Human Nature

Human Nature

Human Nature is the feelings and behavior traits of humankind. Personal reflections such as Hiroshima by John Hersey and Night by Elie Wiesel show the nature of humans. What we learn about human nature from reading personal reflections is that first of all humans are stubborn, and also us humans are naturally indifferent in certain situations. Being stubborn is not a good thing, but it’s also not a bad thing. In the personal narrative Night, the Jews heard of how in neighboring places other Jews were being killed by Germans. The Jews ignored it, until Germans went to Hungary. The Jews thought Hungary was the farthest they would go so they ignored that too. Three days passed and Germans were living in the Jews’ homes (Wiesel, pg 6-9). Germans were very friendly they claimed, so they ignored the possibility of being harmed by them (Wiesel, pg 10). Then the ghettos were created, (Wiesel, pg 11) and Jews were worried. However in Hiroshima the stubbornness begin in the beginning with Mrs. Hatsuyo. Mrs. Hatsuyo is always taking her kids to a safe area when she hears the warning signals, and she is tired because it always ends up being a false alarm (Hersey, pg 6-7). So when the siren went off for the bomb her stubbornness leads her to fall asleep and pay it no mind. As a result of that her house ends up being three quarters of a mile away from the bomb. Another act of stubbornness is Mr. Fukai. Mr. Fukai refuses to leave the mission house and go to Asano Park. Even after Father Kleinsorge puts him on his back to carry, Mr. Fukai manages to get off. He ends up running straight into the fire never to be seen again. (Hersey Pg, 28-29). Acts of indifference is shown a lot in Night, especially from Elie towards his father. When Elie’s father had asked to go to the bathroom, and the gypsy slapped him, Elie just stood there not doing anything about it, but still wishing he could have (Wiesel pg, 39). Also in Night the prisoners showed an act of indifference. When the prisoners saw the man going to go drink the cauldrons of soup unattended (Wiesel pg, 59-60) they didn’t stop him or anything, knowing they knew what the consequences would be for him. For the personal reflection Hiroshima an act of indifference was at the Medical Station on the East Parade Ground. Instead of the doctors and nurses seeing to all the patients, they turned away the heavily wounded and saw to the victims with small wounds. The Medical Station figured that heavily wounded patients would die quicker, so there would be no point in helping them. The government is also at fault because they were so focused on the horrors of WWII that they didn’t do much at all to help the actual people of Hiroshima knowing that they were in critical condition. People died in the bombing, and the rest were dying from radiation poisoning and yet nothing was done by the Government to help them. Personal reflections do teach us about Human Nature because it shows how other human, and ourselves behave in different situations. Being stubborn because you think things that happen to others won’t happen to you because you’re not where they are. Acting indifferent because you’re afraid something will happen to you if you help or because you’re focused on something else at that moment. Human nature is just natural so there’s really nothing to do about it.