In the beginning of the twentieth century, American culture (and especially African American culture) pitted everybody against their peers in the fight for success and prosperity. It wasn’t easy to survive, and nobody was willing or able to help others in any sort of substantial way. The government didn’t provide assistance; welfare didn’t exist, and the people who really needed help weren’t considered worthy of government time or effort. Friendships even had boundaries. People wanted to see their friends prosper, but they had their own families to feed. In this kind of volatile social atmosphere, people tried hard to feel like they were living a successful life. Everybody had their own way of getting their basic needs met, but in order to maintain psychological health, it was important for them to feel like they were not only leading a physically healthy life, but also a virtuous one. In this way, ‘survival’ incorporated more than the basic necessities of life; people instinctually compared themselves to the rest of their community and judged their worth or success accordingly. Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God paints a powerful picture of this brutal ‘popularity contest’. It illuminates the roots of the culture’s instinctual desire to feel worthy or successful. It also clearly shows that people can fulfill this desire only by actively oppressing those who are lower in the "pecking-order" (Hurston, 144) than they are themselves. Thus, the novel sheds new light on the roots of oppression. Hurston does not define oppression merely as ruthless, irrational attempts at forcing others into subordination, as many critics do. Rather, she describes it as the bi-product of people’s attempts to fulfill their overwhelming psychological need to feel successful.

Mrs. Turner’s character demonstrates that the roots of oppression originate much deeper than many people think. Her racist personality seems paradoxical at first; she is black herself. She is just as discriminatory toward the African American race as many white people in the novel are. She feels that her lighter color and her ‘proud features’ (140) set her far apart from other Negroes, and this differentiation allows her to hold biases against ‘true blacks’. "‘…Who wants to be mixed up wid uh rusty black man, and uh black woman goin’ down de street in all dem loud colors, and whoopin’ and hollerin’ and laughin’ over nothin’?...’" (141). She focuses on African American traits that are distinctly different from her own in order to justify her prejudice. She doesn’t wear "loud colors" or go "whoopin’…over nothin’". She views these characteristics as inferior in order to feel righteous about herself for not being like that. Her society has nourished racist instincts forever, and the concept that black people are inferior to whites is as natural to Mrs. Turner as it is to Joe Starks. Therefore, she measures her success and worth by how ‘white’ she is. She would rather be a submissive wife to a prosperous white man than allow herself to live in the Negro world, even if she could live more independently if she associated with other black people. "‘…Ah can’t stand black niggers. Ah don’t blame de white folks from hatin’ ‘em ‘cause Ah can’t stand ‘em mahself. ‘Nother thing, Ah hates tuh see folks lak me and you mixed up wid ‘em. Us oughta class off.’" (141). Mrs. Turner needs to feel like she has some authority in her community, and she secures this self-esteem by placing herself above other people in her community. She is a "milky sort of woman" (139) with a brother who is "uh fine carpenter, when he kin git anything tuh do" (143). This interpretation of her identity makes it easy for her to feel more well-to-do than the "black niggers" who "[sing] ol’ nigger songs" (141). But this sort of justification is problematic. Her racist remarks are based on only a few aspects of African American cultural characteristics and traditions. She focuses only on qualities that she does not have herself. There are many traits she does share with the Negro race. Her most obvious Negro characteristic is her dialect, which is typically African American in form. As strongly as she believes she is more valuable than Negroes of darker complexion, she is unable to completely ignore her heritage. Somewhere deep inside, she realizes she truly is black (in the above citation, she does not include herself in the realm of "white folks"), but she refuses to consciously acknowledge the fact. She is tremendously determined to define herself as a successful, high-class woman, and she loses sight of reality because of this grand objective. She structures her entire identity around hypocritical discrimination in order to meet this need.

Tea Cake also has a strong instinct to assert his independence and worth to his community, but unlike Mrs. Turner, he resorts to immoral or violent action only in extreme cases. He is much less vicious than Mrs. Turner. The pigmentation of his skin is as dark as can be, so even if he were a ruthless hypocrite, he would not be able to rationalize his way out of being black, as Mrs. Turner tries to do; he is at the bottom of Mrs. Turner’s "pecking-order" (144). Perhaps this fact is the reason he is so rational compared with other characters in the novel: he has nothing except his own perspective to keep him going. His confident demeanor also gives the impression that he has a genuine personality. He is not nearly as shallow as many other characters are. "Seemed as if [Janie] had known him all her life. Look how she had been able to talk with him right off!" (99). He’s comfortable being an ‘equal’ in all his relationships, which is a quality Janie’s other partners lacked. As noble as his self-confidence is, however, Tea Cake also expects a certain amount of respect from others. He doesn’t aggressively demand respect, like some white characters in the novel do. (He understands open aggression would get him nowhere; he realizes his color doesn’t allow him to be too outgoing.) Rather, he just expects to be treated with a basic amount of civility. He has a fairly high tolerance for discrimination, but when people cross the line too far, he is capable of asserting his authority. Mrs. Turner pushes him over the edge by encouraging Janie to leave Tea Cake for her brother. Mrs. Turner’s self-righteous, hypocritical attitude aggravates Tea Cake immensely, and he finally decides to take action. He does not like open confrontation, and he recognizes the futility in doing anything vengeful to Mrs. Turner. So, "he…whipped Janie. Not because her behavior justified his jealousy, but it relieved that awful fear inside him…No brutal beating at all. He just slapped her around a bit to show he was boss." (147). He mainly just wants to prove a point to Mrs. Turner and the rest of his community; he isn’t worried about proving anything to Janie. He knows Janie won’t hold it against him, and he’s right. Janie doesn’t become any less devoted to him after this incident. Tea Cake achieves his goal, perhaps because of Janie’s continuous devotion after he beats her. He shocks everyone on the muck, and earns widespread respect.

This incident proves that everybody has a basic instinct to protect their social integrity. In Tea Cake’s case, this instinct is stronger than his devotion to Janie. He isn’t forced to jeopardize one for the other very often, but this incident clearly illustrates that that hierarchy exists. He is not a bad person because of this ‘weakness’. Unlike Mrs. Turner, he isn’t ruled by a need to constantly feel superior. He has basically good values and healthy priorities; he just gets defensive when his character is unreasonably questioned.

Their Eyes Were Watching God illustrates the impossible social dynamics present in a community that exists in adverse conditions. It shows that unequal distribution of wealth in small, intimate towns creates tremendous power struggles. These conflicts between people can take many forms, but they are always caused by powerful, internal drives to feel independent and successful. The drives are unconscious and more complex than one could fathom, but they are rooted as deeply in human nature as any other natural instincts are. After hearing Mrs. Turner insult him, the otherwise compassionate and rational Tea Cake utters, "‘…Her and dat whittled-down husband uh hers! And dat son! He’s jus’ uh dirty trick her womb played on her…’" (143). If he hadn’t felt so threatened and insulted, he never would have insulted Mrs. Turner’s family just for being related to her. Tea Cake’s insecurities are essentially the same as Mrs. Turner’s, although they manifest in different ways. He rigidly defends his masculinity, whereas Mrs. Turner is concerned about the way society racially classifies her. Both preoccupations are rooted in a need for independence, although each character has a different idea of what it means to be independent. Ironically, though, the drive to break free from oppressive forces in order to embrace independence is the very seed of oppression itself. As Mrs. Turner’s character exemplifies, when you try to climb to the top, you inevitably push somebody else down in the process.