The world has suffered much indifference, and I have found that most people on this earth are happy to remain bystanders- blissfully ignorant and entirely uninterested in the matters of this world. For them, it is easier not to care, and to be so entirely absorbed in their own life that they don’t take the time to realize other people, or their individual problems. Indifference is the greatest epidemic. The fact that one is able to see a fellow being suffering, struggling, and walk past them without a glance is terrifying. People are caring less and less every day. This disinterest is the root of evil. As Elie Wiesel said, “To remain silent and indifferent is the greatest sin of all.” If we are not condemning sin, we are condoning it; if one
…show more content…
The poem is about a hangman who comes into town and sets up gallows, saying, “He who served me the best…shall earn the rope on the gallows-tree.” The hangman chooses a victim at random and hangs him, even though the man was blameless. Despite this, nobody speaks up for him because the townspeople all fear the hangman. They only let out sighs of relief that it isn’t them being hung on the gallows. This process continues until there is only one townsperson left, all the rest having been murdered by the hangman. The hangman then reveals that he has saved the gallows for this last townsperson, saying that he has served him the most faithfully by being so cowardly and never speaking out for the others who had been killed without reason. “I did no more than you let me do,” declares the hangman. The poem ends with the townsperson alone, hung on the gallows, with nobody there to defend him and his “innocence.” The Bible also supports the idea that indifference is a sin. In the book of Obadiah, the prophet Obadiah declared judgement on Edom, a small country, for standing by and watching as God’s people was destroyed. The citizens of Edom were bystanders. Even though they didn’t openly partake in the destruction of the Judah’s people, they allowed it by not taking actions against it. They remained indifferent, and they were punished by …show more content…
In 1990 a civil war broke out in Rwanda between two ethnic groups, the Hutus and the Tutsis, for power. The two groups eventually came up with a peace agreement in 1992, though tensions still ran high. Two years later, Rwanda’s president was killed, and soon afterwards Hutus took over Rwanda’s capital. In the following weeks, Hutus killed anyone who they suspected to be a Tutsi. Tutsi population was significantly decreased. About 800,000 people from both groups were slaughtered over the course of 100 days. This event made history as the quickest killing spree that had ever occurred. Corpses are said to have piled six feet high. Despite these horrendous reports, President Clinton refused to call the Rwandan massacre a genocide so that he could avoid U.S. involvement. International leaders did the same, and even though the entire world saw the catastrophic effects of the Rwandan genocide, nobody wanted to intervene. The Holocaust is another example of what can happen when nobody speaks up. Most of the inhabitants of Europe were aware of the horrible way the Nazis were treating the Jews. However, nobody said anything, out of fear. If everyone had risen together to stand up for the rights of the Jews, maybe today we would remember a different story, or one with not so many
The poem is about a hangman who comes into town and sets up gallows, saying, “He who served me the best…shall earn the rope on the gallows-tree.” The hangman chooses a victim at random and hangs him, even though the man was blameless. Despite this, nobody speaks up for him because the townspeople all fear the hangman. They only let out sighs of relief that it isn’t them being hung on the gallows. This process continues until there is only one townsperson left, all the rest having been murdered by the hangman. The hangman then reveals that he has saved the gallows for this last townsperson, saying that he has served him the most faithfully by being so cowardly and never speaking out for the others who had been killed without reason. “I did no more than you let me do,” declares the hangman. The poem ends with the townsperson alone, hung on the gallows, with nobody there to defend him and his “innocence.” The Bible also supports the idea that indifference is a sin. In the book of Obadiah, the prophet Obadiah declared judgement on Edom, a small country, for standing by and watching as God’s people was destroyed. The citizens of Edom were bystanders. Even though they didn’t openly partake in the destruction of the Judah’s people, they allowed it by not taking actions against it. They remained indifferent, and they were punished by …show more content…
In 1990 a civil war broke out in Rwanda between two ethnic groups, the Hutus and the Tutsis, for power. The two groups eventually came up with a peace agreement in 1992, though tensions still ran high. Two years later, Rwanda’s president was killed, and soon afterwards Hutus took over Rwanda’s capital. In the following weeks, Hutus killed anyone who they suspected to be a Tutsi. Tutsi population was significantly decreased. About 800,000 people from both groups were slaughtered over the course of 100 days. This event made history as the quickest killing spree that had ever occurred. Corpses are said to have piled six feet high. Despite these horrendous reports, President Clinton refused to call the Rwandan massacre a genocide so that he could avoid U.S. involvement. International leaders did the same, and even though the entire world saw the catastrophic effects of the Rwandan genocide, nobody wanted to intervene. The Holocaust is another example of what can happen when nobody speaks up. Most of the inhabitants of Europe were aware of the horrible way the Nazis were treating the Jews. However, nobody said anything, out of fear. If everyone had risen together to stand up for the rights of the Jews, maybe today we would remember a different story, or one with not so many