How the Holocaust Was Able to Occur

Holocaust represents genocide that occurred during World War Two. In this genocide, approximately six million Jews died. This murder was carried out by Nazi Germany led by Adolf Hitler. Before the Holocaust, nine million Jews resided in Europe. About two thirds of them died during Holocaust. This included one million children, two million women and three million men. Apart from the Jews, some other people died during this period. These included homosexuals, Jehovah’s witnesses, Romani and people with disabilities. Therefore, the total number of victims of the Holocaust is approximately eleven million.

Holocaust was one of the greatest murders to have occurred in history. Representation of the pain and suffering that the victims underwent is not achievable. They went through considerable suffering and torture before most of them were brutally murdered. These murders took place in stages. Even before the start of World War Two, the Germans had started making plans of removing Jews from the civil society. Some camps were established and referred to as concentration camps. The Jews were then subjected to labor in slavery until some of them died in the process. Some died of exhaustion, while some died of diseases. The Germans did not care about how the Jews suffered. They did not even consider the kids present. As long as one was a Jew, he/she went through to this treatment. Whenever Germany conquered parts of Eastern Europe, they went round killing the Jews present. They even had distinct units, whose main job was to kill the Jews.

The Jews that survived were taken to Camps where they were exterminated, while others ended up in gas chambers. In these gas chambers, many Jews were put in a single room, and poisonous gases were let into those chambers. After some time, all the people in those chambers would be dead. This was a high level of brutality among human beings. It left the survivors so traumatized that some never recovered.

There have been several attempts to represent the Holocaust. This is in written form, and films, which attempt to show the suffering that the Jews underwent. However, historians have continued to criticize these representations. Some of the things that happened to the victims of the holocaust have never been made public. There are also some details that were omitted in describing Holocaust. For this reason, most film-makers, who attempt to represent it, construct their own events and theories. This is totally unethical, because there are some survivors of the Holocaust, and such representations could be quite disturbing.

Apart from physical torture, the victims also underwent emotional and mental torture. It is so hard to think that someone could hate them to the extent of killing them just because of their race. This made the victims feel as if they did not belong to this world, since they were no accepted by their immediate neighbors. It is just so difficult to explain the torture that these people underwent. Therefore, it is not in line with the correct code of conduct of humans, to attempt representation of the Holocaust.

The extermination of six million people in extremely brutal ways is so strange. The human language certainly has no words that can explain these massive killings. The vocabulary in the human minds is not adequate to describe the merciless events that were being carried out during the Second World War. It is a truly unique event on its own. An event escapes all meaning. Therefore, there is no ethical value in attempting to represent it. It would lead to conveyance of information that is not true. It would create an entirely different picture from the actual events. This is not morally acceptable, since it could disturb the mind of the survivor of the Holocaust. Understanding, analysis and representation of the Holocaust are not as straightforward as that of any other event. This was a truly unique event, which should not have people attempting representation every other day. This would amount to unethical behavior.

Writers like Paul Eisenstein have published monographs on Holocaust. These monographs are designed to outline and describe the problems encountered by scholars in describing Holocausts. He even describes how hard it is for teachers to inform their students on the occurrences and events of the Holocaust. The representation of Holocaust lacks truth in it every time it is attempted. This is because there were remarkably few  survivors compared to the people who died in the event. Most survivors never want to remember the events that took place. Some of them have physical scars, which are proof of the brutality of the Germans at that time. Therefore, the facts and statistics that are needed in the representation of Holocaust are hard to find. Most film-makers only want to produce entertaining movies, which will be sold. They do not care about the truth value of their story line. Such behavior is not ethical or morally upright.

The murder of all these people was a brutal act that will live to be remembered by generations to come. It is so scary to think of how the people were being executed. Therefore, people should use parts of the events that can be clearly remembered. Using these events, they should learn different things, so that they cannot repeat the mistakes that were committed during that time. Otherwise, trying to represent it is not morally upright. This is not an event that survivors would like to be reminded about time and again. A little kid who watched his/her parents being murdered brutally would not like to watch that event repeated again and again. Therefore, scholars should try to come up with lessons that can be learnt from the Holocaust. This would prevent a repetition of such acts in the modern world.

To kill all these people so brutally, the Germans had to be filled with passionate hatred for the Jews. This hatred cannot be imagined by the average human being. The hatred that would let a person kill a little child without mercy is unimaginable. Using people and characters to try to manifest this hatred is an almost impossible task. It is quite difficult for people to represent something that they cannot even imagine. Some of those events were so brutal that they scare people who were not victims of these murders. People are even afraid of hearing the other untold truths of the Holocaust. Therefore, it is clear that there is no ethical value in trying to represent the Holocaust.

The events of the Holocaust took place some time ago. Therefore, a lot has changed since then. The physical outlooks of places and people’s attitudes have also changed. However, representation of the Holocaust could bring up controversies and stir up the past. This can have serious consequences, since it would prompt a repeat of the hatred that existed between these two groups. In the modern world, the Germans and the Jews do not seem to have a visible conflict of any kind. Therefore, it would be better if things remained that way. The idea of having controversy between these two groups is just not bearable.

Scholars may argue that representations of other events, which include deaths, have been done. Therefore, they would argue that representation of the Holocaust is not exceptional. However, Holocaust is certainly exceptional. It was a murder that was committed on totally innocent people whose only mistake was their race. The number of people killed was also unusually large for a remarkably short time.

In addition, the methods through which the people were murdered were really brutal. People were transported to camps knowing exceptionally well that they were going to be killed. These were extremely serious crimes against humanity. If it was possible, the survivors could erase each and every little detail of the events. This is because the thought of the Holocaust creates fear in people (Haber 54). Representation of these crimes against humanity can never be adequate to show the sufferings that the survivors underwent. Watching most of your relatives get killed just because of their race is something that cannot be represented. This is because the methods that were being used to execute the people were unimaginable. An attempt to represent such methods would lead to the creation of a false impression of the actual events that took place. This is totally immoral and unethical.

How the Holocaust Was Able to Occur

The Nazi ideology was deeply rooted in anti-Semitism whereby Nazi rhetoric branded those they differed from as Jews. Hostility towards the Jews in Europe possessed a long history and they were subjected to violence and held responsible for pandemics. Moreover, they were subjected institutionalized discrimination, such as being cowed into ghettos and putting on specific badges to identify them as Jewish. This intolerance was more than sectarian discrimination since a shift to a different sect did not change the way these individuals were perceived at all. In line with this perspective, clearly the Nazis were in a sense demigods who exploited this prejudice. Besides that, the leader of the holocaust Hitler is connected to the anti-Semitic mayor Karl Leer who is said to have used a similar kind of demagoguery. Furthermore, they justified their beliefs with the pseudo-science of social Darwinism that they utilitarianism interpreted to mean that the interest of others did not logically entail an equal consideration of interests. 

At first, in Germany a utilitarian eugenics program "euthanized" people with physical or mental disabilities in order for "the strong to survive."  In other words these ideas brought about the notion that they could craft a "master race" by doing away with those that were considered a drain on society, and these thoughts actually became a mainstreamed into the entire society. "At first parents brought their kids to the government to be killed by choice if they "considered" unworthy of living". This is an indication of how the German publics were fooled to believe and support the nation of a master race. "That they had the hypothetical imperative "the advancement of the human race." As a result the firs mass killings were the killings of the disabled.

Following the events of the WWI all countries suffered economically.  This created an opportunity the Nazi party to strongly and craftily invoke the aforementioned prejudices. Hitler was agitating for the Nazi party and his popularity had increased after he participated in the beer hall putsch in Munich. Early on Bergen talks about the "intentionalists because they emphasize Hitler's intentions and consider the holocaust a result of his long term planning" and the "funtionalists because they describe the holocaust as a functionalist because they view the holocaust as a function of other developments". He had been jailed for 13 months and it was while serving this jail term that he wrote the book Mein Kampf.  Joseph Gobbels a popular journalist and writer became involved in the Nazi party in 1924 and was head of propaganda by 1928 and remained at that post throughout WWII. He openly incited hatred and organized Nazi hate speech rallies. Another important figure was Heinrich Himmler who served as the head of the Schutzstaffel between 1929-1945 and also doubled up as the chief of German police in 1936

The Weimar republic remained vibrant from 1918 until Hitler was promoted to serve German as a chancellor in January of 1933. Currencies in Europe had inflated after the First World War and in 1923, as a result of extremist methods the German state there was a hyperinflation of the German mark. This was a decade before Hitler came to power and legislation had been passed to stabilize their currency. In fact Wymar was in a better financial situation than most countries in Europe at the time. Then in 1929 after the U.S stock market crashed Germany was severely affects. By 1930 Germany was having a crisis, so they invoked Article 48 which allowed the president, Paul von Hindenburg, to use doctorial powers. In 1932 Hitler ran against Hindenburg in the presidential elections and lost.  However to gain support Hindenburg decided to make Hitler the chancellor in 1933.

As support for the Nazi party had diminished contrasting support for a more egalitarian society was gaining momentum.  Subsequently, on February 27, of 1933 the Reichstag was incinerated.  Hitler's propagandists spinned this incident to gain support by claiming that it was razed by communists. The press consistently reported the information from the Nazis. On the other hand some non-Nazis did posit that the Nazis had torched their own building. Hitler ordered more attacks against German communists, and opened the first concentration camp Dachau, where he confined many communists. He also capitalized on the Reichstag fire by using it to pass the enabling act despite mainstream social democrat resistance, in March 1933. The enabling act allowed Hitler more doctoral power as he could now pass any policy without approval of the Reichstag.  As a result of these new powers Hitler was able to outlaw all political parties other than the Nazi party and he did.

Further injustices took the form of an anti-gay agenda and propaganda. By 1933 The Nazistorm troopers were already raiding places where gays socialized. Sectarian forces acted with the state to legislate against other religious sects. Additional measures banned Jews from the civil service. This created an environment of animosity and provoked People to go beyond the institutionalized anti-Jewish measures and divorce their Jewish mate's. Jewish people were fired from their jobs and the pro-nazi protestant church removed Jewish members. The German government halted entitlementsprograms to Jews. The in 1933 Hitler began to rearm his country. The lack of defense for the targeted individuals was probably signaling to the instigators of these policies that what they were doing was permissible.

On the night of long nights or the Rohm Putsch on June 30, 1934, the SS killed many people that the Nazi party found problematic.  This consolidated more power with Hitler and the Nazi party. Routinization of the Nazi party had several factors. First off was the centralization of power. Next was legalization through the Nuremberg laws which defined Jews and made it illegal for them to have relationships with "Aryans." The Nazis also ritualized it through dramatic displays of power and unity typically at rallies like book burning. Finally the Nazis coordinated together and began to prepare for war that their ideology presupposed.

By 1938, Germany was rearmed and looking for war. At first, the Germans annexed Austria and the Sudetenland this emboldened the people of Germany that Hitler's policies could be trusted. In 1939 the German army took over the remaining land in czecoslevakia. At this point the concentration camp system started expanding and people could be jailed there without trial.  Germany expanded its military operations too and invaded Poland in September 1^st 1939.

Expansion and systemization took over after the rutionization (page 135). In 1940 German forces attacked Denmark. Denmark surrendered to German and by June 1940 it had successfully invaded Norway too.  German then attacked the Netherlands, Belgium, and Luxembourg. By June 14 of 1940 she had taken control of Paris too.  The Germans plan was to weaken Britain. They kept attacking Britain throughout 1940 and expected to come back later for an easy victory when Britain is weak.  On June 22 1941 German troops now invaded Russia in a very destructive war.  This moved the Nazi leaders to the full implementation of their racial plan.  They had the hypothetical framework in place and now saw the war as an opportunity to slaughter all the Jews and other people that they deemed unworthy of life. The einsatzgruppen rounded up Jews, dug pits and shot them in large groups in the pits.

"Special murder squads" and "einsatzgruppen" " had explicit instructions from heydrich to kill Jews, prominent communists, and anyone suspected of sabotage or anti German activity". In 1941 "the chaplains appealed to the local military commander, to take pity on the children." "The army commander agreed to postpone the shooting of the children, but SS representatives and military officers on the spot prevailed, pointing to instructions from German field marshal Walter von Reichenau. The attempts to stop the shooting of children were futile because of orders that they had received. These orders received functional universal support as there is no evidence that any German was ever punished for refusing to murder people. They were not forced to do it.  In 1942 Germans met to try to find more efficient ways to better kill Jews.

The Genocide lasted as long as the Second World War coming to an end only after German had lost the war to the allies. It is unfortunate that Nazi used human difference to punish other for being different. Theirs was an absurd attempt to redefine race through what can be considered racial cleansing. The genocide caused a lot of suffering and many people lost their lives.

Conclusion

Many events have occurred in history. It is the nature of human beings to want to represent these events. This is because human beings study their history and want to remember it even in the coming times. Some of these events in history can comfortably be represented. On the other hand, some historic events cannot be adequately represented. As the essay above illustrates, Holocaust is one of them. Therefore, every writer who is ethical and claims to be morally upright should not attempt representation of the Holocaust. This is because it would not portray a true picture of the events that occurred during the Second World War.