The Role Of Genocide In Elie Wiesel's Night

Have you ever seen something so bad that you just couldn’t bear it anymore? Genocide is one of those things. Genocide is the killing of many people. During the World War two over 60 million people died. In the 1940s there was approximately a 2.3 billion people in the world. That’s only about 3% of the amount of people, but that’s still a lot of people. The Holocaust is actually one of the worst genocides in history because of the death toll. In the book “Night”, it talks all about the Holocaust. Elie is the one who wrote the book and it’s the true story about what he went through. Elie was a Jew during this time and if you were a Jew you pretty much were killed. He was brought into two concentration camps and he was just 16 years old. He lost his entire family. His father was eventually the only thing that was keeping him alive and he lost him too. Elie survived against all odds.

The Jews were always beaten, abused and killed. There was a never ending battle of this. The leaders of the concentration camps hurt them enough so they wouldn’t want to fight back, but not so bad that they wouldn’t be able to work. Elie said, “Dozens of inmates were

there to receive us, sticks in hand, striking everywhere, anyone, without reason.” This quote is when Elie is entering the first concentration camp. The SS used the penalty of death as a way to empower themselves even more. The reason I chose this quote was because the SS were horrible people and I just wanted to show that. I don’t think that all of them were all that bad because some were forced to do those things, but never in a million years would I want to do those things to another person. I wouldn’t be able to live with myself. Therefore I think that the SS people were all pretty bad, but some were way worse than others.
Throughout this paper it’s going to make it seem like the SS were awful and that’s because they did some awful things.

They threatened so many people so many times and they meant everything that they said. The SS weren’t easy people to get along with. The Jews didn’t have it easy in the camps. Elie also says that, “Jews were prohibited from leaving their residencies for three days, under the penalty of death.” This quote just goes to show that the Jews couldn’t live the life that they wanted to live. Elie said this right before they were forced to go into the camps. Elie didn’t know the horrible few years he would have after that and even though not being able to live the life you want to live is horrible, being threatened and on the verge of death everyday is one of the worst things that will happen in someone's

life.
“Can this be true? This is the twentieth century, not the middle ages. Who would allow such crimes to be committed? How could the world remain silent?” Although this isn’t in the main part of the book it still has a strong impact on the book itself. Elie heard a little boy, a little Jewish boy, ask this to his father. No one should ever have to ask that about anything and that’s what makes it so sad that someone would even have to ask that. Genocide should never have been something that people would have to worry about and they still shouldn’t have to. Even though life is hard and definitely not perfect, these things could definitely stay out of lives.
No one likes hard times. Like I’ve said before, genocide is an awful thing. I don’t want to have to watch genocide become a problem like it used to be then. Elie even said that, “ I succeeded in digging a hole in that wall of dead people, a small hole through which I could drink a little air.” This happened at his second camp. This was when there was just bodies upon bodies on top of each other whether you were alive or dead. That just sounds horrible and I wouldn’t want that to happen to you or me. This topic is so important because it still happens around the world. If we don’t watch what we do then these things could get out of hand and then we wouldn’t be able to stop them. Then we would have an even bigger problem on our hands then we do now.