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Elie Wiesel: The Actualization Of Human Rights

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“The opposite of love is not hate, it’s indifference” (Wiesel interview with US Media, 1986). This is a quote from Elie Wiesel a Romanian, Jewish man who grew up in the holocaust. During his life time Wiesel was a major human rights activist. Human rights are principles that belong to every person on this earth. In thought Human Rights are a beautiful idea but, in all reality, they cannot be actualized for every person. Take World War II for instance where an entire race of people was enslaved and killed off, and in the 1950s, blacks were terrified to go to a coffee shop because of their skin color. Their rights were taken away because of something that were out of their control. Human Rights cannot be actualized for every person because …show more content…

Throughout history many races have been treated like inferiors by others such as the Irish salves that first came over to the Americas and the Chinese when the Mongolians took over. But the most well-known was the civil rights movement. If a person was black during this time, there was a chance that you could get beat up or damage to your belongings like such that happened to Josephine Backer. Baker describes a traumatic experience as a child, Josephine conveys, “When I was child and they burned me out of my home, I was frightened, and I ran away” (Baker 10). She was just a kid with a different skin color. People treated her like the scum of the earth because of the color of her skin. She came back to America in her later years. She had gone to get a cup of coffee but was refused because she was black, and she would not stand for this. After the store retaliated, she described this as, “…so then they thought they could smear me, and the best way to that was to call me a Communist” (Baker 51-52). That word dreaded in those days. The movement was taking place in the Cold war and back then to call someone a Communist was terribly offensive and meant that they would be watched for months. She was a Communist just because she was black and would not stand for the injustice done to her. Nobody should be treated that way no matter your …show more content…

They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood “(UDHR). Surely everyone will follow these laws placed after World War II, Right? While there are laws in place to protect our basic human rights, some humans do not follow them. As previously mentioned, the Civil Rights movement or in current time the slaves and citizens in North Korea, both which happened after the laws were placed. Just because law is set in place doesn’t make people follow it. “The basic rights that belong to every person” describes Human Rights. Examples such as the Civil Rights movement, World War II, and even North Korea, show that human right cannot be actualized for every person. A law set in place to protect these rights does not mean that everyone will follow it. Human Rights can only be actualized if everyone respects them and follows

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For centuries mankind has faced injustice due to prejudice and hate. How we have dealt with unjust acts has shaped society and molded the way that we think, changing our very morals and values. In Elie Wiesel’s memoir Night, millions of people in concentration camps, including Elie, endure the tyranny of Hitler’s rein in an unforgettable event known as the holocaust. The deplorable conditions and oppressive treatment emphasizes the injustice inflicted upon Elie and his comrades. Wiesel’s theme is to stand up against oppression and speak out against injustice.

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Wells was heavily influenced to continue her fight for people in her community upon hearing of the 3 black men who owned a grocery store and were tried initially because a white owner did not like the competition and had them tried as a public nuisance. They were later lynched by a white mob. Wells wrote on the injustice and later wrote on the unfair conditions of black women and wanted to be treated as an equal leader amongst men. She wrote on how disappointing the circumstances were for black women in the South as there was, “wholesale contemptuous defamation of their women.” (Adams, 1994)

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Elie Wiesel was a young boy when he did survived the holocaust.. In his memoir Night, we follow his journey as a Jewish boy in a time where expressing your religion could mean life or death. Between living under the watch of Nazi regimes, trying to keep his father alive, and surviving the inhumanity of others, Elie’s had fought and lived through the genocide unlike any other. However, surviving the holocaust does not come without a price. Wiesel lived at the sacrifice of his faith and identity, which were left in fragments after the existence of evil that left a permanent scar on his life. At the start of life, a person will be given an identity that they will be able to shape and mold through experiences and beliefs.

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Elie Wiesel’s true story Night, is an intriguing story about the Holocaust. The guards and even veteran prisoners are cruel to others. The punishments, even for tiny faults, are unthinkably horrid. Man does not care how old or weak someone is; this makes the children and teens change and act inhumane towards other prisoners, even towards their own family. It clearly, and painfully, explains man’s inhumanity to man.

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Holocaust survivor and prolific author, Elie Wiesel thought it was important to stand for something people believe in. He once argued, “There may be times when we are powerless to prevent injustice, but there must never be a time when we fail to protest.” The documentary Bully displays how one should stand up for what he or she believes in, and help make a difference and end injustice. For instance, World War II was a major act of injustice. If someone had said something, it most likely would have been stopped and would have never happened.

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What are human rights? Human rights are rights that are believed to belong justifiably to everybody. Everyone has natural human rights by simply just being born, however, a large amount of people’s human rights has been violated. A big reason why is because of the amount of indifference. The actualization of human rights for everyone is not possible.

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Humankind is the only kind judged on morality, therefore, rights must be attributed to all of humankind. It doesn’t make sense to attribute rights to individuals. No rational person would consider it fair to give some individuals of the same kind rights, and then deny those rights to others. Simply put, rights must be given on the basis of what kind something is, not an individual basis. This also leads to the widely accepted concept of natural rights.

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In which millions of Jews were innocently killed and persecuted because of their religion. As a student who is familiar with the years of the holocaust that will forever live in infamy, Wiesel’s memoir has undoubtedly changed my perspective. Throughout the text, I have been emotionally touched by the topics of dehumanization, the young life of Elie Wiesel, and gained a better understanding of the Holocaust. With how dehumanization was portrayed through words, pondering my mind the most.

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"Civil Disobedience, I shall argue, is an unsuccessful attempt to combine, on the level of principle, revolutions and conventional political action" The anonymous author of "The Case Against Civil Disobedience" asserts that peaceful protesting does not play a significant role in reforming political norms. His words often ring true in protests. In many instances of Civil Disobedience, the "peaceful" protests become dangerously violent. They tend to cause more tension and discourse than they cause change. Protests lead to increased divisions between the two viewpoints, causing support for current implication to solidify out of fear of change.

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Skin Deep How would you feel if you had to watch the people you love and care about be tortured and abused? What if you were a victim of discrimination? Elie Wiesel was one of the many Jews that experienced hatred because of his race.

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Human right can be defined as those inalienable privileges that are inherent to all human beings irrespective of their race, color, religion, language or any other status. A definition of human rights was given by the Scottish philosopher John Locke as “absolute moral claims or entitlement to life, liberty and property.” The Virginia declaration of rights of 1776 stated that, “ all men are by nature equally free and independent and have certain inherent rights of which when they enter a state of society, they cannot by any compact deprive or divest posterity.” In the case of Ogba v. The state, the supreme court extra-judicially declared that “a fundamental human right is one that cannot be waived by the government or any form of legislation.”

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