Elie Wiesel's The Perils of Indifference Speech Analysis

The Holocaust will forever be remembered as one of the most devastating genocides in the world. Millions of innocent lives were taken and everlasting trauma was inflicted on survivors. Since then though, society has changed little by little, but nothing will ever replace the suffering endured. Elie Wiesel, a holocaust survivor, knows that all too well. In his strongly sympathetic and undoubtedly critical speech to members of the White House, Wiesel urges the audience through the use of rhetorical questions and appeals to emotion to treat all victims of injustice equally, and assure nothing like the Holocaust will ever repeat.

To begin, Wiesel questions the actions, or lack thereof, of the United States during the Holocaust. The United States was very reluctant to help Jews during this horrible and inhumane time. He inquires, “Why was there a greater effort to save SS murderers after the war than to save their victims during the war?” (Wiesel 3). By asking this tough question, he makes the audience think deeply about how unethical their actions were. The judgement of importance demonstrated is ethically and logically wrong, and Wiesel makes that obvious through judging the audience’s morals. The murderer was not the one suffering. The government put the lives and safety of the murderers above the innocently murdered, and no one questioned it. Because no one stood up and they just allowed it to happen, he displays how the future is deemed uncertain. People could sit and allow tragedies like this to happen yet again. But by pointing out this seemingly obvious flaw in the country’s history, Wiesel urges the audience to do the opposite and stand up for all types of grievances.

After Wiesel accomplished waking up the American people through rhetorical question, he moves on to aim at their emotions through his remembrance of the tragedies that occured. He recalls during their time of despair they thought if the United States knew “surely those leaders  would have moved heaven and earth to intervene” and then continues about how they “discovered that the Pentagon knew, the State Department knew” (Wiesel 3). This makes the audience feel sympathetic for the victims of the holocaust, as they were stranded without a savior. Their initial thought was that the United States didn’t know and assumed that was why they weren’t helping, unaware of the cruel truth. More importantly though, a feeling of guilt is invoked within not only the government, but the American people as a whole, as they knew about the torture and did not do anything to help. However, the United States did rush to the rescue in Kosovo, an example of another genocide brought up by Wiesel. The same torture they didn’t bat an eye at during the Holocaust was the same torture they rushed to help with in Kosovo. Wiesel’s inclusion of this piece illustrates that they cannot pick and choose who to help, and directly supports him persuading the audience that they have to treat all cases of injustice the same. 

Ultimately, Wiesel successfully voices the importance of treating all victims of horrific tragedies the same through his incorporation of rhetorical questions and appeals to emotion. His personal experience with the the Holocaust serves as an insight to what could happen again. He questions how a murderer’s life was solidified as more important than an innocent Jew’s, making wrongdoings of the country clear, which encourages the audience to realize how incorrect their values were. He also tugs at the hearts of the audience, making them feel a sense of sympathy and guilt for their negligence towards helpless victims. Genocides are inevitably horrible in the first place, but ignoring some and assisting others is even worse. History cannot be changed, but it is the hands of society to build the future.