Synthesis

1. The Hazards of Apathy

2. From about 1450-1700, the Roman-Catholic churches of Europe engaged in the truly heinous crime of witch hunting. Many villages in rural Europe were involved in the burning, drowning, and drawing and quartering of many women in their communities. "The Lottery," by Shirley Jackson, reveals a peaceful and tiny village that is able to commit the crime of stoning a woman to death based upon the random chance of her fate being drawn from a box. Similarly, the church used such techniques as floating a person in water, and comparing their weight to that of a duck, to decide whether the women on trial was "guilty," or not. The level of the community involvement with the stoning in the story is equal to the involvement of community that would have been present in a witch burning, and the witch's family and friends would have turned against her in the same way.

3. Elie Wiesel's speech "The Perils of Indifference" directly relates to the story "The Lottery," by Shirley Jackson. The townspeople of the story perfectly illustrate Wiesel's point that "for the person that is indifferent, his or her neighbors are of no consequence. And therefore, their lives are meaningless." The meaninglessness of the life that the townspeople take echoes in the beginning of the story, as the many topics of conversation in the town are all superficial, involving the weather, dishes and crops. Not a single person, not the woman's children, not her husband, nor her neighbors or friends, tell her that they will miss her, or love her. Instead, they show a complete apathy towards her situation, and refuse any kind of emotion. Throughout his essay, Wiesel is cautioning against exactly that lack of emotion towards fellow human beings. His essay truly presents the same argument as Jackson's story, that indifference is one of the predominant failings of human nature, and, if left unchecked, will destroy the lives of individuals and societies.