Dehumanization In Night By Elie Wiesel

Even before the start of WWII, Hitler and the Nazi’s had started the process of dehumanizing anyone they deemed as a threat the the Aryan race. Dehumanization is the “psychological process of demonizing the enemy, making them seem less than human and hence not worthy of humane treatment,” (Maiese). The Holocaust is one the most recognizable examples of mass dehumanization and genocide. However, anti-semitism was around long before Hitler decided to use his power to discriminate against Jews. Leaders in the Catholic church, back in the first millennium of the Christian era, solidified the ideas that all Jews were at fault for the crucifixion of Christ and that the destruction of the Temple and scattering of their people was punishment for their

They were systematically dehumanized, captures, and slaughtered. Many survivors have written about their time in the concentration camps, including Nobel Laureate Elie Wiesel. His book, Night, has many examples of the dehumanization and discrimination that Jews faced. Upon first arriving to Auschwitz, the Nazis separated the Jews by gender. As soon as they stepped of the train, there were SS men saying “Men to the left! Women to the right!” and pushing people either way (Wiesel 27). After this, the Nazis determined who would be fit to work and who would go straight to the crematory. Wiesel and his father were lucky enough to selected to live and he spent the next year struggling to survive through Auschwitz and later Buna, two notorious concentration camps. This struggle is seen clearly in Night, and prominently when Wiesel asks “Was there a single place here where you were not in danger of death?” ( Wiesel 37). The Nazis made sure to continue dehumanizing the Jews even after putting them into concentration camps. Once someone was allowed to live, they were tattooed with a number, so that the SS wouldn’t have to use their names. In Night, Wiesel shows this, writing“I became A-7713. From then on, I had no other name” (42). They shaved their heads and gave them all the same uniform, so that each and every Jew looked the same to them. To the Nazis, the Jews were nothing but animals. So they made sure the let the Jews know how they felt about them with daily beatings and killings. They forced the Jews and other prisoners in the camps to do hard labor, which used up what little calories they were given in the form of moldy bread and a little soup. This left the Jews frail, skinny, and disease ridden. Those who didn’t die of starvation or a beating often died of typhus because their bodies were too weak to fight off any disease or illness. Once the Holocaust ended, the world was left to marvel and the piles of