The Indifference of People to Suffering

548 Words2 Pages

The indifference of people is to behave or act as if something, someone or some event

does not affect them or that they are somehow immune to it, or it does not apply to them,

their family, or anyone they know. Indifference is to be without compassion and without

sensitivity and not caring about or the denial of the suffering of others.

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. The political prisoner in his cell, the hungry children, the homeless refugees ­­ not to respond to their plight, not to relieve their solitude by offering them a spark of hope is to exile them from human memory. And in denying their humanity, we betray our own. (Elie Wiesel, The Perils of Indifference, American Rhetoric, 12 April 1999)

The indifference to the pain and suffering of others is a continuing theme of reflection

and comment. One of the effects of in...

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