The Danger of Carelessness

  In the short story "The Perils of Indifference" by Shirley Jackson, a woman is stoned to death by her fellow villagers at the end of the passage. This can be related to many situations during high school and middle school life. Multiple students have been bullied by their peers due to peer pressure which is exactly what happens to the woman when she gets stoned by her own family! If kids grow up around bullying its what they're used to and they see no wrong in what they're doing. The same can be said about the children that are handed stones to kill their own mother. They have been brought up on this idea, and the fact that its their mother doesnt even bother them. While reading the end of the story, most people fail to comprehend what took place. Until you take a deeper look at yourself and your own life, it will remain the same way. But once you  take everything into perspective, you will soon realize how capable you are, and how possible it is for events such as this to take place.

  Elie Wiesels message in "Perils of Indifference" can closely relate to the topic presented in "The Lottery" by Shirley Jackson. The message Elie Wiesel is trying to get across is that in most cases, not caring and not taking action, is even more harmful than releasing your anger in a negative way. As the black dot is drawn by the mother in the short story, the townspeople, and even her own family show no care or any compassion towards her. Instead, they hand her children large rocks in order to stone her with. Elie's points do not only relate to other ideas from stories, but they also depict many tragedys throughout history. As the holocaust was taking place in Germany and other european countries, the United States claimed that they had no knowledge of the events taking place. Think what you want, but to some extent the states must have had some idea of the horrific killings happening. The simple fact that they refused to act and let these events continue, is in a sense, worse than what the Germans were doing.