Elie wiesel and his "perils of Indifference" speech (rhetoric)

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Topic Elie WieselIn the East Room of the White House on April 1, 1 Elie Wiesel gave his speech The Perils of Indifference Lessons Learned From a Violent Century." It was the 7th evening of the series. He spoke to a diverse audience of members of Congress, ambassadors, religious leaders, historians, human rights activists, and even high school students. These fortunate audience members got the chance to sit down and listen to a master lecturer speak. Elie Wiesel flawlessly managed to establish his ethos, keep a sound speaker audience relationship by including himself in his enactment, by treating a sensitive subject of blame with respect, and finally with his use and knowledge of ideologies and ideographs.Elie Wiesel does not have to do much persuading to establish his ethos, but he does a good job of it. He has more expertise than almost anyone could. He is a Jewish holocaust survivor. In the summer of 144, as a teenager in Hungary, Elie Wiesel, along with his father, his mother, and his sister were deported by the Nazis to Auschwitz extermination camp in occupied Poland. Upon their arrival, Wiesel and his father were selected for slave labor and wound up at a nearby rubber factory. His daily life included starvation rations of soup and bread. He faced brutal discipline and a constant struggle against overwhelming despair and lurking death. He constantly had to live with the fear of dying while watching others die themselves. In January 145, as the Russian Army drew near, Wiesel and his father were quickly evacuated from Auschwitz and to forced march to Gleiwitz. Then they were herded on to a train to Buchenwald in Germany, where his father, mother, and his younger sister eventually died.

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After Elie Wiesel was liberated from the concentration camp he moved to Paris and became a journalist. He later came to America settled in New York. Since 176, he has been an Andrew Mellon Professor in the Humanities at Boston University. He has received many awards and honors including the 186 Nobel Peace Prize and the Presidential Medal of Freedom. He was also the Founding Chair of the United States Holocaust Memorial. Wiesel has written over 40 books including Night, an autobiography about his Holocaust experiences (History Place).

Even if members of the Millennium lectures audience were not familiar with Elie Wiesel's tragic history, they would understand it after they heard his speech because of his artistic ethos. Elie Wiesel demonstrates his ethos particularly well. He begins his speech by telling a small story about a young Jewish boy. An interesting part of this story is that he never mentions specifically that the young boy was actually himself. I assumed it was Elie Wiesel who was the young boy, because I was familiar with his background. One of the first clues that hint to the fact that Wiesel was a holocaust survivor is that he says, "I am filled with a profound and abiding gratitude for the American people." He mentions this right after he tells us that the Americans liberated the young boy from the death camps.

Elie Wiesel's knowledge of the holocaust demonstrates his ethos. At one point in his speech he talks about the "Muselmanner", which he describes as people who were in torn blankets who didn't move, seemed unaware of their surroundings, and who were basically the living dead. The manner in which Wiesel talked about the Muselmanner made him seem like he was the little boy. After saying muselmanner he followed it with "As they were called." This phrase points to the fact that he was there at the death camps. The statement was said in the past tense. In the audio version of the text, he stated it a reminiscing voice. In another instance, he stated, "Rooted in our tradition, some of us felt that to be abandoned by humanity was not the ultimate. We felt that to be abandoned by God was worse than being punished by him." Wiesel's usage of the words "us" and "we" are strong words that include him in the holocaust experience and therefore establishing his ethos.

Now that I've shown that Elie Wiesel has established his ethos with his expertise in the subject matter, the text must be examined for elements of goodwill and trustworthiness. He demonstrates his trustworthiness when he addresses the President. He said, "And now I stand before you, Mr. President- commander-in-chief of the army that freed me and tens of thousands of others- I am filled with a profound and abiding gratitude to the American people." (Wiesel) The fact that he was standing before the president of the army that freed him is a powerful sentence. Standing before someone in the position of the man whose political powers saved his life is not something that Elie Wiesel or anyone would take lightly. It is an honor for him to be in this position at this time. Furthermore he expresses his gratitude to the President and the American people. This man is not in any position to be dishonest or untrustworthy to these people. He has a great amount of respect for the people who liberated him from the hell he lived. Wiesel feels this way because of the trauma he went through. According Judith Herman, one of the first stages in a victim's recovery is to feel safe. He eventually settled in America, a place where he can feel safe from persecution after his ordeal (Herman pg.16).

Elie Wiesel demonstrates the goodwill aspect of ethos through out his speech. The topic of his speech is not one that is entirely of finger pointing or the placement of blame. The point of his speech is to stop indifference amongst the human race. In the beginning of his speech he talks about some of the darkest points in human history. He mentions the countless wars, assassinations, and cultural blood baths of the last century. He calls people to stop the violence and the indifference people have towards one another. He gives instances of indifference and examples of their effects. He talks about how President Roosevelt sent a ship full of Jewish refugees back to Europe and how American companies still did business with German companies, even though they knew of the genocide that was happening there. The goal of his speech is to teach people that doing nothing about an atrocity is just as bad or even worse than being the perpetrator of the crime.

Elie Wiesel's motivation towards goodwill can also be explained by using Judith Herman's book, Trauma and Recovery. In her book she describes many instances of traumatic events. Many of these instances used Holocaust survivors as examples. One of the activities involved in recovering from such an experience, is for a victim to find a survivor mission. This helps a survivor to resolve some of their issues with their traumatic experiences by using their life to make other lives better. Wiesel's survivor mission is to educate others about the Holocaust and prevent other traumatic situations from happening to others. According to Herman, Wiesel feels "called upon to engage in a wider world." As a survivor, Wiesel feels a religious and political aspect in his tragedy. He is making meaning out of his life to help others so that his misfortunes can be rectified for some good towards mankind (Herman pg.07).

In a speaker audience relationship it is imperative that the speaker follows his call for action himself. If a speaker wants to be successful and wants the outcome of the speech to be just as successful, he or she must also show that they are participating in the call to action themselves. Wiesel's call to action is for all people to stop indifference. In his speech he supports his call by showing support for America's intervention in Kosovo. He comments, "But this time the world is not silent. This time we do respond. This time we intervene." (Wiesel) This lets the audience know that he supports the cause and that everyone does. Wiesel also uses the word we, this unites all Americans and includes himself in the action, allowing the audience to see his enactment. Wiesel also describes the time he saw President Clinton, Rabin, and Arafat at a meeting for peace. Wiesel described it as, "filled with drama and emotion…I was there and I will never forget it." (Wiesel) With this sentence Wiesel shows that he is involved in the peace process and is not indifferent, but supportive.

Wiesel has a powerful need and use of enactment. Psychiatrist Leo Eitinger, who worked with Jews who survived the Nazi death camps stated, "War and victims are something the community wants to forget; a veil of oblivion is drawn over everything painful and unpleasant. We find the two sides face to face; on one side the victims who perhaps wish to forget but cannot, and the other all those strong, often unconscious motives who very intensely both wish to forget and succeed in doing so. The contrast…is very painful for both sides. The weakest one…remains the losing party in this silent unequal dialogue."(Herman pg.8) In this passage there are the victims and the bystanders. The victims are the ones who usually lose that battle of remembrance. People do not like to hear bad things; its upsetting to them, but for the victim, Elie Wiesel, that's all he has are the memories. He must make the world remember. He is doing so through enactment. By his example he will make the world remember and therefore "WIN". Another way the subject can be approached is by looking at the statement, "Sharing the traumatic experience with others is a precondition for the restitution of a sense of a meaningful world." (Herman pg.70) If Wiesel wants to be able to fully live, he must make the world a safe, livable place for himself and others.

Many of Wiesel's calls to action are in question form. He includes himself in the calls to action by not saying "you" (as in you Americans) but "we". He asks questions such as, "What about the children? Oh, we see them on television" or "Do we hear their pleas" and "Do we learn from the past." All of these questions stimulate the audience's thinking and includes Wiesel himself into the questioning. When said in this manner Wiesel is not alienating his audience. Elie Wiesel is very careful with his relationship between himself and his audience. He does not throw an accusation of guilt at his audience. He actually seems to be forming a connection with his audience. According to Judith Herman, trauma isolates people from the group or a society. In identifying himself with the people in his audience, he is strengthening his self worth and humanity through the group (Herman pg.14).The millennium lectures was scheduled early enough so that Wiesel had to have known prior to the writing of his speech who was invited to be an audience member. Hillary Clinton said herself, It was more than a year ago that I asked Elie if he would be willing to participate in these Millennium Lectures." (History Place)This shows that he clearly knew who some of his immediate audience members were.

With the knowledge he had about his audience members he was very prepared. It was important for him to give a speech that did not place too much blame on one group of people. He tiptoed around blaming America for not stopping the Nazi death camps. He even said President was a good man with a heart, after he sent a boat full of refugees back to Europe. Wiesel was especially thankful to President Clinton and the First Lady Hillary. He said he was grateful to them three separate times in the speech.

It was important for Wiesel to thank the Americans and its leaders because of the content of the speech. The holocaust was a very serious tragedy and there are many individuals and countries that were at fault. It was even more important for Wiesel to have a good relationship with his audience because he is Jewish and can pass out blame. He has all the reason in the world to condemn America for her leaders' indifference. He suffered longer than he should have because our political leaders knew of the situations going in Europe and they did nothing to stop it.

There were of course portions of the speech that did confront the faults of American leaders. The catch is that Wiesel used the negative topics not to condemn, but to instead teach. For example when Wiesel approached the incident in which Roosevelt sent the St. Louis back to Europe he said the good things that the president accomplished. Wiesel pointed out that the president mobilized thousands of brave Americans to fight dictatorship, fascism, and Hitler. Here Wiesel is setting the dialogue up for a turn to the negative side. He calls the American people brave and says some good things about our country and its leaders. After doing so and warming up the audience, he approaches the situation by calling it a depressing tale. Then Wiesel skillfully tells the St. Louis story and follows it with neutral questions like "I don't understand?" and "what happened?" He uses this situation to show how even good countries like America are capable of showing the indifference that Wiesel is crusading against.

Next Wiesel brings up the case of American corporations that had business dealings with Germany during Word War II. With our businesses' help Germany acquired enough oil from America to help Germany invade France. Again instead pointing fingers and placing blame on America, Wiesel ends that part of the speech by asking, "How is one to explain their indifference?" Elie Wiesel and his speech were influenced by ideologies and ideographs. His speech also demonstrates how ideologies and ideographs can be challenged and broken. One ideology that Wiesel makes use of is religion. He begins by asking how the last century would be remembered. He follows this question with, "surely it will be judged, and judged severely, in both moral and metaphysical terms." Here he is saying the ideology that God judges and punishes all. This off course is not a universal belief. There are many atheists who do not believe in God or judgment day. This is a specific example of how an ideology such as religion that was used in a text. Another religious ideology was used when he describes how in the Jewish tradition, some felt to be abandoned by society is not as bad as being abandoned by God. Wiesel uses this ideology to further his argument that indifference by people and even a God is a morally reprehensible thing to do.

Wiesel manages to challenge American ideology in his speech. America is the home of the free and land of the brave. Wiesel describes it as, "America, a great country, the greatest democracy, the most generous of all nations in history." (Wiesel) To this day it seems that Wiesel still cannot fathom why President Roosevelt did not allow the St. Louis' Jewish passengers to disembark their ship. This action contradicted our ideology. Our president did not allow over 1000 Jewish refugees to come on shore even after Kristallnatch. The whole world knew that the Jews were beginning to be persecuted. Our actions as a country allowed this (the St. Louis incident) to occur when we are supposed to be the home of the free and brave. Wiesel also discusses the fact that the American government knew about the holocaust and did not stop it. For a land that recognizes freedom as a virtue of principle, we certainly did not demonstrate it when innocent groups of people were being exterminated.

An ideograph that Wiesel used in his speech was the term heart. He uses it to describe President Roosevelt when he refused to let the refugees into America. He said, "I don't understand, President Roosevelt was a good man, with a heart." Heart is an ideograph when used in this context. Instead of using it literally as in the organ, Wiesel is using it as a part of the President that embodies good nature and kindness. Here Wiesel is saying that he thought the President was good and kind person.

In conclusion, Elie Wiesel's speech, "The Perils of Indifference" was solidly written. He established his ethos completely but incorporating all the aspects of ethos credibility, trustworthiness, and good will. He maintained a good speaker audience relationship by gently and skillfully placing blame on an America's faults in handling the Holocaust situation during World War II. He used the information not as condemning facts, but instead as a teaching tool. Wiesel also incorporated himself in his call to action for Americans. He successfully showed himself as an active advocate in his call to action against in difference. He demonstrates his knowledge and us of American ideologies and ideographs in his speech by using America's ideals and virtues. All in all Elie Wiesel did a lot more than just participate in the millennium lectures; he showed America that even though we were at one time at fault we are learning from our mistakes and have hope that indifference will not rein upon us in the future.

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