Genocide Paper

Ryan Moser

College Reading

Sara Kepros

Genocide/Evil Reflection

            A person is different, whether good or evil or vice versa, based on their human character.  Many people suffer from the evil power and the danger that the government puts on the working people.  Evil is a psychological term meaning exercise of power.  This type of power is shown in many forms, even from genocides.  From many genocides, the Holocaust and the battle in Cambodia will be talking about what happened during the genocide and explain who would be considered an everyday hero.

The human character reflects on the amount of behavior shown in each genocide.  “The race toward death had begun.” quote from Night.  From the movie, “The Killing Fields”, Cambodians were afraid of the war going on, plus the Khmer Rouge group, selecting families, including kids and torturing them.   All families were subjected to interrogation, torturing, and killing because the Khmer group thought that all parents were the enemy to them.  Even the children, played this evil game of torture and kill because they were ripped apart from loving their parents and watched their families work or sent to be killed. 

One special person, Pran, lived through the malicious tactics; even escaped from near death.  Pran was a reporter and helped write about the war, plus taking pictures of the gruesome killings happening there.  During the time in Cambodia, Americans were trying to bomb the state, but were somewhat unsuccessful because of the miss-printed coordinates.  People were also sent to live on their own because of a massive evacuation.  Pran was a good example of an everyday hero because he showed loyalty to Schanberg and for reporting, in general.  Pran always thought on the positive side of the worse situations. 

Another genocide that involves the human behavior would be the Holocaust.  This involved many Hitler army men, taking control of millions of Jewish culture and killing them with many deathly experiments.  I think that Hitler is, overall, showing that he is humane to these people.  The Human Character that these soldiers are in is the situation or “Bad Barrels” evil because they think that, by caging and torturing these Jews that come from the cities, they feel dominate over everyone else.  I think that by wearing the Nazi band, people are disgusted of you; working for the enemy and creating chaos. 

Although one person, Elie Wiesel, lived, worked and survived through the harsh conditions.  “But we no longer feared death, in any event not this particular death.” Quote from Night.  Some ways that the Jewish people died were from the crematorium, starvation, mass shootings by SS soldiers, and Zyklon B gas put into the gas chambers.  “In the air, the smell of burning flesh.  It must have been around midnight.”  Quote from Night.  The Zyklon B gas was the worst of them all because the pellets mixed in with carbon dioxide, from people breathing, created death through suffocation.  From the days that Elie was in the camp, he describes the first night that he went through.  He thought if working or starving or sleeping would be the last time until death.  “My heart was about to burst.  There.  I was face-to-face with the Angel of Death.”  Quote from Night.  Elie Weisel is considered an everyday hero because he helped his father more than helping himself.  His father was dying from some form of diarrhea, so he made sure that they were going to make to the end, no matter what. 

            Here are the reasons for each genocide and who would be considered the everyday hero.  To have Elie talk about the concentration camp and the many killings that happened, when talking to Oprah, shows that he is still concerned with all of the killings and just understand why.  For survivors telling their stories from living in Cambodia, they are showing that no matter how hard the situation is, there is still a chance to live.  I believe that good outweighs evil, in any circumstances, because many people in camps believe in the hope that will come, later in their life.