The Lottery and The Perils of Indifference

Both "The Lottery" and "The Perils of Indifference" explore the idea that ordinary, moral people have the capacity to commit terrible acts of violence given the proper circumstance. Perhaps no event can better confirm this than the holocaust. Under the influence of a charismatic leader the people of Germany acted in ways that were completely uncharacteristic of them. In almost a cult like way, the people were taken in by eloquence and convinced to act violently.Something similar is seen in "The Lottery." In this case ordinary citizens are killing people annually for a reason long forgotten. Simply because it has always been done villagers the villagers partake without question. What they do is randomly select another villager's name from a box and stone them to death, showing no remorse for killing the peole they were once friends with. On any other day the villagers are non violent people with morals. "The Perils of Indifference" suggests that the worst form of violence is indifference. The victims of the holocaust certainly suffered greatly at the hands of their captors during world war two, but many feel more anger towards those who stood by and did nothing at all to help. It cannot simply be said that the allies did not know of the atrocities being comitted because in truth they did. The Germans' behaviour during the war is accurately depicted by the villagers of the lottery'. They became the willing executioners of the war contrary to the beliefs of some people that they were forced into by Hitler. Caught up in the fierce nationality that emerged many Germans went out of their way to imprison their 'un-German' neighbors that they were once friends with. Some of the efforts carried out to help the Nazi cause were far greater than any task instructed to them. The actions of the Nazis clearly demonstrate the capacity and willingness of an ordinary citizen to act inhuman often without the need for threatening to convince them to do so.