Literary works on the topic of indifference, real cruelty. Mitchell Wilson on indifference

Indifference

• Indifference is an indifferent attitude towards other people, their problems and troubles. This is an unwillingness to help them even a little, to ease their pain and suffering. An indifferent person will not extend a helping hand to someone in need; he can calmly pass by.
• Indifference is also an indifferent, passive attitude towards everything that happens. An indifferent person is not interested in what is happening around him. He lives in his own world, with his own problems, concerns, and everything that interests and worries his contemporaries, people living with him in the same country, city, working in the same team - all this is indifferent to him.
• Indifference is a human character trait that leads him to spiritual emptiness, unwillingness to respond to the feelings and emotions of others, to anger and even cruelty. An indifferent person does not feel sorry for anything or anyone, he loses shame and conscience.
• Indifference is sometimes the result of a tired soul, when a person has experienced so much in his life that he tries to protect himself from new troubles with indifference. Such indifference can pass over time, the soul will gradually begin to warm up, returning to its previous state, when a person can again sympathize with others. But such a process may not occur, then the person will remain completely indifferent to everything around him.
• Indifference is one of the evil vices of man. With the tacit consent of indifferent people, the most disgusting things can be done.
• Indifference is a person’s loss of the ability to love, make friends, appreciate anything in life, the inability to enjoy the beauty around them, because those who are indifferent don’t care. Indifference makes the person himself unhappy and brings a lot of trouble and even misfortune to those around him.

Synonyms for the word “indifference”:

- coldness

- impartiality

- indifference

- insensitivity

- indifference

- apathy

- phlegmatic

Responsiveness

• Responsiveness is one of the positive qualities personality, which manifests itself in the desire to help another, sympathize with him, be close to him, and provide assistance.
• Responsiveness is associated with humanism, with love for people, the desire to be needed by them, especially in difficult moments.
• Responsiveness is also verbal support of another when it is necessary to reassure, or simply listen. These are specific deeds and actions, which are expressed in the fact that a person, leaving his problems in the background, first of all helps those who need this help. Therefore, a selfish, narcissistic person is unlikely to be responsive to someone else’s misfortune, because for him, his problems are most important.
• A responsive person is sensitive to the state of another, he can predict that he needs help and support, without waiting to hear about it. Responsiveness is the result of tact, attentiveness, and sincerity towards others. This is a trait of strong and well-mannered people.
• Responsiveness is adjacent to selflessness, because it does not require praise or reward. This is a state of mind when a person simply cannot live differently, passing by people and all living things who need help.

Synonyms for the word "responsiveness":

- attention

- participation

- sympathy

- good nature

- humanity

- sensitivity

- attentiveness

- sincerity

- compassion

What is indifference?

This is an indifferent attitude towards everything that surrounds a person. Everything that happens around a person does not touch him at all, does not interest him, he does not want to take any part in it. True, with one amendment, if this does not affect him own interests. Indifferent people live by the principle:

Unfortunately, there are more and more indifferent people in our world. And it's scary.

After all, a person can be cruel due to various circumstances, often beyond his control. He acts cruelly involuntarily and his harshness, to some extent, can be attributed to objective factors.

Indifference is the ability to pass by a person in need of help and not help him, even if this help is quite within your power.

Often, indifference hurts and even kills more painfully and faster than cruelty.

Indeed, indifference is one of worst qualities in humans.

Indifferent people do not seem to touch or offend anyone, but with their indifference they are capable of killing.

Indifferent people absolutely don’t care what’s going on around them, they are fixated only on themselves, they think only about themselves.

If you choose between indifferent and evil people, then the indifferent ones are worse. Evil people At least they have some emotions, but indifferent people in this regard are absolutely unemotional and callous.

An indifferent person will calmly pass by people’s grief, it will not touch him. Such people are not able to love, sympathize, worry, they are emotionally empty individuals.

What to write in the final essay on the topic: “Do you agree that indifference is the highest cruelty?” (Kindness and Cruelty) (final essay of the Unified State Exam 2018-2019)?

Manifestations of cruelty cannot be justified, because cruelty is the violence of a stronger person over a weaker dependent person and such an act is base and inhumane. But even more cruel is an indifferent attitude towards the misfortune of another person, because indifference shown to a person in trouble can lead to the death of this person and then the person who showed indifference, who could have helped, but did not help, will live with a feeling of guilt for the rest life. And if he does not consider himself guilty, then the people around him will remember his cruelty and, accordingly, their attitude towards him will be unkind.

Let us remember how Nikolai Ivanovich from the story “Gooseberry” was indifferent to the suffering of his wife, who, as a result of his indifference, died. Nikolai Ivanovich, having bought the land, felt like an important gentleman, and did not blame himself at all for the death of his wife. But everyone knew why his wife died and even his brother condemned Nikolai Ivanovich.

More other arguments:

I agree with the expression that indifference is the highest cruelty.

An indifferent person passes by the misfortune of another person. Sometimes indifference manifests itself even towards close people. An indifferent person does not want to pay attention to the problems of others, does not want to help if he is asked for help. And the worst thing is that he doesn’t even worry about it, he calmly lives on, not noticing his cruelty and indifference.

Gogol’s work “The Overcoat” can serve as arguments from literature. When the main character's overcoat was stolen, which was very difficult for him, no one helped him. He turned to whomever he asked for help, but everyone showed indifference. The result is that the person died.

Indifference is extremely destructive in its essence. To become indifferent, you need to kill your love for your neighbor, to simply show monstrous cruelty, which in its usual understanding still has something human, you just need to get to the bottom of it. For example, cruel treatment of one spouse towards another may also indicate that he wants more love and attention. And he himself can experience feelings, why not? For the indifferent, his spouse will be nothing more than a perfect toy from a sex shop or some kind of multifunctional food processor. He uses it and as long as everything suits him - everything is fine, no - and the person is mercilessly thrown into the trash. Cruel people are also capable of high emotional outbursts in moments of danger; there are many examples in life when people in difficult situations were helped by those who had previously been cruel to them. We must not forget that cruelty can be a protective shell for an inherently vulnerable person. Indifference is an attitude towards living beings, as well as towards inanimate objects, with which you can do whatever you want.

Yes, I agree. It is indifference, not hatred, that is the opposite of love in this world. It is indifference that destroys people, brings evil, breaks destinies and relationships. Onegin's indifference, and not his natural cruelty, hurts Tatyana and leads to Lensky's death. How terrible is Bazarov’s indifference to his parents, he is not touched by their pain, their tears, he does not notice their love for himself, he does not need it. The indifference of society is very well shown in Chekhov’s stories, for example, in the story “The Overcoat”.

Indifference has firmly settled in our own souls; much of what happens in our lives, in our country, is to blame for our own indifference.

• Heartlessness manifests itself even towards very close people
• The thirst for profit often leads to heartlessness and dishonorable acts.
• A person’s spiritual callousness complicates his life in society
• The reasons for a heartless attitude towards others lie in upbringing
• The problem of heartlessness and mental callousness can be characteristic not only of an individual, but also of society as a whole.
• Difficult life circumstances can make a person heartless
• Often, spiritual callousness manifests itself in relation to moral, worthy people
• A person admits that he was heartless when nothing can be changed
• Mental callousness does not make a person truly happy
• The consequences of a callous attitude towards people are often irreversible

Arguments

A.S. Pushkin "Dubrovsky". The conflict between Andrei Dubrovsky and Kirilla Petrovich Troekurov ended tragically due to the callousness and heartlessness on the part of the latter. The words spoken by Dubrovsky, although they were offensive to Troekurov, were certainly not worth the abuse, dishonest trial and death of the hero. Kirill Petrovich did not spare his friend, although in the past they had a lot of good things in common. The landowner was driven by heartlessness and a desire for revenge, which led to the death of Andrei Gavrilovich Dubrovsky. The consequences of what happened were terrible: officials burned, people were left without their real master, Vladimir Dubrovsky became a robber. The manifestation of the spiritual callousness of just one person made the lives of many people miserable.

A.S. Pushkin "The Queen of Spades". Hermann, the protagonist of the work, is driven to act heartlessly by the desire to get rich. To achieve his goal, he presents himself as an admirer of Lizaveta, although in fact he does not have feelings for her. He gives the girl false hopes. Penetrating into the countess's house with the help of Lizaveta, Hermann asks the old woman to tell him the secret of the three cards, and after her refusal, he takes out an unloaded pistol. Graphia, very frightened, dies. The deceased old woman comes to him a few days later and reveals the secret on the condition that Hermann will not play more than one card per day, in the future will not play at all and will marry Lizaveta. But the hero does not have a happy future: his heartless actions serve as a reason for retribution. After two wins, Hermann loses, which causes him to go crazy.

M. Gorky “At the Bottom”. Vasilisa Kostyleva does not feel any feelings for her husband except hatred and complete indifference. Wanting to inherit at least a small fortune, she very easily decides to persuade the thief Vaska Pepel to kill her husband. It's hard to imagine how heartless a person would have to be to come up with such a plan. The fact that Vasilisa was not married out of love does not in the least justify her action. A person must remain a person in any situation.

I.A. Bunin "Mr. from San Francisco". The theme of the death of human civilization is one of the main ones in this work. The manifestation of the spiritual degradation of people lies, among other things, in their spiritual callousness, heartlessness, and indifference towards each other. The sudden death of the gentleman from San Francisco evokes not compassion, but disgust. During his life, he is loved for his money, and after his death, they heartlessly put him in the worst room, so as not to spoil the reputation of the establishment. They cannot even make a normal coffin for a person who dies in a foreign country. People have lost true spiritual values, which have been replaced by a thirst for material gain.

K.G. Paustovsky "Telegram". A life full of activities and events captivates Nastya so much that she forgets about the only person truly close to her - her old mother Katerina Petrovna. The girl, receiving letters from her, is glad that her mother is alive, but does not think about anything else. Nastya doesn’t even read and perceive the telegram from Tikhon about Katerina Petrovna’s poor condition right away: at first she doesn’t understand at all who they are talking about. Later, the girl realizes how heartless her attitude towards her loved one was. Nastya goes to Katerina Petrovna, but does not find her alive. She feels guilty before her mother, who loved her so much.

A.I. Solzhenitsyn "Matrenin's Dvor". Matryona is a person you rarely meet. Without thinking about herself, she never refused to help strangers and treated everyone with kindness and compassion. People didn't answer her in kind. After the tragic death of Matryona, Thaddeus thought only about how to win back part of the hut. Almost all relatives came to cry over the woman’s coffin only as an obligation. They did not remember Matryona during her lifetime, but after her death they began to lay claim to the inheritance. This situation shows how callous and indifferent human souls have become.

F.M. Dostoevsky "Crime and Punishment". Rodion Raskolnikov's heartlessness was expressed by his desire to test his terrible theory. Having killed the old pawnbroker, he tried to find out who he belonged to: “trembling creatures” or “those with the right.” The hero failed to maintain composure, to accept what he did as right, which means that he is not characterized by absolute spiritual callousness. The spiritual resurrection of Rodion Raskolnikov confirms that a person has a chance for correction.

Y. Yakovlev “He killed my dog.” The boy, showing compassion and mercy, brings a stray dog ​​into his apartment. His father doesn’t like this: the man demands that the animal be thrown back onto the street. The hero cannot do this, because “she was already kicked out.” The father, acting completely indifferent and indifferent, calls the dog to him and shoots him in the ear. The child cannot understand why an innocent animal was killed. Together with the dog, the father kills the child’s faith in the justice of this world.

ON THE. Nekrasov “Reflections at the Main Entrance”. The poem depicts the harsh reality of that time. The life of ordinary men and officials who spend their lives only in pleasure are contrasted. High-ranking people are heartless because they are indifferent to problems ordinary people. And for common man An official's solution to even the most insignificant issue can be a salvation.

V. Zheleznikov “Scarecrow”. Lena Bessoltseva voluntarily took responsibility for a very bad act to which she had nothing to do. Because of this, she was forced to endure humiliation and bullying from her classmates. One of the most difficult tests for the girl was loneliness, because being an outcast is difficult at any age, and even more so in childhood. The boy who actually committed this act did not have the courage to confess. Two classmates who learned the truth also decided not to interfere in the situation. The indifference and heartlessness of those around him made the man suffer.

The essay “Indifference is the highest cruelty” reveals the significance of this problem in modern world.

Essay “Indifference”

Every person has feelings such as love, goodness, anger, hypocrisy. These qualities can probably be continued indefinitely. Along with these qualities, there is also indifference - this seemingly ordinary feeling is appearing more and more often in the modern world. But what is terrible indifference?

I believe that, first of all, this is a property of the soul and a real misfortune for society. Of course, there is indifference in everyone. It just manifests itself in someone to a greater extent, some have less. But the fear is that it is there. And that's a fact!

Today, indifference can be observed at every step. Every morning we go to school or work the same way. And every morning, for example, an old woman asks for alms from the church. And we pass by and don’t even notice such seemingly everyday little things. Constant concern does not allow us to stop. And a wall grows. It’s not for nothing that they say: “The highest wall in the world is the wall of indifference.” Everyone has their own. Isn’t it obvious that today indifference has reached colossal proportions? For a long time we have not cared about a person who walks down the street and cries or a homeless kitten is freezing on the street. We just don't care.

Indifference is paralysis of the soul, premature death.
A.P. Chekhov

Indifference is the highest cruelty.
M. Wilson

We won't do anything. We don't care about all this.
A. Koch

I drew attention to the connection that exists between the number of synonyms in the language of a people and the prevalence of the phenomenon designated by these synonyms. In the Russian language there are a lot of synonyms for the word “indifference” and only a few synonyms for the word “indifference”...

Indifference, indifference, indifference, not caring, passivity, indifference, apathy, lack of alternatives, indifference, anachrenism, all-fenism, dophenism, all-indifference, pre-lightbulbism, all-lampism, all-fenism, cold-heartedness, inactivity, sleepiness, constipation, detachment, aloofness, detachment, oblivion, reluctance, atony, stiffness, phlegmatism, lethargy, anergy... More than 100 synonyms in total...

I'm not talking about psychological state, when a person is indifferent to what is happening or about apathy - we will talk about paralysis of activity, the desire to adapt, contentment with total silence, the indifference of the “deep people” to their “deep country” and to their own destiny. Indifference and indifference are even worse than delusion, it is indifference to oneself, not caring about the fate of one’s children and grandchildren, a deadly death of the soul...

Polish writer Bruno Jasinski once said: “Fear the indifferent - they do not kill or betray, but only with their tacit consent does betrayal and murder exist on earth.” I understand this statement as follows: for beautiful phrases about greatness or patriotism - complete indifference to everything that happens nearby. No one is indignant at lawlessness, injustice, fraud, humiliation, lies, zombies, stolen lives... The majority tolerates and remains silent... Silent and indifferent consent to servitude deprives a person of all feelings, makes him a lever in the hands of unscrupulous people, and takes away his individuality. But if everyone or the majority remains silent, then it is much easier for the villains to carry out their unseemly deeds.

Indifference is dangerous because in any case it brings darkness; it is the antithesis of happiness, joy and goodness. Indifference accelerates the process of personality destruction. Indifference is the death of the soul. “The greatest sin of man is not hatred, but indifference to his brothers” (Mother Teresa). I would strengthen it: not only to my brothers, but to ourselves, to my children, to the destinies of my country...

Indifference destroys a person and makes him not care about the world around him. Such a person is indifferent to the feelings of other people. He can easily offend a person; he doesn’t care not only about himself, but also about others. Indifferent people, as a rule, do not pay attention to other people's pain and suffering. They do not want to help anyone, they hardly take initiative or responsibility. This behavior is becoming the norm.

Social injustice, constant concern, a large number of problems, distrust of the world around us, an attempt to protect ourselves from cruel reality - all these are the reasons for the spread of indifference. It is easier for a person to ignore and avoid negative emotions or unnecessary hassle.

What are the consequences of such behavior? Indifference kills a person's soul. He loses the opportunity to sympathize, be kind and merciful. How many people die every day just because no one wanted to help? How many scary stories we hear?

Despite the fact that indifference is not actually a negative emotion, the consequences of such a state are disastrous. Becoming indifferent to oneself, a person stops in his development, does not set new goals for himself and does not strive to achieve them. And since stagnation cannot be stable, it gradually leads to degradation. Showing indifference to others, a person becomes callous and loses the ability to empathize. “My house is on the edge, I don’t know anything,” is the motto of those in whom indifference has completely taken root. Having experienced a strong shock, a person loses interest in work in general and subsequent difficulties in particular. He gives up, loses the desire to fight and look for a solution, and as a result, the problem can really develop into a real crisis.

Sometimes it seems to me that the propaganda of patriotism serves one purpose - to cover up the indifference and unscrupulousness of the people. No matter how much blood is shed, no matter how many crimes the government commits in the name and hands of its fellow citizens, the residents do not care at all. They are not even “deceived”, they just don’t want to know anything, and if they suddenly find out about what is happening in their own country, then the reaction is the same - “everything is correct... this is how it should be... the interests of the people... Talking to them is simply not about than, meaningless. There is a microscopic group of remaining normal people, they are not just in the minority, they are an endangered species. According to a famous journalist, there are few of them, very few, but today they are allowed to live. And even crowd into tiny reservations for people with the wrong mindset like “Echo” and “Snob”. But, most likely, this is not generosity, but saving on soap and ropes. As it turned out, the renegades are completely harmless. Their intellectual tricks are indifferent to the population. People are very busy. He licks his lips, remembering the sweetness of the polish on Stalin's boots. It is being built into immortal regiments.

“This is a state of permanent delay in adopting the most important decisions, on which the lives of people and the country depend. Delay stems from a lack of thought, from a lack of understanding, from indifference to people, from contempt for the country, from a manic lust for power. The essence of this state is to be a brake, to stand with its back to the future, to resist change to the end, until the explosion of hatred, until the revolution, until the massacre of everyone by everyone, until the Ipatiev House.”

Crazy carelessness
On all four sides.
Plain. Infinity.
Crows scream ominously.

Revelry. Fires. Stealth.
Stupid indifference.
And everywhere there is originality
And eerie grandeur.