Tuesday, December 26, 2006
Unbelievable...
It is interesting to think that Wiesel wrote this book mainly for the purpose of educating people and to prevent something like this to happen again in the future. He didn't want this tragedy to be forgotten or denied. He said - "those who keep silent yesterday will remain silent tomorrow." I couldn't help to think about what would happen when the survivors of the Holocaust are gone and the facts of this may be lost forever as well. I am glad of the journals left behind and the many books written and museums dedicated to the victims in order for us and future generations to not forget. This leads to a discussion question that I have been pondering - can something like this happen again today? It seems impossible and surreal and that it could never happen again. But as we all know - these types of things are occurring right now in foreign lands. With Wiesel's purpose of writing this book in mind, I wonder if there is anything we can do (after reading this book) to prevent such evil from ever occurring again?
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2 comments:
That's a really good question. And, like you said and Jess said in an earlier comment, things like this kinda have happened-- Rwanda being a really good example. But for some reason we were able to look at it on the evening news and go back to eating dinner.
I wish I could talk to more people who lived during WWII who could remember all the stuff going on and ask them if they knew all this stuff was going on with the Jews.
Maybe people didn't want to believe that this was actually happening. In Darfur 400,000+ have died and we still aren't doing anything about it. This morning I saw a commerical about it on TV-- an awareness advertisement. Sometimes I think we think we're "just one person", and that our voice can't be heard. I think it's a lie we believe -- it's a lie that keeps us quiet until everything in us is too upset to be quiet anymore.
Good question Crystal. Questions that lead us to *do something* are so important.
Sorry I'm just now replying, girls. I don't have anything profound to add, really, just reiterating some of the same questions. Why does God allow things like this to happen? How would I have reacted? Did people outside of Europe know what was happening to the Jews? Finally...how could anyone involved in the killings actually think they were doing a "good" thing? How could they live with themselves when they killed a helpless baby/child? Did they really not believe in right and wrong and did they really believe that the horrible persecution and killings of Jews was okay? It just tears my heart to pieces to think of what these people went through.
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