Introduction

During the course Facing History and Ourselves you will learn many of the brutal and horrifying details about the experience of the Holocaust. The course takes you through the entire experience of being in 1930’s Germany leading up to the holocaust. The course will show you the entire dark side of humanity as you see countless murders and bodies while men stand aside and allow it to happen. The course will show you every step leading up to the massacre and help explain why each step needed to happen in order to allow the holocaust to occur. I took the course because I had an interest in a certain peculiar subject (the holocaust) that I had never learned much about in school. I took the course because I wanted to see just how the holocaust happened and have the civil agency in order to make sure anything like it never happens again. I took the course in order to become more educated on the subject of one of the worst atrocities in human history. I have always had an interest in history and especially world war two. I have always wondered just how something as awful and unthinkable as the horror of the holocaust ever happened. Before this course, I just could not imagine in my head how the horror of the holocaust happened. But now, I know exactly what happened in order to create the appropriate conditions for it, and more importantly, I now have the civil agency necessary to prevent it.

Essay

When faced with the question “In what ways did Facing History and Ourselves benefit you as a student and a person?” many moments from the course come to my mind. I remember all of the films we watched sequentially and how this sequential viewing revealed the step by step process the Nazis took in their plan to separate and eventually exterminate the Jewish people. The course effected me deeply in both spheres of my life as a student and as a person as a whole. Three specific classes I remembered stuck with me in a much deeper fashion than just the simple act of watching a movie. These three lessons include our viewing of the movie The Pianist, our viewing of the movie The Grey Zone and finally the military documentary of the American troops discovering the Nazi death camps and the bodies of thousands upon thousands of Jews. All of these movies left not only images burned into my eyes and mind, but made me take a look at the world around me and be thankful for all that I have and think about what I would do or sacrifice in order to protect me. These films have successfully made me question myself as a person and made me think about my actions differently.

            While viewing the movie The Pianist, there were many scenes throughout this lengthy film which show key transitions in the Germans approach to the Jewish question. These scenes include when the family is forced to wear the stars signifying to others that they are Jewish. They then are moved into the Ghetto in which many unthinkable atrocities occur. One that sticks in my head very clearly is when the Nazis storm an apartment building in the ghetto and systematically remove all of the Jews from the building. When they encounter an old man in a wheelchair, they lift him out of it and throw him out of the window where he falls many stories to his death. This part made my heart skip a beat and left me in shock for much of the remainder of the day. It was just out of my realm of thinking to see someone not only treat such a weak defenseless being with such anger and violence, but to murder him in front of his family in one of the most gruesome ways imaginable. After the Nazis cleared the building, they took the survivors to the street in which they ran while being gunned down. This left both the main character and the audience in complete and total shock. After this scene, the family is then taken on a train ride to the camp where they eventually split paths. This is when the main character shows his true desperation for life as he escapes the death camp and is almost killed by the liberating Russian army as he is starving to death in the cold. This movie was a masterpiece which moved me so deeply and single handedly changed my opinion and view on the holocaust.  

            While viewing the second movie, The Grey Zone, a whole different set of emotions came to my mind. This movie showed me just how desperate the Jews were on all sides, whether they were the prisoners or employed by the death camps under various threats. It went through the story of Jews who were employed in the gas chambers as people who would convince the Jews they were just taking a shower and have them strip naked and make them enter the gas chamber. They would then not only collect the bodies but go through the remains left behind and look for valuables. Some scenes which stayed with me include when the main character locks a group of Jews in the chamber and continues to just sit in the undressing room as the only sound the audience car hear is the sudden startling, then screaming and then silence as the zyklon-b canisters are dropped in. This scene is so powerful because you see how this deeply affects the main character as he is shaking while sitting in silence as hundreds of people die. Another scene is at the end of the movie when he and the other main characters are being put to death by the Nazis by gunshot while laying face down on the ground. This is when you really see the humanity of the characters as they say their heartfelt goodbyes and joke about how their plans outside of the camp will never be seen to fruition. This scene left me near tears as I could feel so deeply for the characters as they had come so close to escape but didn’t make it.

            Lastly, there is the horrifying documentary made by the American armed forces as they discover and clean the Nazi death camps. The scenes go on and on and on of skeleton like bodies being dragged out from every crevasse in the camps. The bodies are shown as they have decayed and are missing eyes, teeth and have gaping holes teeming with pus and maggots throughout their bodies. There was one quote which said that the state of the camps was so disgusting it was even deemed a HazMat zone. The scene that stayed with me the most in this film, was one in which the amount of bodies became so massive that the Americans resorted to using bulldozers in order to move the huge amount of bodies in group grave pits. This scene beyond disgusted me and really brought my understanding of the holocaust atrocities full circle.

            In conclusion, this course has changed me deeply in both spheres of my life as a student and a person. It has shown me the full brunt of the Nazi atrocities contained in the holocaust and given me a much deeper and richer understanding of the events which took place. It has allowed me to take steps towards civil agency through the movies The Pianist, The Grey Zone and the military documentaries of the Nazi death camps. This course has changed me permanently and has brought me full circle in the path towards civic agency.

Works Cited

Works Cited

The Pianist. Google Images. Image. 24 May 2012.

The Pianist End Scene. Google Images. Image. 24 May 2012.

The Grey Zone Poster. Google Images. Image. 24 May 2012.

The Grey Zone movie scene. Google Images. Image. 24 May 2012.

Death Camp Bodies. Google Images. Image. 24 May 2012.