Holocaust Awareness…Contemporary Lessons Essay

hardly a(prenominal) blushts in recent history harbor had as dramatic an impact on history as the mass impinge on of Jews in parsimony camps during serviceman contend II, the final solution. The final solution appears to be a comfortably registered event (Hilberg, 1992), yet immediately on that point be those who feel it is nonwithstanding a myth. When he discovered the preoccupation camps, General and emerging President Dwight David Eisenhower knew that a future day would come when stack would claim that the final solution n ever so happened, so he took great pains to document and record the events on film so that the origination would never forget.Even so, his efforts did non go past what he knew would happen. In filth of say to the contrary, nowadays, on that point are many who claim that the Holocaust did not hail and that there is no evidence that it did. tho the evidence suggests that is did happen and connatural events such(prenominal) as the murd er of more than 2 million batch by the Khmer paint in Cambodia plus mass murders hea because intolerance in Iraq, the Sudan, Rwanda and Yugoslavia continue to mesh place even now. During the early hours of kinfolk 1, 1939, Adolph Hitler invaded Poland bringing ab by the Second World state of war.Historically, this war began because of Hitlers contempt regarding the focusing Germans were treated at the end of the world-class World War and other connect ends. At the conviction World War II began, there was a world wide depression that helped bring Hitler ruddiness to antecedent in Germany and President Franklin Delano Roosevelt to power in the U. S. It is generally viewed that Hitler used the issue of Judaic economic domination in Germany two to push for war and as an excuse for the economic woes of Germany.(Bartov, 2000 Friedman, 1993). Ultimately, Hitler blamed the Jews for Germanys economic problems and to begin exterminating them in concentration campsmass genocide. (Gigliotti and Lang, 2005) on a de musical scale that surpassed anything that had ever happened up to that time in spite of appearance so short a time span. Does engraining memories of past atrocities into the public psyche eliminate future atrocities? Political campaigns install that by slinging mud sensdidates provide fall upon recognition for their opp mavinnt(s).In a akin vain, peradventure remembering the events of the Holocaust and similar events throughout history (and unfortunately, unperturbed occurring some the world today) go out only moil home the occurrence that those events exist and are continuing. Do we existingly want to do that? We could be reinforcing the Holocaust in the minds of individuals who magnate not otherwise be assured that any such thing has ever happened or ever will. We have any reason to believe that Hitler knew of the mass experimental extinction of the millions of Jews but ironically, there is no authenticated evidence in writing to endure this idea.(Irving, 1977) Most German citizens during WWII also claimed ignorance of the Judaic defunctness in progress at the time. How could such a widespread extermination and mass murder have at peace(p) unnoticed and Where are the documents to show that Hitler was aware of it? Today, nearly seventy years aft(prenominal) the beginning of WWII and Jewish extermination, the question is still asked, Did Hitler even know about the Jewish extermination process underway? The fact that anyone even asks this question is, perhaps, the greatest evidence that we need to teach that it is a real part of human history. While it shoot the breezems ill-considered to assume that Hitler actually had no friendship of what was going on, it appears to be equally honest that few if any documents exist to demonstrate his knowledge of what was going on (Irving, 1977) even though there certainly appears to be a great deal of financial backing about the war and the Holocaust (Wolfe, 1990). We hatful only wonder why these distant situations exist.In his 1977 book Hitlers War, one noted British historian, David Irving, outlines why he feels that stories of the mass killings of European Jews in last Camps are merely British and Ameri mess inventions, war-time propaganda perpetrated by the Allies. Irving presents several lines of argument to musical accompaniment his claims. For example, he points out that there is no archival evidence anywhere for the gassings, no wartime German documents that refer to the gassings of human beings and there is no clear evidence as to who gave the orders to gas people.He also claims that rhetorical tests of the laboratories, crematoria, gas chambers and Auschwitz fail to rule any trace or of import residue of a cyanide compound. Irving dismisses oculus witness accounts on the grounds that there are equal numbers of heart and soul witness accounts of the gas chambers in Dachau even though there werent any gas chambers in D achau and he believes that photographs documenting the Holocaust have been misrepresented. why is it so vital that we remember the Holocaust?Arguments dissolve be made both for and against that stance, but certainly, the history of the Holocaust should not be slighted or overlooked. The repeated efforts to sift to wipe the memory of the Holocaust out of the human psyche as if it never occurred may be one of the strongest points in favor or remembering it. The intend purpose of engraining events from the Holocaust into the mind of todays generation is to allow them to expose the less(prenominal)ons of horror from the past and annul themso that we wont repeat them.Whether this is dependable or not, we more or less taking comfort in the belief, mature or wrong, that if people weigh the horrors of those events, they will make every effort to avoid them, prevent them and take precautions against repeating them whenever they see the signs in the future. Perhaps the way to trash fu ture human atrocities is to focus on the opposite rather than to memorialize them. What lessons can we learn from the Holocaust? First, the Holocaust demonstrates how vainglorious groups and numbers of people, even on the scale of nations, can subtly be influenced into groupthink (i.e. , where groups of people think and behave alike because others are thinking and behaving the same way) (Janis, 1972) and manipulated by a very few influential individuals. Second, the Holocaust demonstrates that all too often, man treats his confrere man inhumanely. How do we avoid this in the future? I fear that there is no global answer. Whenever such a situation begins in the future, only then can we address the issue. Another lesson we can learn is that anyone can be the victim, so everyone should recognize and acknowledge it whenever it happens.When we recognize it, we mustiness act together to stop it, and that, unfortunately, is oft easier said then done. Perhaps there is no satisfactory s olution to preventing future atrocities like the Holocaust. In he end, perhaps all be can do is to try to recognize such events when we see them approaching and then to do everything we can to prevent them.ReferencesBartov, Omar. The Holocaust. Origin, Implementation, Aftermath. New York, NY Routledge, 2000. Friedman, Saul S. Holocaust Literature. A Handbook of Critical, Historical and literary Writing. Westport, CT Greenwood Press, 1993.Gigliotti, Simone and Berel Lang. The Holocaust. A Reader. Oxford Blackwell Publishing, 2005. Hilberg, Raul. Perpetrators Victims Bystanders. The Jewish cataclysm 1933-1945. New York, NY Aaron Asher Books, 1992. Irving, David. Hitlers War. New York, NY Viking Press, 1977. Janis, Irving L. Victims of Groupthink. capital of Massachusetts Houghton Mifflin Company, 1972. Levi, Neil and Michael Rothberg. The Holocaust. Theoretical Readings. New Brunswick. NJ Rutgers University Press, 2003. Wolfe, Robert. Holocaust. The documental Evidence. Washington, DC National Archives and Records Administration, 1990.