The Dangers of Not-Caring.

2. The ending on the short story 'The Lottery' by Shirley Jackson is shocking. The whole story leads the reader to believe that the winnings of the lottery will be something desirable, but instead, the person who draws the slip with the little black dot on it, gets stoned. In this story the person happened to be a chipper young women named Tessie. At first this seems crazy and unrealistic. But if we look at the world's history and our past, it doesn't seem that bizarre. There are many examples of this in our history. How 'normal' people, with respectable jobs, happy families and university degrees, turn around and can do something so horrible , such as, kill another human being. There are many examples of this in history and even now. Known leaders and members of the KKK (Ku Klux Klan) have been very smart and respectable people in their 'normal lives', they have families, nice houses, and good educations...but then, because of some of their beliefs, have done unimaginable, disgusting things. Killed innocent people because of their skin colour. The lottery may seem bizarre when it is first read, but once you start to think about real life situations, it's not that out of line.

3. Elie Wiesel's speech 'The Perils of Indifference' was moving and emotional. He talked about, how people are indifferent, such as in 'The Lottery' where all the townspeople turned a blind eye when Tessie pulls out the soiled piece of paper. They don't listen to her pleas, they just stone her, because that is the thing to do. Nobody in the village tries to stop or stand up for Tessie, they just use the mob mentality to make sure it is not themselves getting stoned. In his speech, Elie described his days in the concentration camps. He, along with many others thought 'If [the leaders] knew, surely those leaders would have moved heaven and earth to intervene.' (445) He thought that if anyone knew that the Jewish people were suffering in these concentration camps, that they would help, they would stop what they were doing to help the sufferers. But some did know, they knew what was going on and didn't stop it. He, along with the theme of The Lottery, describe that, if the suffering is not effecting you, you are mostly indifferent. This of coarse, is not true with every single person, in every single situation...but it has definitely been apparent throughout history.