Auschwitz

[Swiss Peter]

Re: Auschwitz

Not read that one - I'll check it out.

It's a film that was getting quite good reviews a few months back. I went to see it twice in a week, which I very rarely do (...partly because there was quite a bit I didn't understand first time around!)

[Divine Wright]

Re: Auschwitz

How many thousands of infants is Israel currently murdering ? Nobody learns anything. Crimes of the son I guess.

[AfricanBluebird]

Re: Auschwitz

I've been to the holocaust memorial museum in Israel, the genocide memorial in Rwanda, the killing fields in Phnom Penh and a number of other places where atrocities have occurred.

Awful but necessary places to never let us forget.

But the words 'never again' are hollow when the above examples show that it does happen again, perhaps not on the scale of what happened in 1940's Europe, but the evilness of mankind knows no bounds.

Gaza will become yet another genocide memorial site and we will all be saying 'never again', again :(

[Steve the Tea]

Re: Auschwitz

We have a duty never to forget the horrors that happened to people just because they were different. It's a lesson many still need to learn now.

Very true, Eric.

StT.
<><

[truthpaste]

Re: Auschwitz

The Holocaust has horrified me and been an interest ever since I read Schindlers Ark (which became the truly excellent film Schindlers List) in year 10.

It is unimaginable. What perhaps is most remarkable is how lucky the survivors were. To survive the ghettos and the transportations, then to survive the initial selections and then life in Auschwitz.

I think it's also worth stating that those bound for Auschwitz and other concentration camps were the comparatively lucky ones as they weren't death camps. Treblinka, Sobibor and the like were places where all bar a tiny tiny minority survived no more than an hour or two.

The uprising at Treblinka is one of the most inspiring and fascinating stories of the entire war. There is a documentary on Treblinka here. Its as bleak as our humanity has ever been but it's an incredibly engaging watch and I think we all have a duty to remember in our own ways.

https://youtu.be/x-lKa35g7hA?si=K38En3df59xw8GLZ

Can I ask you (and others here) if they have visited Auschwitz and Birkenau and:

1. Did it alter their perspective on what happened back then?

2. Did it leave them feeling that people who could visit these places should do this at least once in their lives?

3. Did the experience change their opinion on what evil could look like?

[Steve the Tea]

Re: Auschwitz

Yad Vashem, the Holocaust Memorial and Museum in Jerusalem, is a sobering experience for anyone who will visit it. During the Holocaust 1,500,000 Jewish children were systematically murdered. Their only crime was that they were Jewish.

May their memory be a blessing.

The Children's Memorial at Yad Vashem is harrowing:

https://youtu.be/BsJqKdN9B3A?si=xEqID6Ieu9KJaOFz

https://youtu.be/O7I84JLrjD0?si=_GycF3XaUxMshDAU

StT.
<><

[Taunton Blue Genie]

Re: Auschwitz

Can I ask you (and others here) if they have visited Auschwitz and Birkenau and:

1. Did it alter their perspective on what happened back then?

2. Did it leave them feeling that people who could visit these places should do this at least once in their lives?

3. Did the experience change their opinion on what evil could look like?

1. I knew a great deal about German history before I visited Auschwitz so it didn't change my perspective.

2. I wouldn't be so prescriptive although I understand the sentiment.

3. I don't have a concept of what 'evil looks like' but some of the greatest 'evil' acts in history were, and indeed still are, carried out by those following an overarching collective dogma.

Visits to Hiroshima and The Killing Fields were also very sobering.

[Cyclops]

Re: Auschwitz

"Man has dominated man to his injury".
A truism that hasn't changed over thousands of years.
No amount of education will stop this.
It is a fact of life.
Hardly a day goes by without us hearing news of man's inhumanity to man, sometimes on our doorstep.
There is no solution.
Even now in Britain and the US (let alone in Ukraine and the Middle East - the list is long) decisions are being made by governments which ruin people's lives.
"Man has dominated man to his injury"

[FormerlyJohnnyBreadhead]

Re: Auschwitz

Can I ask you (and others here) if they have visited Auschwitz and Birkenau and:

1. Did it alter their perspective on what happened back then?

2. Did it leave them feeling that people who could visit these places should do this at least once in their lives?

3. Did the experience change their opinion on what evil could look like?

1. No. I'd already read 'If This Is A Man' by Primo Levi (an incredible read), seen all the documentaries and films like Schindler's List, The Pianist etc. so already had a pretty informed perspective.

2. I think so, yes. Simply because of the immediacy of the environment. It's not a book you can put down or a film you can turn off, being there forces you to seriously think about where you are and what you're seeing.

3. One of the biggest things that struck me there was seeing the bureaucracy of it. There are numerous documents (invoices, memos, inventories etc.) on display that really force home how clinical and 'professional' the whole thing was, as if they were running a business. To them, these human beings were literally numbers, targets to be met, processes to be streamlined and made more efficient. How on earth do you reach that point of normalcy?

An interesting side note to visiting is seeing how other people react to it. Most people have some sense of respect and decorum, some are visibly upset. Some just see it as a tourist attraction. But I saw one guy repeatedly taking photos in the crematorium (despite there being several prominent signs telling people not to) and, bizarrely, even saw one group having a cheery family photo in front of one of the rail carts, smiles and all.

I highly recommend a documentary on Netflix called "Hitler and the Nazis: Evil on Trial". It doesn't exactly break new ground, but it looks more closely at how ordinary people went along with the Nazis in the 1920s and 30s from a modern-day perspective (one of Goebbels' initial slogans was, interestingly, 'Make Germany Great Again'). It also uses AI to recreate William Shirer's original reporting from within Nazi Germany, as well as original audio recordings from the Nuremberg trials. Very interesting and timely documentary.

[Dorcus]

Re: Auschwitz

Can I ask you (and others here) if they have visited Auschwitz and Birkenau and:

1. Did it alter their perspective on what happened back then?

2. Did it leave them feeling that people who could visit these places should do this at least once in their lives?

3. Did the experience change their opinion on what evil could look like?

1. No
2. Yes (and other places, eg Gaza)
3. No unfortunately evil takes many shapes and forms.

[JamesWales]

Re: Auschwitz

Can I ask you (and others here) if they have visited Auschwitz and Birkenau and:

1. Did it alter their perspective on what happened back then?

2. Did it leave them feeling that people who could visit these places should do this at least once in their lives?

3. Did the experience change their opinion on what evil could look like?

Interesting questions.

1/ I've never been to Auschwitz. But I have been to Dachau, which was the first camp the Nazis used and remained a concentration camp throughout the war. I guess it did alter my perspective as standing where history has happened is always a powerful and emotive thing for me. I've been to the Normandy beaches and seen where Anne Boleyn was beheaded etc. I really do feel the power in such places. That said, WW2 has been a life long interest so I don't think I had to visit a camp to feel that. I will visit Auschwitz one day. I also want to visit Treblinka which as I referenced yesterday is where I think humanity was at its most evil. I'm not sure why I want to visit but I feel like I want to pay respects in some way and as it was such a secret place I feel like visiting empowers the victims somehow?

2/ Yes, although I must say I don't think people should "do Auschwitz" like people also "do the saltmines" or "Do the old town" when they go to Krakow. I think people should read about it first to fully respect it.

3/. I've always appreciated the Nazis were amongst the most evil regimes in history and that this was most on display in the camps.

[Steve the Tea]

Re: Auschwitz

Yad Vashem World Holocaust Remembrance Website ...

https://www.yadvashem.org/

This is an excellent Holocaust resource.

StT.
<><

[caerkid]

Re: Auschwitz

1. No. I'd already read 'If This Is A Man' by Primo Levi (an incredible read), seen all the documentaries and films like Schindler's List, The Pianist etc. so already had a pretty informed perspective.

2. I think so, yes. Simply because of the immediacy of the environment. It's not a book you can put down or a film you can turn off, being there forces you to seriously think about where you are and what you're seeing.

3. One of the biggest things that struck me there was seeing the bureaucracy of it. There are numerous documents (invoices, memos, inventories etc.) on display that really force home how clinical and 'professional' the whole thing was, as if they were running a business. To them, these human beings were literally numbers, targets to be met, processes to be streamlined and made more efficient. How on earth do you reach that point of normalcy?

An interesting side note to visiting is seeing how other people react to it. Most people have some sense of respect and decorum, some are visibly upset. Some just see it as a tourist attraction. But I saw one guy repeatedly taking photos in the crematorium (despite there being several prominent signs telling people not to) and, bizarrely, even saw one group having a cheery family photo in front of one of the rail carts, smiles and all.

I highly recommend a documentary on Netflix called "Hitler and the Nazis: Evil on Trial". It doesn't exactly break new ground, but it looks more closely at how ordinary people went along with the Nazis in the 1920s and 30s from a modern-day perspective (one of Goebbels' initial slogans was, interestingly, 'Make Germany Great Again'). It also uses AI to recreate William Shirer's original reporting from within Nazi Germany, as well as original audio recordings from the Nuremberg trials. Very interesting and timely documentary.

Would echo the recommendation of If This Is a Man/The Truce, Primo Levi was an incredible author but those books are on another level.

Just to expand on the smiling people comment (and I sometimes question my memory on this but I'm glad I wrote it down at the time ) when I was at Auschwitz about 20 years ago I witnessed a family where the mother gave a signal to her teenage son at the exact moment she took a photo in front of the crematorium , and he raised his arm in the air. I wasn't the only one to notice and they were swiftly escorted out. Terrifying to think that people do that.

[jeepster]

Re: Auschwitz

Edited out the quote


Sick sick sick

[blue matt]

Re: Auschwitz

Sick sick sick

agreed and deleted