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The Perils Of Indifference By Elie Wiesel

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Elie Wiesel, a Holocaust survivor and recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, has devoted his life to informing others about the violence that is inflicted and then transforms into indifference. In his millennium talk on "The Perils of Indifference" on April 2, 1999, Elie Wiesel outlines the injustices that people experience and implores the audience to become activists and never to turn a blind eye to the suffering of others. Such a strong message, a cry for humanity. He correctly recognized this as an idea worthy of this particular stage on this particular day—a call for people to recognize the allure of indifference and rage against apathy.
In order to inform the audience about the existence of indifference in the world and how harmful it is …show more content…

light and darkness, twilight and dawn, crime and punishment, cruelty and compassion, good and evil,"(2) he says in one sentence, listing a number of brief sentences. Wiesel's use of the antithesis to explain apathy reveals that most people tend to ignore the details that lie between two extremes. The use of an antithesis is a great approach to highlight how individuals are usually aware of situations that are obvious. Antithesis is the ideal tool to emphasize indifference because it isn't immediately apparent. For instance, during a conflict, people will either inquire about the heroics or the casualties. Numerous instances of catastrophic incidents that "have thrown a black shadow over humanity" are cited by him. He discusses the murders of Ghandi and Martin Luther King Jr., as well as cruel incidents like Hiroshima and Auschwitz. He says all of this in one phrase to overwhelm the audience with examples of indifference in a wide range of contexts. By citing so many instances of indifference, he hopes to make the point that it is exceedingly …show more content…

"And together, driven by intense anxiety and incredible hope, we move toward the new millennium." Wiesel repeatedly brings up the wrath throughout the speech, but he also anticipates a moment when change will be met with indifference. He encourages the audience to apply their own experiences to start future change, therefore this concludes his speech. He also makes a reference to God in order to convey a message of hope. Wiesel discusses how God is present everywhere you are and whatever you are doing. Wiesel found hope and strength in the knowledge that God had been with him during the Holocaust. He demonstrates how faith can help individuals overcome hardship. Using a reference to God illustrates Wiesel's individual ideas and confirms that he has had personal encounters with God. As a result of Wiesel's own experience being directly impacted by God and His power, this inspires both emotional regard for him as well as believability. Wiesel thinks that change is possible if a person has hope, a good attitude, and a belief in the

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American Jewish writer, and political activist Elie Wiesel, in his sympathetic speech “The Perils of Indifference” to send a strong message to the audience. As a survivor of the Holocaust, he supports his claim through his speech explaining the dangers of indifference from first hand experience. Specifically in his speech he refers to himself, “A young Jewish boy [..] woke up in a place of eternal infamy called Buchenwald”(par 1).. In addition, Wiesel use of rhetorical questions is for the audience to question or to think about indifference. Wiesel’s purpose is to warn people about indifference in order to “save” our future.

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A speaker is not credible if they attempt to make listeners feel pity for them, because the audience will view him in a degrading way. Similar to this, Wiesel is humble. He does not speak of his Nobel Peace Prize, and is emphasizing the importance of the future instead of the past in hopes of moving forward in the future. This increases Wiesel’s credibility because he is not bragging or exaggerating his words, and he has experienced this issue first hand, which allows the audience to trust Wiesel and believe his stance on the

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Furthermore, the author wants us to know that when someone is indifference to the suffering of someone else, he or she is just as guilty as the other person. Wiesel's purpose is to inform us that everyone is different but not everyone is indifferent in order to create awareness of the danger. He establishes a thoughtful tone for readers by using stylistic devices such as repetition , imagery and syntactic

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The speaker's attitude can make or break the effectiveness of a speech. If a speaker’s tone is disinterested and apathetic then the message will never be received because the audience is no longer engaged. Wiesel successfully yields a serious tone, which captivates the audience and enables them to receive the

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In his speech Wiesel uses his life to demonstrate its effects and to argue against the sentiment of indifference that caused him and many others to suffer. Gratitude

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Using such harsh imagery and descriptive detail when giving Wiesel's speech elicits strong emotional responses from the audience, making the audience empathetic to Wiesel’s purpose for his

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In his 1986 Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech, Elie Wiesel strives to inform his audience of the unbelievable atrocities of the Holocaust in order to prevent them from ever again responding to inhumanity and injustice with silence and neutrality. The structure or organization of Wiesel’s speech, his skillful use of the rhetorical appeals of pathos and ethos, combined with powerful rhetorical devices leads his audience to understand that they must never choose silence when they witness injustice. To do so supports the oppressors. Wiesel’s speech is tightly organized and moves the ideas forward effectively. Wiesel begins with humility, stating that he does not have the right to speak for the dead, introducing the framework of his words.

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This issue turns to Wiesel's description of apathy, and the different circumstances in which it can occur. Indifference can be subtle and tempting, because it is easier (6). Wiesel uses this to show the gravity of what the Holocaust was. People would assume that it was in the hands of someone else, so they did not have any reason to do anything about it. Indifference is vicious.

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Indifference need to be gain awareness and be stopped. He develops his claim by narrating the dangers of indifference, and how it affected his life then, describes how wrongful it is to be treated in such a way. Finally Wiesel illustrates examples of how indifference affected the world. Wiesel’s purpose is to inform us about the dangers of indifference in order to bring change about it. He establishes a straightforward tone for the president, ambassadors, politicians, and congressmen.

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In “The Perils of Indifference” a speech given from a holocaust survivor, Elie Wiesel discussed the issues society had during World War 2 associated with insouciance. The speech revolved around the world coming to a new millennium, and he asked “what will the legacy of this vanishing century be?” This allows him to directly bring the topic of indifference into the equation quite brilliantly. He begins with his stories of prisoners sitting in Auschwitz that felt nothing, “They were dead and did not know it.” He states that indifference is the friend of the enemy.

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Wiesel pinpoints the indifference of humans as the real enemy, causing further suffering and lost to those already in peril. Wiesel commenced the speech with an interesting attention getter: a story about a young Jewish from a small town that was at the end of war liberated from Nazi rule by American soldiers. This young boy was in fact himself. The first-hand experience of cruelty gave him credibility in discussing the dangers of indifference; he was a victim himself.

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Wiesel’s goal is to get more people to stand up to the “bully” and address the problem. Once people rally together and acknowledge the victims, the aggressor can no longer feel superior to the poor group of people.

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He also questioned if we, as humanity, have learned from the past and became less indifferent. Mr. Wiesel, brought an emotional hook to the audience by giving details regarding his suffering. At the end of the speech

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Although indifference can be very dangerous, Wiesel begins to explain how good things have happened in this century. By using a counter argument, it shows Wiesel knows a lot about this topic, which also makes him more

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You Denounce it. You Disarm it. ”(Wiesel). This was the biggest part I though Wiesel used for his strongest point of Pathos. These words made me take a step back from what exactly was being said by Wiesel, how anger and hatred are less dangerous than indifferent because hatred and anger have somewhat

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