Jaune Chat's Life, the Universe, and Everything

This is very interesting and very well articulated. I agree that the first person narrative is something that must be taken into account when considering the attitudes towards the ways of Panem. Sometimes people can conflate a first person narrative with an author's direct mouthpiece or with a reflection of the target audience's assumed attitudes towards the issues in the book, but I find that first person works best for me when neither of those are the case--when it's distinctly the character's voice on the page.

And, I mean, really, we exist alongside unpleasant parts of our own lives and world and don't feel the need to explain our complacency or our revolutionary aspirations as main aspects of our identity. Most people that I know don't talk about their thoughts on contemporary genocide when they introduce themselves, nor do they even think about it every day. Even with an issue that's visible in our everyday western world lives, like homelessness, most people ignore it and some even go so far as to blame the victims for the problem. So I don't think it's at all far-fetched that the citizens of the Districts would suffer the Hunger Games in near-silence, especially given the likely/possible Capitol retribution, and I very much don't think that we could get away with calling them depraved for doing so. (You didn't mention that, but I've heard objections along those lines.)

Wow, that got long. Sorry. I'll just say that I like what you've said about other issues, too, and stop talking now. ^_^