Armand and their relationship lead to her downfall. When she discovers that he is not the perfect man she thought he was, she is unable to cope with the reality of their relationship and kills herself. While the story of "Desiree's Baby" is fictional, it highlights the dangers of making hasty generalizations. In the real world, hasty generalizations can lead to misunderstandings and conflict. They can also prevent us from seeing the true value in people and experiences.
- The fallacy of false cause occurs when someone incorrectly assumes that one thing is the cause of another. In the story "Desiree's Baby" by Kate Chopin, false cause is used to explain Desiree's child's skin color. The baby is born with dark skin and the father, Armand, is outraged. He immediately begins to think that Desiree must have had an affair with a black man and that the child is not really his. Armand's mother also believes this to be true and she tells Desiree to leave the plantation. Desiree does not know who the child's father is, but she knows that she loves him no matter what. She decides to leave and does not look back. The fallacy of false cause is used in this story to show how quick people are to judge and make assumptions without knowing all of the facts. Armand and his mother jump to conclusions about Desiree and the child without any evidence to support their claims. This ultimately leads to the downfall of their family.
- In the story "Desiree's Baby" by Kate Chopin, the false cause is the belief that Desiree's baby is black because of a curse placed on her by a voodoo doctor. This belief leads to the baby's death and Desiree's suicide. There are several other examples of false cause in the story, including the idea that Armand's rejection of Desiree is the cause of her insanity, when in fact it is the loss of her child that drives her to madness.
- The fallacy of false cause is a dangerous way of thinking because it can lead to unfair judgments and unjust actions. In Armand's case, his false assumptions about Desiree led him to treat her unfairly and ultimately drive her away. This story highlights the importance of critically examining evidence before making any conclusions.
Part 2
- A great thesis for this story could focus on the theme of social class and its impact on Desiree and her family.
- In "Desiree's Baby", social class plays a significant role in the story and affects the characters in various ways.
- Desiree is a young woman of unknown parentage who is taken in and raised by a wealthy family. She grows up not knowing her true origins, and her adoptive family never tells her. As a result, Desiree feels like she doesn't truly belong anywhere.
- The story takes place in Louisiana during the antebellum period, when there was a strict social hierarchy based on race and class. People of color were considered inferior to whites, and those of lower social class were considered inferior to those of higher social class.
- Desiree marries a wealthy man named Armand Aubigny. They seem to be happy at first, but Armand eventually becomes distant and cruel. Desiree has a baby, but the child is born with dark skin. Armand is disgusted and blames Desiree, saying she must have had an affair with a black man.
- Desiree is heartbroken and doesn't know what to do. She eventually decides to leave her baby and husband, and she disappears into the night.
- The story ends with Armand's realization that he is of mixed race himself. His own mother was a quadroon, a person of mixed African and European ancestry. This revelation changes Armand's perspective on race and social class, and he is left to deal with the consequences of his own prejudice.
- A great thesis for this story could focus on the theme of social class and its impact on Desiree and her family. The story highlights how social class can shape people's lives in ways that they may not even be aware of. It also shows how class can be a factor in relationships, both in terms of how people are treated and how they view themselves.
- Desiree is a young woman who is born into a family of lower social class. She is not given the same opportunities as those of higher social class, and she is constantly reminded of her place in society. This impacts her greatly, and she becomes withdrawn and depressed. However, she eventually meets a man who is also of lower social class, and she begins to see the world in a different light. She realizes that she is just as good as anyone else, regardless of their social class. This newfound confidence allows her to break free from her family's expectations and pursue her own happiness.
In the story Desiree's Baby, a lady is rejected by her husband and her neighborhood once it is discovered that her child is mixed-race. During the era of slavery, the story takes place in the heart of the South. Desiree is a young woman who is wed to Armand Aubigny, a wealthy plantation owner. Together, they had a child with dark complexion from birth. Incredulous, Armand declares Desiree to be herself a mixed-race person. She leaves after hearing his order to do so and takes their young child with her.
Dialogue, particularly that between Armand and Desiree, is used to advance the plot. The conversation is used by the author to make the characters' inner thoughts and feelings known. Armand's heartlessness and harshness against his wife and child expose the actual nature of the guy. It is made clear that Desiree is a sweet and compassionate woman who is heartbroken over her husband's rejection.
The stark reality of racism and prejudice is the story's central topic. The way Armand treats Desiree and their child demonstrates this. Because of the color of their skin, he finds them repulsive. This brings to light the systemic racism that pervaded society at the time.
It may be said that Armand Aubigny treated Desiree unfairly and with hypocrisy. Without being aware of Desiree's past or family history, Armand falls in love with her and marries her. He doesn't care about anything else besides her beauty and her anonymity. But when he learns that she is mixed-race, he abruptly turns against her. In addition to being adulterous, he charges her with purposefully disguising her true identity from him. He mistreats her and drives her away from their house. Because he only considers Desiree's appearance and not her character, Armand's actions are hypocritical. He cares less about Desiree's happiness than he does about what other people will think of him.
Explanation:
It is discovered in the story Desiree's Baby that the mother of the kid has a child of a mixed race, and as a result, her husband and the community turn their backs on her. The action of the story takes place in the deep south in the era of slavery. Desiree is a young woman who is married to Armand Aubigny, who is the affluent owner of a plantation. They eventually have a child together, a baby boy who is born with a dark complexion. Armand is astounded by the news and accuses Desiree of having a racially mixed ancestry herself. They are separated because he instructs her to leave, and she does so while taking their child with her.
The tale is advanced mostly through the use of language, particularly that which occurs between Armand and Desiree. This conversation is used by the author to expose the characters' inner thoughts and feelings to the reader. The vicious and callous treatment that Armand metes out to his wife and child sheds light on the man's true nature. It turns out that Desiree is a sweet and considerate person who is heartbroken over the fact that her spouse has rejected her.
The brutal realities of racism and prejudice serve as the narrative's central topic. This is clear from the manner in which Armand interacts with Desiree and their child. Because of the hue of their skin, he finds them absolutely repugnant. This sheds light on the pervasive prejudice that existed in the culture of that era's society.
It's possible to make the case that Armand Aubigny is hypocritical and unfair in the way that he treats Desiree. Armand falls in love with Desiree and eventually marries her without first learning anything about her past or her family. He is just interested in her physical attractiveness and the fact that she has no name. However, when he learns that she is of a mixed race, he immediately becomes hostile toward her. He says that she has been unfaithful to him and that she has concealed her true identity on purpose from him. She is subjected to inhumane treatment from him, and he ultimately compels her to leave their house. Armand's behavior is hypocritical due to the fact that he cares solely about Desiree's appearance and not her character. He cares more about what other people will think of him than he does about how satisfied Desiree will be with their relationship.
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Desiree’s Baby Kate Chopin Gothic Digital Series @ UFSC ____________________________________________________________
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Desiree’s Baby Kate Chopin
(August 1893, United States Saturday Post)
AS the day was pleasant, Madame Valmonde drove over to L’Abri to see Desiree
and the baby.
It made her laugh to think of Desiree with a baby. Why, it seemed but yesterday
that Desiree was little more than a baby herself; when Monsieur in riding through the
gateway of Valmonde had found her lying asleep in the shadow of the big stone pillar.
The little one awoke in his arms and began to cry for “Dada.” That was as much as
she could do or say. Some people thought she might have strayed there of her own
accord, for she was of the toddling age. The prevailing belief was that she had been
purposely left by a party of Texans, whose canvas-covered wagon, late in the day, had
crossed the ferry that Coton Mais kept, just below the plantation. In time Madame
Valmonde abandoned every speculation but the one that Desiree had been sent to her
by a beneficent Providence to be the child of her affection, seeing that she was without
child of the flesh. For the girl grew to be beautiful and gentle, affectionate and sincere, — the idol of Valmonde.
It was no wonder, when she stood one day against the stone pillar in whose
shadow she had lain asleep, eighteen years before, that Armand Aubigny riding by and
seeing her there, had fallen in love with her. That was the way all the Aubignys fell in
love, as if struck by a pistol shot. The wonder was that he had not loved her before; for
he had known her since his father brought him home from Paris, a boy of eight, after his
mother died there. The passion that awoke in him that day, when he saw her at the gate,
swept along like an avalanche, or like a prairie fire, or like anything that drives headlong
over all obstacles.
Monsieur Valmonde grew practical and wanted things well considered: that is, the
girl’s obscure origin. Armand looked into her eyes and did not care. He was reminded
that she was nameless. What did it matter about a name when he could give her one of
the oldest and proudest in Louisiana? He ordered the corbeille from Paris, and contained
himself with what patience he could until it arrived; then they were married.
Madame Valmonde had not seen Desiree and the baby for four weeks. When she
reached L’Abri she shuddered at the first sight of it, as she always did. It was a sad
looking place, which for many years had not known the gentle presence of a mistress,
old Monsieur Aubigny having married and buried his wife in France, and she having
loved her own land too well ever to leave it. The roof came down steep and black like a
cowl, reaching out beyond the wide galleries that encircled the yellow stuccoed house.
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Big, solemn oaks grew close to it, and their thick-leaved, far-reaching branches
shadowed it like a pall. Young Aubigny’s rule was a strict one, too, and under it his
negroes had forgotten how to be gay, as they had been during the old master’s
easy-going and indulgent lifetime.
The young mother was recovering slowly, and lay full length, in her soft white
muslins and laces, upon a couch. The baby was beside her, upon her arm, where he had
fallen asleep, at her breast. The yellow nurse woman sat beside a window fanning
herself.
Madame Valmonde bent her portly figure over Desiree and kissed her, holding her
an instant tenderly in her arms. Then she turned to the child.
“This is not the baby!” she exclaimed, in startled tones. French was the language
spoken at Valmonde in those days.
“I knew you would be astonished,” laughed Desiree, “at the way he has grown. The
little cochon de lait! Look at his legs, mamma, and his hands and fingernails, — real finger-nails. Zandrine had to cut them this morning. Isn’t it true, Zandrine?”
The woman bowed her turbaned head majestically, “Mais si, Madame.”
“And the way he cries,” went on Desiree, “is deafening. Armand heard him the
other day as far away as La Blanche’s cabin.”
Madame Valmonde had never removed her eyes from the child. She lifted it and
walked with it over to the window that was lightest. She scanned the baby narrowly,
then looked as searchingly at Zandrine, whose face was turned to gaze across the fields.
“Yes, the child has grown, has changed,” said Madame Valmonde, slowly, as she
replaced it beside its mother. “What does Armand say?”
Desiree’s face became suffused with a glow that was happiness itself.
“Oh, Armand is the proudest father in the parish, I believe, chiefly because it is a
boy, to bear his name; though he says not, — that he would have loved a girl as well. But I know it isn’t true. I know he says that to please me. And mamma,” she added, drawing
Madame Valmonde’s head down to her, and speaking in a whisper, “he hasn’t punished
one of them — not one of them — since baby is born. Even Negrillon, who pretended to have burnt his leg that he might rest from work — he only laughed, and said Negrillon was a great scamp. oh, mamma, I’m so happy; it frightens me.”
What Desiree said was true. Marriage, and later the birth of his son had softened
Armand Aubigny’s imperious and exacting nature greatly. This was what made the gentle
Desiree so happy, for she loved him desperately. When he frowned she trembled, but
loved him. When he smiled, she asked no greater blessing of God. But Armand’s dark,
handsome face had not often been disfigured by frowns since the day he fell in love with
her.
When the baby was about three months old, Desiree awoke one day to the
conviction that there was something in the air menacing her peace. It was at first too
subtle to grasp. It had only been a disquieting suggestion; an air of mystery among the
blacks; unexpected visits from far-off neighbors who could hardly account for their
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coming. Then a strange, an awful change in her husband’s manner, which she dared not
ask him to explain. When he spoke to her, it was with averted eyes, from which the old
love-light seemed to have gone out. He absented himself from home; and when there,
avoided her presence and that of her child, without excuse. And the very spirit of Satan
seemed suddenly to take hold of him in his dealings with the slaves. Desiree was
miserable enough to die.
She sat in her room, one hot afternoon, in her peignoir, listlessly drawing through
her fingers the strands of her long, silky brown hair that hung about her shoulders. The
baby, half naked, lay asleep upon her own great mahogany bed, that was like a
sumptuous throne, with its satin-lined half-canopy. One of La Blanche’s little quadroon
boys — half naked too — stood fanning the child slowly with a fan of peacock feathers. Desiree’s eyes had been fixed absently and sadly upon the baby, while she was striving to
penetrate the threatening mist that she felt closing about her. She looked from her child
to the boy who stood beside him, and back again; over and over. “Ah!” It was a cry that
she could not help; which she was not conscious of having uttered. The blood turned
like ice in her veins, and a clammy moisture gathered upon her face.
She tried to speak to the little quadroon boy; but no sound would come, at first.
When he heard his name uttered, he looked up, and his mistress was pointing to the
door. He laid aside the great, soft fan, and obediently stole away, over the polished floor,
on his bare tiptoes.
She stayed motionless, with gaze riveted upon her child, and her face the picture of
fright.
Presently her husband entered the room, and without noticing her, went to a table
and began to search among some papers which covered it.
“Armand,” she called to him, in a voice which must have stabbed him, if he was
human. But he did not notice. “Armand,” she said again. Then she rose and tottered
towards him. “Armand,” she panted once more, clutching his arm, “look at our child.
What does it mean? tell me.”
He coldly but gently loosened her fingers from about his arm and thrust the hand
away from him. “Tell me what it means!” she cried despairingly.
“It means,” he answered lightly, “that the child is not white; it means that you are
not white.”
A quick conception of all that this accusation meant for her nerved her with
unwonted courage to deny it. “It is a lie; it is not true, I am white! Look at my hair, it is
brown; and my eyes are gray, Armand, you know they are gray. And my skin is fair,”
seizing his wrist. “Look at my hand; whiter than yours, Armand,” she laughed hysterically.
“As white as La Blanche’s,” he returned cruelly; and went away leaving her alone
with their child.
When she could hold a pen in her hand, she sent a despairing letter to Madame
Valmonde.
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“My mother, they tell me I am not white. Armand has told me I am not white. For
God’s sake tell them it is not true. You must know it is not true. I shall die. I must die. I
cannot be so unhappy, and live.”
The answer that came was brief:
“My own Desiree: Come home to Valmonde; back to your mother who loves you.
Come with your child.”
When the letter reached Desiree she went with it to her husband’s study, and laid it
open upon the desk before which he sat. She was like a stone image: silent, white,
motionless after she placed it there.
In silence he ran his cold eyes over the written words.
He said nothing. “Shall I go, Armand?” she asked in tones sharp with agonized
suspense.
“Yes, go.”
“Do you want me to go?”
“Yes, I want you to go.”
He thought Almighty God had dealt cruelly and unjustly with him; and felt,
somehow, that he was paying Him back in kind when he stabbed thus into his wife’s
soul. Moreover he no longer loved her, because of the unconscious injury she had
brought upon his home and his name.
She turned away like one stunned by a blow, and walked slowly towards the door,
hoping he would call her back.
“Good-bye, Armand,” she moaned.
He did not answer her. That was his last blow at fate.
Desiree went in search of her child. Zandrine was pacing the sombre gallery with it.
She took the little one from the nurse’s arms with no word of explanation, and
descending the steps, walked away, under the live-oak branches.
It was an October afternoon; the sun was just sinking. Out in the still fields the
negroes were picking cotton.
Desiree had not changed the thin white garment nor the slippers which she wore.
Her hair was uncovered and the sun’s rays brought a golden gleam from its brown
meshes. She did not take the broad, beaten road which led to the far-off plantation of
Valmonde. She walked across a deserted field, where the stubble bruised her tender
feet, so delicately shod, and tore her thin gown to shreds.
She disappeared among the reeds and willows that grew thick along the banks of
the deep, sluggish bayou; and she did not come back again.
Some weeks later there was a curious scene enacted at L’Abri. In the centre of the
smoothly swept back yard was a great bonfire. Armand Aubigny sat in the wide hallway
that commanded a view of the spectacle; and it was he who dealt out to a half dozen
negroes the material which kept this fire ablaze.
A graceful cradle of willow, with all its dainty furbishings, was laid upon the pyre,
which had already been fed with the richness of a priceless layette. Then there were silk
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gowns, and velvet and satin ones added to these; laces, too, and embroideries; bonnets
and gloves; for the corbeille had been of rare quality.
The last thing to go was a tiny bundle of letters; innocent little scribblings that
Desiree had sent to him during the days of their espousal. There was the remnant of one
back in the drawer from which he took them. But it was not Desiree’s; it was part of an
old letter from his mother to his father. He read it. She was thanking God for the blessing
of her husband’s love: — “But above all,” she wrote, “night and day, I thank the good God for having so arranged our lives that our dear Armand will never know that his mother, who adores him, belongs to the race that is cursed with the brand of slavery.”
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