Dehumanization In Night By Elie Wiesel

599 Words3 Pages

In the memoir, “Night” is the story of a Jewish boy who experiences and lives through the Holocaust. Dehumanization is the process by which the Nazis gradually reduce the Jews to little more than “things” which could easily be gotten rid of in terrible with no remorse.

Throughout this memoir one way Jews were dehumanized was by being treated with cruelty. The Jews were forced to watch their family members, friends, & own kind slowly die. They were starved to death and deprived from all their belongings. “In front of us flames. In the air that smell of burning flesh.” (26) The Nazi were cruel and would burn the Jews alive. Some were put in gas chambers others were shot. This happened to mostly the weak elderly or the young kids, babies were thrown and shot at in the air with no compassion. Cruelty ended up becoming nothing to the Jewish victims, they worried more about eating than the pain they felt. …show more content…

Jews were so dehumanized they came to not care about the idea of dying although they knew they would die at some point but they wouldn’t mind to try any challenge to survive that could lead them to an early death. “Poor hero, committing suicide for a ration of soup!” (57) A man who is starving takes advantage of the kitchen that is alone as the camp is being bombed, he crawls over to get a meal but as he eats he is killed by a bomb. This shows how he knew the risk he would be putting himself in but he took the risk by feelings worthless and having nothing to lose. Although the Jews were treated like nothing I think they still felt some sort of value to their life if they would risk their life to try to