Holocaust Reflection

Millions of innocent human beings were treated worse than dirt throughout the holocaust. Numerous adults and children experienced events in their lives that made their life seem like a nightmare, due to them being Jewish. Crowds of eyes watched the horror that occurred in front of them, bearing witness of the genocide. They were seeing innocent souls being abused, thrown around, being dehumanized and their rights stolen away from them, but yet voices weren’t heard. Instead the voices were trapped within bodies and hearts, due to fear and ignorance. This was a major aspect of the holocaust. In the holocaust, the stages of genocide were shown, which displayed the oppression that led to the extermination of Jews. Classification is a stage where the Jews are categorized as ‘them’ or ‘others’. When Jews were called as ‘them’, it made them feel isolated and made them feel that they were not part of society, which was Hitler’s first plan. The idea of being isolated made Jews feel invisible and they felt that they were not worthy enough to be paid attention to. It is also an act of discrimination. Another stage is symbolization, which plays an important stage in the genocide. It was a sign to allow other people around them distinguish that they are Jewish and the ones that at fault. Throughout the genocide, Jews were forced to wear a yellow star. In the novel, Night by Elie Wiesel, it shows that Jews weren’t allowed to go to restaurants, cafés, or to be on the streets after a certain time once the purpose of the star was revealed. It demonstrates how powerful symbolization could be. The situation made non-Jews identify the Jews easily which influenced them to not allow them to do much as a regular person could do. Dehumanization played a huge role in the genocide as well. The concept of it was to take humanity away from a group, in this case, the Jews. For example, in the novel, it shows that Jews were given tattooed numbers on their left arms, “I became A-7712. From