(the-boy-in-the-striped-pajamas-image.jpg.google images.image. May 21,2013)

                               
                (images.jpeg.google images.image. May 22,2013)

(JEWISH CHILDREN LIBERATED.jpg.google images.image. May 22,2013)

(Treblinka.jpg.google images.image. May 22,2013)

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Facing History and Ourselves

Facing History and Ourselves is a course with many over lapping messages. This is a course designed by Mr. Gallagher to inform about the holocaust and the dangers of being a bystander in the face of bullying. Mr. Gallagher spreads this message using the horrible atrocities human beings committed on one another during the Second World War as evidence of the importance of this behavior.  The course follows the events leading up to the holocaust. The main message, of the slow rise of the Nazi’s, being that it would have been all too easy to stop them.  Facing history as a course has been the most involving class I’ve ever taken. I hope that this class serves as a model of the types of classes I will be taking in college. The material was engaging and spoke for its self, I found the topic interesting and it was not a struggle to remain interested in. It was the first class that I’ve taken where my understanding the material is the most important thing to the teacher. The passion that Mr. Gallagher feels for this subject is beyond that of any other teacher that I have had. Before taking this class I did not fully understand how an event like the holocaust could happen. The fact that 6 million people were killed as a result of the Nazi’s rise to power never really resonated with me. I had no idea how to put any substance behind the number. Facing History made that number personal. Being sheltered from this was not doing me any favors as a person, and I believe that’s the element of Facing history is so important to this class.

Mr. Gallagher’s instance that we understand the existence of amoral people taught me a lot about the depth of the human personality. Never truly believing that a person could be truly evil, I always assumed that the Nazi’s regretted their actions. Although this was true for some, there where soldiers who were interviewed in the documentary “Road to Treblinka” that had no feelings of remorse for their actions. One soldier in particular talked about killing young children. He explained how they would just fall dead and that would be the end of it. Im not sure if this man was trained through repetative action to feel this way or if he truly was an amoral person. Class discussion is a huge part of this class and I feel that I have learned just as much from my fellow students as I have from watching videos in class. This particular topic sparked a class discussion that added another level to my thinking on the subject.  Several students expressed that they belived that there was  no one that was entirely evil. Their main point being that they felt that what they were doing was right or that they were kind to those close to them. Mr. Gallagher presented the example of Hitler as someone who is truly amoral. What was particularly interesting to me was that there was one student in the class who disagreed, saying that there is some good in everyone. This is a difficult point to argue due to the fact that knowledege of Hitlers true thoughts or actions in private are not available. However in my opinion Hitlers actions and disregard for human life make him the prime example of someone who is without a moral compass.

What I appriciate about facing History as a class is that Mr.Gallagher made sure that we understood the extensive mistreatment of Nazi’s prisoners. A standard history class does not cover the dehuminaztion on the jews and other prisoners, the torture or poor conditions they faced, it leaves a very flat and uninvolved reprisention. Before taking this class I had very limited knowledge of what was done to jews and political prisoners within the camps. For example, I had no idea that the Nazis conducted medical experiments on their pisoners. It shocked me that the Nazi’s could go beyond extermination and actuallty tourture people who had themselves done no wrong. We were given packets containing personal experiences of those who survived this experimentation. It is hard to understand how the Nazi’s were able to completely dehumanize someone to the point where they were able to preform operations on someone without anestesia.

The actions of the Nazis show malicious intent to harm prisoners with no remource, however many Nazi’s claimed that they were only following orders. One thing Mr. Gallagher made sure we understood was that this was untrue. We watched a video documentation of a study that tested the strength of human will. In most cases subjects where unwilling to cause another person harm, even when presented with no other option. Although there is a diffrence in cercumstance between this text and the consiquences Nazi soldiers faced, I still belive in the valdiity of this experiement.  In order to be successful in the ranks of nazi germany you had to allow yourself to be a bystander to truly amoral engagements. The comparison was made in class betwwen this behavior and those who are bystanders to bullying because in reality there is no diffrence. The Nazi’s would not have been able to rise to power if people had not allowed themselves to become bystanders. If we as a society do not make a point in standing up for what we believe in, history could easily repeat itself. that is why it is easy for me to see the importance of this class, that is why it is important for us to face history and that is why it is important to look inwardly at ourselves.