The Perils Of Indifference By Elie Wiesel

Holocaust Survivor and Award Winning Author, Elie Wiesel in his somber yet optimistic speech, “The Perils of Indifference,” argues that indifference is one of the most dangerous feeling to experience. He supports his claim through revealing life-changing personal experiences from the holocaust. In particular, Wiesel explains how the Jews believed the world was unaware of the situation in Auschwitz. In fact, they believed if other leaders knew of the dire situation they would move “heaven and earth” to intervene. This will not only makes us feel sympathy towards Wiesel, but also makes him credible to his audience. Wiesel’s purpose is to educate and warn the new generation of the dangers of indifference; in order to bring about change. He establishes a critical and hopeful tone for readers by using stylistic devices and …show more content…
For example, there was a dreadful and forlorn genocide in Cambodia surrounding the idea of restoring Cambodia’s “basic” years in order to create a utopia. 1975 marks the year they began to have a “re-education” campaign where people suspected of receiving education were given cruel and unusual punishment. However, one could relate this tragedy to Elie Wiesel’s speech because there was not much coverage for this genocide. The U.S. had just gotten out of the Vietnam war and although they were aware of what was happening in Cambodia, they did not act on it. Additionally, one can argue that this is one of the main issues with the feeling of indifference. People feel indifferent simply because they would rather let others be the victim instead of themselves. As a result, leaders did not take a stand, about twenty-five percent of the Cambodian population was murdered or tortured in a span of 4 years. Although there are a number of cases of indifference, there are also multiple examples of persistence that are extraordinarily important to

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