“First they came for the Communists, and I didn’t speak up, because I wasn’t a Communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn’t speak up, because I wasn’t a Jew. Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn’t speak up, because I was a Protestant. Then they came for me, and by that time there was no one left to speak up for me.”
–Martin Niemöller
* * *
This is the blog post that I almost didn’t write. I debated long and hard about it, knowing that I could never do justice to the topic, that I wasn’t worthy and I would have to abandon the mockery, snark and sarcasm in order to discuss it. Let’s face it – as much as I hate it, some shit just isn’t funny.
In the end, I decided to sober up and write it, knowing that I still can do no justice to the topic, but the fact that it is such an important subject won over doubt. While I am still not worthy, I have done my best and have had to ask for some assistance in speaking about this from a few of those who have already phrased things much better than I and are of far greater authority than myself.
While in Germany, Olivier and I made a visit to the Sachsenhausen concentration camp. We spent the entire day walking the grounds, in and out of the prisoner’s barracks, infirmary and prison cells. We passed under the watchtowers, along the roll-call area and the tables where they ate… when they ate.
In the memorial museum, we spent hours reading about specific individuals that had either perished in the camp, or had survived and had provided an account of the hell that they endured.
We walked down to the execution trench, which was when my composure began to falter. It begins to weaken again as I write this.
Standing there, one has no need of psychic abilities to feel it.
We can hear them, though they no longer have a voice.
We can see them, though they no longer have a form.
“The Nazis victimized some people for what they did, some for what they refused to do, some for what they were, and some for the fact that they were.”
-John Conway
“For your benefit, learn from our tragedy. It is not a written law that the next victims must be Jews.”
-Simon Wiesenthal
“We who lived in concentration camps can remember the men who walked through the huts comforting others, giving away their last piece of bread. They may have been few in number, but they offer sufficient proof that everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms – to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.”
-Viktor Frankl
“In Italy, the country where fascism was born, we have a particular relation with the Holocaust, but as a turning point in history it belongs to everybody in the world. It is a part of humanity.”
-Roberto Benigni
“When I came to power, I did not want the concentration camps to become old age pensioners homes, but instruments of terror.”
-Adolf Hitler
“We in the United States should be all the more thankful for the freedom and religious tolerance we enjoy. And we should always remember the lessons learned from the Holocaust, in hopes we stay vigilant against such inhumanity now and in the future.”
–Charlie Dent
“Our many Jewish friends and acquaintances are being taken away in droves. The Gestapo is treating them very roughly and transporting them in cattle cars to Westerbork, the big camp in Drenthe to which they’re sending all the Jews….If it’s that bad in Holland, what must it be like in those faraway and uncivilized places where the Germans are sending them? We assume that most of them are being murdered. The English radio says they’re being gassed.”
-Anne Frank
“When I teach about the Holocaust, I use it to try and get people to understand that the values that led to Hitler’s election and the theories behind the mass execution of Jews were also prominent and are prominent in American society.”
-Ralph Leck
“… in spite of everything, I still believe that people are really good at heart. I simply can’t build up my hopes on a foundation consisting of confusion, misery, and death. I see the world gradually being turned into a wilderness, I hear the ever approaching thunder, which will destroy us too, I can feel the sufferings of millions and yet, if I look up into the heavens, I think that it will all come right, that this cruelty too will end, and that peace and tranquility will return again.”
-Anne Frank
Sachsenhausen closed in May, 1945. However, the hell went on inside its gates due to the camp being located in the Soviet Occupation Zone. Because of this, there is no shortage of communist propaganda in the museum and information on the mass graves that were excavated after the fall of communism in East Germany.
Olivier and I stayed at the camp until shortly after the museum had closed. We drove back to our room, stunned and worn out… not quite lucid, the entire experience slapping us with so much reality, that it all seemed somewhat surreal.
Neither one of was able to sleep that night, both of us haunted by dreams not only of what we saw, read and felt, but what really kept us awake was the “what if.”
What if it were us? Would we speak up?
“The man who has no sense of history, is like a man who has no ears or eyes.”
-Adolf Hitler
Rassi…
I’m so far beyond words reading and seeing this post. I must admit that before even I came to your question in the end I was asking myself if I would even have the courage to visit such a place. Would I speak up? I don’t think any of us can truly know unless we find ourselves in the position. I know it’s so easy to speak up from behind a keyboard… easy even to be out as a lesbian and a witch when the actual danger is negligible for me. But then I must look at the truth that often my mouth has a mind of its own, especially when it comes to protectiong someone else. I’d say it’s a fair bet I’d have been killed rather horribly in one way or another. Of course, perhaps a quick death would have been preferable.
Who really knows? Thank you for this, and thank you for having the courage to go there.
Captcha: godsends Community
Thank you very much for posting that. very important. Especially when there are people, far too many people, who claim that it never even happened.
Jacki, what a thoughtful post. A few years back, I visited the Holocaust museum in DC with friends from varied backgrounds… a black man, a gay man, and a Jewish woman. At the beginning of the tour each person receives a little book–the story of a person who was sent to the camps. You are invited to become that person, and in the end you find out if you survived or not. That in itself was moving, but even more so was the realization that among OUR group, all except me would probably have been sent to the camps. We went back to our hotel rooms depressed and sad. I will never forget it.
What an important blog you have written. So difficult to commit to words your emotions and feelings I am certain.
This part of history must never be forgotten; thank you for sharing it with us. x
Thanks Jacki. Moving. I truly believe that anyone who counts themselves a member of the human race should visit one of the death camps in their lifetime. You’re right to feel moved. You’re even more right to ask “what if…”
Hugs.