Dehumanization In The Book Night By Elie Wiesel

Elie faces extreme dehumanization like when Franek saw him as a way to get extra money. Though he was able to handle the holocaust because he showed humanity to others and others gave it to him back. At the start of the book when Elie’s family maid tried to save them from their fate and when Elie lived for his father and showed empathy to him. Elie constantly gets

The book Night by Elie Wiesel offers a harrowing account of the atrocities that were inflicted on Jews during the Holocaust. The Jews were subjected to inhumane treatment, such as being forcefully deported to concentration camps, starved, worked until exhaustion, and routinely beaten, among other forms of cruelty. The brutalization of Jews reached its peak with their systematic extermination in gas chambers and crematoria. These events offer insight into the dehumanization of Jews under Nazi rule. The book offers a reminder of the horrors of the Holocaust and the need to prevent such tragedies from occurring in the future Jews were subjected to inhumane treatment in concentration camps during the Holocaust.

While many people believe that Elie was able to keep his humanity during the Holocaust, it is clear that what he went through in the concentration camps dehumanized him because of how he acted when his father was being beaten and later passed away. Proof that Elie was fully dehumanized in the Holocaust was

“I told him that I did not believe that they could burn people in our age, that humanity would never tolerate it…” -Elie Wiesel ( https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/tag/holocaust ) book that describes the Holocaust very well, through the eyes of the author Elie Wiesel, is Night. The Holocaust was an event in history that impacted millions of lives and souls. Through the book Night there were cases that demonstrated dehumanization towards the Jewish people, the selection, comparison to animals and other creatures, and starvation. At the arrival to the concentration camp, a selection was taken place and the Jewish people went a certain way based on gender, age, ability to do certain things, and health.

Elie was beaten countless times by other people. No one was safe from the anger and hatred that fueled the Nazis. But what stood out to everyone in the camp was the tragic death of the young boy who was hanged. His death lasted longer and the horror the others had to witness as they walked away. Nothing could be done, this moment is where Elie no longer believes his religion.

For Elie specifically, the loss of his home in Sighet, his first day in Auschwitz, and the punishing route to Buchenwald were all dehumanizing experiences that vastly changed his views on himself and the world around him. To begin, losing his home in Sighet, along with everything he knew, caused Elie to perceive his own identity differently. Next, the horrors the first day of Auschwitz ushered in had caused Elie to see the world in a different, more negative light. Finally, the route to Buchenwald essentially stripped Elie of any hope to survive that he might have had left, even after everything he’d been through. Altogether, it’s hard to discuss painful topics like the Holocaust; it seems it would be easier to ignore them or dismiss the events as a thing of the past.

A third example of dehumanization is the way in which the prisoners were forced to endure horrific physical and emotional abuse. This is evident in the way Elie describes the treatment he and his father received from the SS guards at the concentration camps. He writes, "The SS seemed more preoccupied, more worried, than usual. At times, they seemed to forget us.

From then on, I had no other name” (Wiesel 42). Hitler takes away the only thing that Elie has left. His name. Although he still has his identity, by calling someone only a code they begin to believe that they do not deserve to be treated like human beings and they don’t have enough significance to be viewed as a person with value. Another example of Elie Wiesel’s loss of identity is when he believes that he has to look a certain way to survive.

One of the first things to happen to Elie and his family was psychological torture. He, his family, and the many other Jews with them knew that they would be forced to leave. However, in a sick game, the Nazi’s toyed with the Jews by making them stand and run; the Jews never truly knew when they would be forced to leave their entire lives behind. “We stood, We were counted. We sat down.

Elie is a human, but “from the depths of the mirror, a corpse was contemplating me. The look in his eyes as he gazed at me has never left me” (Wiesel 115). He is tortured, is suffered from hunger, thirsty, and the departure from his loving ones. His humanity is gradually and almost destroyed by the Nazis and the Holocaust. Not only Elie, so do other people.

He showed the readers a personal view of the Nazi's treatment to the prisoners. The hell Elie went through in the camps is something that he will never forget. In contrast the dehumanization the jews received was very harsh it was something that changed their lives forever. They lost their possession, family,morality and their identity. Because of the strength Elie had through this horrible experience he has gained a stronger

This ties back to dehumanization because humans give things they deem important or significant names. The act of taking away the Jew’s names means the Nazis do not view them as significant, further dehumanizing the Jewish prisoners. Similarly, early in Elie’s second day in Auschwitz Birkenau, at five o’clock in the morning, the prisoners were told to leave the barrack and to strip naked to receive their prison uniforms. During this Elie again, narrates, “Another barrack: the storeroom. Very long tables.

“What happened to me? My father had just been struck, in front of me, and I had not even blinked. I had watched and kept silent” (Wiesel 39). Many of the prisoners were subject to abuse both mentally and physically and were in turn affected both mentally and socially. Prisoners commonly became dehumanized and in the case of Elie and his father, became more distant socially.

Suffering not only forces people to make inhumane decisions but it also causes people to lose hope and give up on themselves. In this section of the book, Elie describes a time where he was devastated to see his father beaten and hurt in the camps. Throughout his time in the camps, Elie saw and heard the abuse that was given to people in the camp killing his hope. The biggest turning point in the story was when he saw his father getting beat. When Idek “began beating [Elie’s father] with an iron bar … [Elie’s] father simply doubled over under the blows, but then [Elie's father] seemed to break in two like an old tree struck by lightning”

Elie was held captive in concentration camps from 1944-1945. During his time in the concentration camps, he became grateful for what he had, overcame countless obstacles, and more importantly kept fighting until he was free. [The Holocaust is very important to learn about because it can teach you some important life lessons.] You should always be grateful for what you have, no matter what the circumstances are. This lesson can be learned when Elie says, “After my father’s death, nothing could touch me any more”(109).