Human Action: Indifference or Making a Difference

A detailed Summary of Human Action: Indifference or Making a Difference

Bystanders are ordinary people who play it safe. At the beginning of Cynthia Ozick's "Of Christian Heroism" we learn much about bystanders and the affects of their actions - or rather their inaction - during the Holocaust. Ozick directly involves us in the story of Christian heroism; she asks us to really imagine how it was during the Holocaust and to explore the ordinary human reaction during that time. By identifying with and pointing out the indifference of the majority, we learn how rare and magnificent heroism was then and still is now. Ozick recognizes that it may be human nature to be a bystander; however, she urges us to try heroism instead to learn how we can make a difference for mankind.

At the start of her essay, Ozick includes a quote by Herbert Gold:

There is a story about Clare Booth Luce complaining that she was bored with hearing about the Holocaust. A Jewish friend of hers said he perfectly understood her sensitivity in the matter; in fact, he had the same sense of repetitiousness and fatigue, hearing so often about the Crucifixion. (167)

Before starting her essay, I believe Ozick is setting the tone to show that we live in a time where indifference becomes an everyday reaction. Our minds are filled wi

When a whole population takes on the status of bystander, the victims are without allies; the criminals, unchecked, are strengthened; and only then do we need to speak of heroes. When a field is filled from end to end with sheep, a stag stands out. When a continent is filled from end to end with the compliant, we learn what heroism is. (170)

Ozick also wonders what makes the heroes different. She states:

It is typical of all of them to deny any heroism. 'It was only decent,' they say. But no: most people are decent; the bystanders were decent. The rescuers are somehow raised above the merely decent. When the rescuers declare that heroism is beside the point, it is hard to agree with them. (172)

Ozick goes on to state that because the bystanders were so large in number, what they did or what they didn't do created the status quo. If they accepted the way things were, that was the way things remained. If they had not been docile and had not accepted the propaganda but rather had massed together to protest the events going on around them, a call for heroes would have been unnecessary. Ozick laments this fact:

Indifference is not so much a gesture of looking away - of choosing to be passive - as it is an active disinclination to feel. Indifference shuts down the human, and it does it deliberately, with all the strength deliberateness demands. Indifference is as determined - as forcibly muscular - as any blow. For the victims on their way to the chimneys, there is scarcely anything to choose between a thug with an uplifted truncheon and the decent citizen who will not lift up his eyes. (171)

Although the bystanders did not actively and directly try to cause harm to the victims of the Holocaust, Ozick is concerned with the conscious indifference towards their plight. The bystanders chose not an act of assistance, but instead the shameless act of indifference and lack of compassion for those suffering around them. I can not - and do not want to - imagine desperately calling out and pleading for help only to have someone turn their back to me or pretend that they can't hear me or just don't want to help me - what a terrible feeling! And imagine being the indifferent bystander - what a terrible feeling to turn away from ignoring pleas of help and having to live with the memory of knowing you did nothing. Ozick is showing us how we are accountable for each of our actions towards each other and ourselves. Through doing so, she is asking us to not be indifferent about the events of the Holocaust, but rather to commit ourselves to compassion and understanding each other.

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Approximate Word count = 3228
Approximate Pages = 13 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: People