![]() ![]() By speaking on his experience with suffering and death he establishes an ethical qualification to speak about the subject, and then interjects his claim that other nations should not let suffering occur. He changes the presupposition that nations should not interfere with the affairs of other nations by speaking on his past, specifically his relationship with outside nations during the holocaust, wishing that they did not know what was going on inside of the concentration camps. These basic human principles are more innate and widely accepted than secondary presuppositions, which he ignores altogether. He makes the opposite point, that nations should interfere with the affairs of other nations without directly saying it by catering to deeply rooted moral presuppositions. By drawing on basic presuppositions such as suffering and death are terrible, we should protect children, killings related to ethnic cleansing are a hate crime, Wiesel does not have to address more complicated presuppositions such as nations should not interfere with the affairs of other nations. These support Wiesel’s claim that standing by and doing nothing to combat suffering has detrimental effects. The imagery of the dying children appeals to pathos. The ethical appeal here draws on the presupposition that suffering and death, specifically of children, is horrible. Do we hear their pleas? Do we feel their pain, their agony? Every minute one of them dies of disease, violence, famine.” Their fate is always the most tragic, inevitably. “What about the children? Oh, we see them on television, we read about them in the papers, and we do so with a broken heart. The primary example of this in the speech is: Wiesel resonates with these presuppositions by talking about the children in Kosovo who are dying. He creates these appeals by drawing on presuppositions such as the basic human ethical ideas that suffering and death are tragic, especially that of children. Throughout his speech, Wiesel uses a liberal amount of the artistic proofs ethos and pathos. He is also able to apply his past to the theme of the occasion, since he is a holocaust survivor, and the holocaust was a major event of the 20th century that should be addressed. As the ongoing war on Kosovo was resulting in a number of hate crimes, including ethnic cleansing, it provided Wiesel with an appeal to ethos, justifying him to talk on the subject because of his past as a victim of the ethnic cleansing of Jews during the holocaust. ![]() Another element of Wiesel’s kairos is his background relating to the topic of ethnic cleansing, and how he could apply it to the retrospective theme of the occasion. ![]() Wiesel’s discourse calls for action in Kosovo, and it had the potential to reach the ears of constituents and politicians alike. The audience was kairotic because it reached into the homes of not only Americans, but the intended audience of most world power countries. This gave Wiesel a reason to discuss his own past and apply it to the ongoing topic of Kosovo, which was a hot issue at the time. The theme was ideal because the Millennium Lecture Series was a conference about reflecting on the past century as a transition into the next century. His occasion is an ideal kairotic situation for his discourse because of its theme, audience, and his ethos relating to the topic. The primary exigence that Wiesel addresses in his speech is the war in Kosovo however, his past shines a judicial light on the holocaust itself to address his primary concern: should world powers (and people in general) intervene on behalf of the oppressed, whoever the oppressed may be? As Wiesel had a national audience and a conference with a theme of retrospection, Wiesel had a window of opportunity to speak about the past as related to the future. This was an issue that needed to be talked about. The war going on in Kosovo required intervention on behalf of the UN and NATO. ![]() One speaker, Elie Wiesel, a prominent Holocaust survivor, took advantage of this occasion to speak on a prominent issue at the time: the war in Kosovo. This took place inside of the White House, and was televised for the nation. In 1999, on the brink of the new century, President Bill Clinton called forth a series of individuals to give a speech at his Millennium Lecture Series. Analysis of The Perils of Indifference by Elie Wiesel ![]()
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