Final Blog Post

This novel was very emotional and eye opening. It’s often hard to truly imagine what went on in camps like Birkenau. But reading this man’s actual experience and feeling some of his pain, it’s almost unreal. I was not surprised that his father dies, since he was old and sick. But I was intrigued that Ellie did cry for his father. It said that he had no tears left, I infer that, after so many tears lose their effect, they lose their meaning. Even though I knew that Elie obviously lives I was wondering how he would manage not get shot by the Germans. My final thoughts on this was that this was an awful, unimaginable time for the Holocaust victims to endure. If I were to pick one theme for the entire novel it would be hopelessness. Elie felt hopeless often in the book. He felt like his life no longer mattered after the death of his father, and he felt hopeless so many times after seeing so much death all around him. When others felt hopeless, the quickly died. One quote I have seen was from the hunger games “Hope is the only thing stronger than fear. A little hope is effective, a lot of hope is dangerous.”

This novel taught me about hope, the effects of losing hope, faith, our own limits, and why not to be a bystander. Blogging showed me that so many people care, and it taught me it can be easy to get your opinion out and to other people. I think it’s a very important topic for  everyone to know about, especially teenagers because we are the youth of the nation, and the future is up to us. We can’t let history keep repeating itself. We cannot be bystanders, we should never just stand aside and let things like this happen. Thank you to everyone who contributed.

Reflection

When I finished to book I was extremely upset. I wasn’t sure how to act on my feelings, like I know I wouldn’t know what I would do in Elie’s shoes, but I find it very hard to believe I would abandon my father in his time of need... near death. I know I wouldn’t know what I would do I know I probably would be thinking the same thing if I were him, but I’m sure he never thought he’d ever do it either, it just goes to show how much Elie truly lost himself in those 3 years of constant torture, and abuse. It was a great book, the ending upset me (clearly) but it was a good way to end it I suppose. The entire book was good, it really gave you an insight on the book, and made me feel like I could completely see and feel everything as though I were there with Elie and his father. I feel like the overall theme of the book was identity loss, Elie lost himself in those 3 years of being held captive in all of those camps, bouncing from one to the next, only thing most important to him was getting his ration of food everyday, living, and his father. Once his father died, he felt his life no longer had meaning, that he no longer needed to live anymore, because the only person truly ever there for him was his father and a few friends here and there. He wasn’t the same boy he was when he went into those camps, but no one could be after they saw the things they saw. Who could ever be the same after something like that?

After this project, I really feel like I have a whole other standpoint on life, it taught me that if someone is trouble, to always stand up and say something, because, its hard to say someone else could do something, and not do anything at all to try and stop something terrible from happening. It taught me to always stay true to myself, and how in certain situations, to always have hope in something, find something to hold on to and always love it because in the end of something petrifying, thats going to be the only thing forcing you to hold on to life. This project is important for teenagers our age to go through, because they get a whole new standpoint on things they never would have even thought twice about, like having a meal every day or life being the gift it is, having a home, a roof over their heads etc. I want to send a final thank you to the people who have been reading our class’s blog. Its important to always get feedback on things like this. Thank you.

The Final Thought of "Night" by Elie Wiesel

When I finished the book I was mad because it ended so abruptly. I don't like how it ended by him looking in the mirror and then that face never leaving his mind because it was just too weird of a place for the book to stop. Getting past the fact of what the book said to end, I think that it was inspirational because even though he lost his faith in god and physically lost his father, he had the motivation to keep going and make it to the end. I liked it how Elie’s Nobel Peace Prize speech was included after the book ended because it gave me more of the “closure feeling” that I needed. The whole book showed me man’s inhumanity to man. This was shown in the beginning of the book when everyone had started listening to Hitler and him saying that Jewish people had to leave and move into a tiny put-off place in the country. Man’s inhumanity to man showed up in the middle of the book when Elie and everybody had to get undressed for the selections. They had to get dehumanized for one person to pick based on natural things. In the end of the book there was the part when bread was getting tossed into the trains so that people could fight over it, while the person that tossed it in was the person that was higher ranking than the Jewish people getting transported watched as they became less and less like humans.

This project made me realize that nobody has ever had the easiest life. I learned that Jewish people were treated worse than I thought they were treated, before I had read my novel. I now know that there are many things that were done that made the Jews purposely feel way worse than they had to feel about being Jewish. I think that this project can help many teenagers realize that it isn't right for a person to make people feel bad about themselves for no reason. The lessons that were taught here can be applied to our everyday life, don't hurt someone for no reason, whether it is physically or with words, it stills hurts the victim. The Teaching Tolerance Project can be a big help to people and I thank all of you guys for contributing your thoughts about all that we have wrote about. I hope that some of this taught you new things, like it did for my classmates and myself. Thanks again!

Final Thoughts on "Night" and this project!

When Elie’s father had died I got somewhat mad and upset and no longer wanted to continue reading the book, but there were only a few pages left so I continued. I also was not very surprised that he had died because of the way the book was going before that part. When Elie’s father had died and he felt that his life no longer mattered that was devastating. And all the way at the very end when Elie himself was sick was horrible considering his father had just passed away. If I had to choose one theme to represent this whole book it would be choiceless choices. Choiceless choices represent this whole book in multiple ways weather being a choice for someone or sometimes they were bystanders due to having choiceless choices. Because if they didn’t just remain a bystander they could die and if they just remained a bystander the victim would be harmed more.

By reading this book I have learned through the eyes and memories of a survivor of what the Holocaust had been like from the conditions to family to death. I have learned that the memories never leave them and that they had a really difficult time and words never leave them. This is an important project for teenagers to be apart of because they will deeply understand the life in the Holocaust more than they did by just learning about it. By reading a book from a survivor about their experience in the Holocaust teenagers will feel like they are there with that survivor and feel what is happening and will better understand what happened during this time period. As for the blogging portion of this project teenagers will be able to put their own thoughts out there about the Holocaust and have others react and talk to them. This is general was a very great and fun project that I loved being apart of. Finally thank you so much to every contributor during this project. You were all so helpful and are very kind to spend some of your time reading and replying to us. I really appreciate you all for doing that. Once again, thank you.

Who should be held responsible?

Prompt:

When human catastrophes occur, especially a catastrophe the magnitude of the Holocaust, how is responsibility determined?  Are there “levels” of blame or is everyone - perpetrator, collaborator, and bystander - ultimately  equally responsible and, therefore, equally guilty?

I feel like catastrophes, at the same severity as the Holocaust, never have just one person deemed as “responsible” because it wasn’t just one person, just one person could not have done this to 6 million Jews. However, I also feel like if anyone had caused pain or distress to any one victim in the Holocaust, they should be held responsible for what they did to that one person and or multiple people.  They should have been punished with all the terrible, petrifying, unforgivable, things they (Nazis, Kapos, Kommandos, etc.) did to those poor people, all of them.  The perpetrators should have endured everything that those victims had. Everyone should not be held equally responsible for what happened. Bystanders were who they were because they were afraid to stand up and say something, afraid to be “punished”, for trying to do something. Collaborators are the people that tried to help the Nazis the people that thought that what Hitler, and the Nazis were doing what was the right thing to do. Those people respected Hitler and the Nazis’ decisions. These people deserve to be looked down upon, to be punished as well as anyone else that thought that the Holocaust was even remotely a good idea, should be punished just as much as anyone else involved with the Holocaust, but that’s just my opinion.

Holocaust Heroes

• Think about the terms “help” and rescue.” What is the difference between these two terms? In the context of the Holocaust, how do you understand the difference between these two terms? Can you think of a specific time when help was needed rather than rescue, and of times when Jews needed to be rescued? Would you characterize those individuals who helped Jews as heroes? Why or why not? Would you characterize those who rescued Jews as heroes? Why or why not? (Echoes and Reflections)

Someone that helped someone else means that they just assisted them in something, but if someone rescues someone else it means that they saved them because they were with them the whole way. They saved the other person from something terrible, like death. During the Holocaust if you helped someone, you were maybe sneaking them an extra ration of bread and soup. If someone was rescued during the Holocaust, that means that they were snuck out of the camp with the help of someone that was higher ranking than them. It could mean that a Jewish police had a friend run away during a transport and pretend that they didn't see them run away. A time when help is needed rather than a rescue is when there is something little that cannot be done as one person. Rescue was given to the Jews when some people hid them from the Nazis (according to Rescuing Jews). Some of the ways that people rescued Jewish people was, hiding them in attics, haystacks, and sheds. Marion Pritchard rescued Jews by bringing them food and clothing. Also a way to rescue them from any legal documents saying that they were Jewish was to make new forged identity papers, which is what Raoul Wallenberg did (also from Rescuing Jews). There were many different ways to help and rescue the Jewish population, but that didn't mean that there was always the option to do that. The people that did feel that they could rescue some of the Jewish people are considered jeeps to me because heros save lives and that is what those people did, they saved some Jewish people's lives.

Who's That?

¨‘A-7713?‘ ‘That‘s me.‘ ‘After your meal, you‘ll go to see the dentist.’ ‘But... I don't have a toothache...’ ‘After your meal. Without fail.’¨ -page 51, Night, Conversation between Elie and the Dentist.

This quote shocked me because it shows how a person will stick to someone else’s rules even if it means that they basically lose their identity. I felt that ¨A-7713¨ and all of the other people should be able to be called by their name and not some bunch of random numbers that the SS officers can qualify as a name. Elie getting called ¨A-7713¨ made me think that having a number for a name actually makes everybody in the camp more and more like each other because all of the numbers can be so similar to each other, and I feel that it makes the people feel that they are not themselves anymore. It is saying that the Jewish population will have to just abide by what a person they have never met before is telling them to do. They had to listen to the SS officers no matter what the task at hand was. It made me wonder how the Jews thought of things like that, how did they deal with everything that was ordered towards them? An order like that would make me want to tell the SS officer that I was not going to go because there was nothing wrong with my teeth right then. Something like that would spark questions in my head that I know that I would not be able to ask the officer because if I did, I would get into some trouble.

Blind obedience can be very powerful. This quote demonstrates blind obedience because the first part shows that Elie listened to the person in charge on the first day of coming to a concentration camp who said that he would have to take a new name (A-7713). He had to listen to them no matter what, he obeyed what they had told him to do, and that was to take a new name instead of his own. The second part of the quote shows blind obedience because the SS officer told him that he will go to the dentist ¨without fail¨ and then by the tone of how that was said, A-7713 will go to the dentist after the meal. He obeyed what the officer told him to do even though he knew that he didn't need to go the dentist because his teeth were fine. Blind obedience can overpower people’s feelings for certain things because it is blind so it is not known during the time the person is obeying the task at hand.