Seeds of #MeToo Planted Under the Orange Trees in Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath

#MeToo took root under the orange trees in California, where hundreds of Depression-era migrant workers endured harassment and exploitation by wealthy landowners. John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath depicts dangers that are clear in today's workplace: an economic system controlled by a wealthy few that eschews decency and morality with an abuse of power that quells the human spirit. This insidious system serves only its perpetrators, who demand silence from victims, until the victims demand the return of their basic rights—no longer fearing reprisal because there is nothing left to lose. Decades following the publication of Steinbeck's Pulitzer Prize–winning novel, another crime against workers has surfaced and #MeToo has demanded that workplace sexual harassment be dragged from behind closed doors into the open. Steinbeck outlines the pathway to collective resistance, the main thrust of #MeToo, a movement that has only now begun to win cases in the courts.