The Haunting of Deprivation
Have you ever had something that you cared about stripped from your possession? It does not even have to be a physical object that was confiscated. Think of how you felt. The suffering Jews in the Holocaust experienced the same feeling you have, but more severe. In the story Night, by Elie Wiesel, he recounts his experience of surviving through the horrific Holocaust. Throughout the entire story, one can perceive many objects as being symbolic. Three in particular are the yellow star that the jews were forced to wear, the captured Jews’ empty homes, and the German officer’s baton.Taking a closer look at the symbols in Night, one can see that the yellow star stands for segregation, the empty homes stand for deprivation, and the officer's baton stands for the social hierarchy.
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When I hear the word segregation I immediately think of the 1960’s when whites were segregating the African Americans. Yes that was segregtaion, but what the Nazi’s were doing to the Jews was also a very harsh form of segregation. The yellow star was bestowed to every Jew. It was the Germans’ way to show their power and control over the Jews. Elie Wiesel unfortunately had to wear it as well. “Three days later, a new decree: every Jew had to wear the yellow star”(Wiesel 11). The Germans used this particular symbol to segregate all the Jews and show that they are in control. Every person holds true to their own personality and beliefs, but once the Germans assigned a star to each Jew, they were all considered to be the same. The yellow star also symbolizes all of the labels and restrictions that that the Nazi’s established. The star was a clear marker of segregation and it emphasized the fact that the Jews had no rights to anything