On May 31st we went to Auschwitz and Birkenau. Auschwitz-Birkenau is a series of camps divided into sub camps, that are further divided into more subcamps. Though it was a hard day I saw it as a very important tiyul day. We stepped in through the gates of Birkenau (the largest subcamp), that hundreds of thousands of people were transported by train through. The Jews and other people being taken here were put in cattle cars, with around 80 to 100 people in each car with no food, water, space to move, no bathrooms, and barely enough air to breathe.
We soon learned that as soon as they were off the trains, families were split up between men and women, then separated again into the sick and the healthy. The sick along with anyone else the Nazis wanted were lead to believe that they were going to go to a shower. They were given soap and everything, when in reality they were being lead to the gas chambers to die. The healthy were set to go to work immediately.
After the bodies were burned into ashes, they were thrown into man made ponds, allowing the ashes to slowly become part of the earth. Reminder that the bodies had to be cleared out of the gas chambers and thrown into the crematorium by someone(s). They just so happened to be the prisoners or better known as the “workers”. These people were treated differently, they were given more food, better clothes, and were treated better by the Nazi’s. My assumption is because they were doing the dirty work for the Germans. But these people were exchanged every 4 months. By exchanged I mean that they were killed, and then replaced.
If you somehow managed to pass through selection you were lead into the Sauna room. This is where the dehumanization truly began. They were given a number, and it was tattooed on their arm. Auschwitz-Birkenau is the only camp to take people's’ names away, and give them numbers as a replacement. Their belongings were taken, and redistributed throughout Germany. Anything that they couldn't redistribute was melted down and used for something else. Their hair was cut to a very short length. They were all made to look alike.
I’ll be quite honest, walking into Auschwitz 1 was like a fictional experience for me. It didn’t have the feeling of a concentration camp, but more of a college campus. Maybe that’s because of the mass amounts of people walking around, or maybe it's because everything was displayed behind a glass wall and it looked like a museum.
Either way it was an experience I will never forget, and hopefully never have to live through.
So my question for you is, would you take the hat to save your life?
I'd like to think that I would not take the hat because it was essentially taking the life of someone else, but if it meant that I would live another day, I can't say that I wouldn't do it. Sometimes the idea of life meant more than an easy way out of torture.
ReplyDeleteIf I still had the will to live, I think I would have to take someone else's hat, seeing as though I was too weak to steal my own back or find one from someone was was dead or close to death. There is no easy way to choose things like this, especially because it is between your life or someone elses.
ReplyDeleteThese impossible decisions truly are impossible. However, for this one, I regret to say that I would probably answer yes. Although we can't possibly know what would be going through their minds, I know that my own life is something that I value very much. When the question was first posed to us, I thought for a bit and said yes. When someone said, "I'd try to take the hat of someone that was already dead", I was actually upset with myself. I had not even considered that thought, showing that I must have been thinking as if I were desperate. But....if that's what I think people's desperation was like......what did the people actually in that situation think?
ReplyDeleteThis is a difficult question, but as I mentioned in Auschwitz, I believe that in times of difficulty, the highest level of humanity must be worked towards. Hence, I would do the noble thing and not steal the hat of another living person at the cost of their life. No matter the severity of the situation, our morals and ethics should not waver, and that is an ideal I strongly advocate.
ReplyDeleteThis question is very hard, but I would take the hat. I would take the hat because if I wouldn't have, I would have definitely died. While at the concentration camps, it was all about survival and you just had to do what you had to do to survive.
ReplyDeleteThat is one of the impossible situations, and I'm not sure what I would actually do. I think I would probably take my hat back from the guy who took it from me. If that wasn't possible though, I would try and find a weak or dying person to take the hat from.
ReplyDeleteIt is a very hard question, but I think I would take the hat if I was so determined to live. I would try to find somebody who would be dying soon anyway so that it would make be probably feel better by trying to justify the predicament I would be in.
ReplyDeleteI don't know if I would. If I found myself in that situation, I probably wouldn't have the strength and courage to keep fighting for my life. I think I would likely throw myself on the fence to take my own life. If I did take the hat, I think I would try to take it from someone who was either old or sick, so al least I could feel like the person who I condemned to death would have died soon anyway.
ReplyDeleteThe man was old and probably wasn't going to last much longer in the camp, so yes, I would. There is no correct answer though. The decisions we had to make at this time in history were impossible.
ReplyDeleteI am almost positive that i would take the Man's hat for myself if put in this situation. I am determined to live, people are inherently determined to live, and people do some messed up things when backed into a corner.
ReplyDeleteI think that I would might have also taken the hat, but I would try to take it from either someone who has done horrible things to other people or someone who is very sick and will die anyway. It is an incrdibly difficult decision to make and as I said in Auschwitz, I might have just thrown myself on the fence.
ReplyDeleteAs much as I would like to think I would not have taken the hat I know that I probably would have. However, I believe that I would take the hat from someone I knew would not make it anyway. I wonder if that makes me a bad person, but I believe it is something almost anyone would do if they had the will and determination to survive.
ReplyDeleteI agree with many others that as much as I would like to think that I would be moral and not take the hat. I don't think that I would be able to refuse staying alive. Most definitely I would be so desperate that I would take the hat.
ReplyDeleteI think, i would do just about anything for my life.
ReplyDeleteI dont think there needs to be a whole explanation, i want to live.
ReplyDelete