The dangers of apathy were stressed by Wiesel in a 1999 address he gave at the White House titled The Perils of Indifference. According to the speech, "to keep quiet when injustices happen is to condone injustice and to undercut human rights everywhere." This statement shows that not stopping racial discrimination when you see it; means that you support it. With his Holocaust experience and the approaching future, Elie Wiesel expresses the need to stop indifference to provide future generations with renewed desire and promise.
Elie Wiesel emphasizes throughout "The Perils of Indifference" how choosing to ignore the suffering of others only produces more misery, more prejudice, and more grief—and it also imperils the very humanity of those who choose to do so. Wiesel also noted that in the
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Elie Wiesel addresses the audience by saying, "Mr. President, Mrs. Clinton, members of Congress, Ambassador Holbrooke, Excellencies, friends," in an effort to get their attention. He also utilizes Ethos by referring to "my friends" to demonstrate how he is attempting to win the audience's trust.
One method of persuasion is pathos. It's intended to impact the audience's emotions when making an argument. When talking about his early years and his life, Elie Wiesel employs pathos. An example of a Patho is “so much violence, so much indifference.” This is considered a Patho because violence can affect others' emotions in many ways.
Logos is a rhetorical device based on reason and logic. In The Perils of Indifference, Wiesel limited his highly impassioned speech to mainly factual information, which may be quite challenging to accomplish when you were actually present for the incident. For example, when Elie says, "It is so much easier to look away from victims. This is an example of a logo because it is factual that it's more uncomfortable to help others that are victims of racial discrimination and
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.
In Weiesel's own life, he faced indifference head-on when he was in the Nazi concentration camp. For example, when Wiesel was in the camp he felt “abandoned by humanity” Wiesel (8) because everyone turned the other cheek and left the Jews out to dry. With no help until the American troops got to them. Another example that Wiesel noted in his speech is that indifference is “always the friend of the enemy”. This means that the perpetrator always wins in the world of indifference because the person or people that are being put down and mistreated don't have the strength and power to help themselves get help or be free.
Pathos is used to get in touch with the emotions of the audience, it is usually used to make viewers think deeper about what they are hearing. Last, logos is related to logic and reasoning, this rhetoric states facts and backs them up. Presidential speeches are extremely important and should have a mixture of Ethos, Logos, and Pathos in order to be successful. In order for citizens to trust someone in power, especially a president, they have to be trustworthy.
In the middle of Wiesel's plea to the government Logos began to appear in his words and effectively strengthened his tone and the assertiveness in his voice. “Indifference elicits no response. Indifference is not a response. Indifference is not a beginning; it is an end. And, therefore, indifference is always the friend of the enemy, for it benefits the aggressor -- never his victim, whose pain is magnified when he or she feels forgotten.
Lack of concern, lack of interest, lack of sympathy. These are all ways to describe indifference and none of them are good. Elie Wiesel made sure America knew that this is how they acted when the Jews were in desperate need of help. In the speech The Perils of Indifference Elie Wiesel uses hypophora, juxtaposition, and paradox to effectively elicit the guilt that should come from being indifferent. With hypophora, Elie is able to highlight the wrong doings that could have been avoided.
On April 12, 1999, Elie Wiesel delivered a poignant speech during the Millennium Lectures. (Wiesel 1) In his effective speech, the author emphasizes the word “indifference” in order to establish a closer connection between the past and the present – contrasting what we, as a country, have done and what we should do going forward. “The Perils of Indifference” is a call to action in order to defend human life in the new millennium. Wiesel captures his audience with facts, appeals to the human conscience, and utilizes many strategies to add weight to his words.
He appeals to his audience by using pathos present in his repetition of “indifference.” he explains that the neutrality of indifference “is always the friend of the enemy, for it benefits the aggressor” (cite) he works to convince the audience to end their indifference because it does more harm than good. By not actively working to help the oppressed those who are indifferent avail the aggressor. Throughout his entire speech, Elie Wiesel effectively argues the
This is an example of logos because Wiesel is able to appeal to the logical side of his audience. Even though he is using terms that cater more to emotion, he is still able to explain what exactly the word means. When indifference is a core component of the entirety of Wiesel’s speech, starting with something logical will help it stick with the audience. Instead of second-guessing what indifference could mean, they’ll trust Wiesel’s definition of the word. If he chooses not to define it, the audience may be a bit more skeptical to trust what he has to say about indifference.
Wiesel emphasizes the problem of apathy using pathos and ethos to make his case. Elie Wiesel achieves this in a number of ways by putting the audience and himself on an equal footing, and because of his earlier success, he has credibility even before he starts talking about the idea of indifference. Elie Wiesel urges his audience to take action to fight the indifference in society and between nations. This speech attempts to educate listeners on the speaker's viewpoint on indifference and how societies respond to disasters.audience in his shoes and the shoes of others who have suffered as a result of indifference. Elie Wiesel's life has been marred by tragedy.
The general statement made by Elie Wiesel in his speech, The Perils of Indifference, is that indifference is sinful. More specifically, Wiesel argues that awareness needs to be brought that indifference is dangerous. He writes “Indifference is not a beginning, it is an end”. In this speech, Wiesel is suggesting that indifference is dangerous it can bring the end to many lives. In conclusion Wiesel's belief is suggesting that indifference is an end, it needs to be noticed and taken care of.
In the speech, titled “The Perils of Indifference,” Elie Wiesel showed gratitude to the American people, President Clinton, and Mrs. Hillary Clinton for the help they brought and apprised the audience about the violent consequences and human suffering due to indifference against humanity (Wiesel). This speech was persuasive. It was also effective because it conveyed to the audience the understanding of
In the “Perils of Indifference” speech Elie Wiesel persuades his readers to understand that no one should ever be judged for being different from others. During Wiesel's speech he was explaining when he woke up one morning close to an internal infamy called Buchenwald where he was free and no longer felt joy; he never would again. “In a way indifference to the suffering is what makes the human being inhuman.” This quote shows that Wiesel thinks that indifference is a sin, and that indifference is worse than hatred. Wiesel came from a place where society was composed of the killers, victims, and bystanders, of which he was a victim of indifference.
Rebecca Rickord Mrs. Graver English 1112 12 April 2023 The Perils of Indifference Elie Wiesel gave his influential speech “The Perils of Indifference” eat the White House in 1999. Wiesel was a survivor of the Holocaust; and due to this experience, he spent his life advocating for human rights and sharing what he endured as a prisoner in concentration camps.
Pathos is when the speech appeals to the audience’s emotions. President Abraham Lincoln uses pathos is this speech to console the audience for the losses that the country has endured during the Civil War. Lincoln uses pathos to convey sadness when he says, “The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract.” When saying this Lincoln appeals to the people’s emotions by explaining that their loved ones struggled there and he also appeals to the feeling of pride they feel for their loved ones who dedicated their lives to their cause. Another example of pathos in this speech is, “...that from these honored dead we take increased devotion-that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain…”
Pathos control the emotions of an audience and evoke a certain feeling to persuade the crowd in this case. Finally, logos convince an audience using reasoning and logic. Antony expresses a variety of persuasive techniques throughout his entire speech and change the mindset of the commoners using ethos, pathos, and logos. In Marc Antony’s speech, he used to persuasive technique known as ethos.