Harrison Bergeron

In the year 2081, Constitutional Amendments have been created to make everyone equal to one another. Handicap devices such as masks, weights, and ear-radios are given to individuals who are deemed "unequal" or "gifted" more so than other people. Hazel and George Bergeron, a married couple, are in their living room watching a television program featuring dancing ballerinas. George has many handicaps because he is seen as gifted, so he must wear a thought disrupting ear radio and carry heavy lead balls attached to him by a handicap bag, while Hazel is much simpler than him, thus having no handicaps. The two have a conversation about how George has been feeling tired lately, and his wife Hazel suggests he take some lead balls out of his handicap bag to lessen his load. George tells his wife that he can not make himself unequal because he can not cheat the law for the sake of society. After their conversation, the television program the two were viewing was interupted to state that Harrison Bergeron, George and Hazel's son, who was taken away by the handicappers for being extremely talented, has escaped from prison and is plotting to overthrow the government. Suddenly, Harrison bursts into the broadcasting studio, and claims himself to be the "emperor" and tears off his many complex handicaps with ease. Harrison then announces he will select his empress, and a ballerina stands up and takes off her mask, revealing her blindingly beutiful face. Both of them dance around the studio, and jump high enough to reach the ceiling of the building. As the two kiss in mid-air, the Handicapper General walks in the room and fires two shots from a shotgun, killing both Harrison and the ballerina. The Handicapper General then tells everyone in the studio who took off their handicaps with Harrison to put them back on, or she will kill them too. Soon after the event, the Bergeron's television set burns out, and George returns from the kitchen with a beer to find Hazel in tears. George asks Hazel why she was crying, and she states that something really sad happened on the television, but she can not remember due to her lack of intelligence, and she forgets witnessing her own sons death.