Aside from pain pills, which do not seem to be used very much, the pills that Jonas takes are for his "Stirrings." He begins these shortly before he is expected to celebrate his Ceremony of Twelve, which means he is about to turn twelve years old. The pills begin after he reports a dream to his parents in which he wanted his friend Fiona to take off all of her clothes and get in the...
Aside from pain pills, which do not seem to be used very much, the pills that Jonas takes are for his "Stirrings." He begins these shortly before he is expected to celebrate his Ceremony of Twelve, which means he is about to turn twelve years old. The pills begin after he reports a dream to his parents in which he wanted his friend Fiona to take off all of her clothes and get in the bathtub, so he could touch her and bathe her. These were Jonas' first indication of sexual desire, which is what Stirrings are called in the community. Sexual desire is a condition that the community "treats" with these pills because the community wants all sexual desire to be repressed. Both of Jonas' parents take these pills, as does his friend Asher. Babies are produced by Birthmothers, and there is no other reproduction in the community. Each family unit gets two children this way. It is clear that the community does not want people to have sex. This is a means of controlling the population. If people do not have sex, there is no risk of unwanted pregnancies. I also think that repressing sexuality is meant to avoid all the messy emotions that result from sexual desire, love and jealousy, for example.
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