Essay Execution by Hunger

The feeding of the prisoners was a major issue in the concentration camps during the holocaust. The jewish prisoners were fed three times a day in the concentration camps, those three times were morning, noon, and evening. (living conditions, labor and executions) It wasn’t the amount of food given a day that was an issue the nutritional value that the Nazis had for the concentration camps. (living conditions, labor and executions) When the Nazis would feed the prisoners they gave the less physically demanding workers one thousand three hundred calories per day and gave the ones who engaged in hard labor one thousand seven hundred calories per day. (living conditions, labor and executions) This was an issue because after several weeks on such starvation in the camps, most prisoners began to experience what is called organic deterioration that led to the well known “Muzulman” state. (living conditions, labor and executions) This was when the prisoners ended being so tiny, extreme physical exhaustion, and soon ended up in death. (living conditions, labor and executions) In march 31, 1942 the WVHA established a minimum working day of 11 hour in all concentration camps. Labor in some concentration camps was the way of destroying prisoners, they worked them until they died. (living conditions, labor and executions) The prisoners usually labored in various sectors of

The merciless starvation was a constant factor at the concentration camps. The inmates received a daily ration of soup and bread, but that was it. They were also forced to work daily on these empty stomachs, as if the starvation wasn’t bad enough on it’s own. “The bell announced that we were dismissed. We went to fetch the evening meal: bread and margarine. I was terribly hungry and swallowed my ration on the spot. My father told me, “You mustn’t eat all at once. Tomorrow is another day…” This quote is a perfect example of relentless work and merciless starvation.

In his speech, Stalin also mentions that kulaks, which were wealthy peasants, must be eliminated as a class. (Document 3) In this speech Stalin explained that agriculture must change in order to feed the growing population of industrial workers. The collective farms would receive the needed modern technology and scientific equipment, and it would all result in increased food production. Stalin made clear that the kulaks must be driven out in order for the plan to be successful. Once again, Stalin is using the power of speech to gain support for his collectivization plan. An excerpt from A History Civilization describes the horrific effects of Stalin’s collectivization. Stalin began deporting the capitalistic farmers (kulaks) to forced labor camps or Siberia, and peasants were being machine-gunned into submission. Peasants slaughtered huge amounts of horses, cattle, sheep and goats, burned crops and broke plows in desperate revolts. The amount of Russian livestock lost due to collectivization was immense. (Document 4)

     The prisoners are further degraded because they simply do not have enough to eat. They become very haggardly and often have difficulty in judging each other?s age. Acquisition of a sufficient amount of food becomes a daily struggle, and for those who do not rise to the occasion ultimately parish. After a certain time period, it is impossible to survive unless you become an ?Organisator, Kombinator, or a Prominent? (Levi, 89). Levi writes, ?We have learnt the value of food; now we also diligently scrape the bottom of the bowl after the ration and we hold it under our chins when we eat bread so as not to lose the crumbs? (Levi, 33). A prisoner could only survive on a normal ration for around 3 months at best. Starving to death was not the main reason to acquire an adequate amount of food. The selections had to be avoided. If a prisoner was too weak to work, he was destined for the gas chambers.

I was in the Buchenwald camp when I heard about the defeat of the German Army at the Stalingrad. I was excited, and wished that I had witnessed the defeat in person so that I can laugh at the German soldiers. However, my imaginary laughter was halted when one of the guards hit the floor with a bat thrice, which means labor time. My role in the camp was to wake up before sunrise, work the entire day and starve. The camp is the most dreadful place I have ever encountered. Yet, this may not be true for the SS guards, who can visit the zoo or the brothel in the camp anytime they desire (Bergen “Chapter 7”). Fortunately, I was blessed with my skills I acquired in the Volkswagen, for it assigned me into one of the workshops that build war supplies for Germany. The starvation in the camp is intense, for a chunk of bread

Hunger: a feeling of discomfort or weakness caused by lack of food, coupled with the desire to eat. About 795 million people in the world do not have enough food to live a healthy life. When we think of hunger, most of us tend to think of third world countries or places on the other side of the world. Although there is a lot of hunger in those places, there is also a lot of hunger in our country and in our own town.

Every day, prisoners were awoken early in the morning by the kappo. A kappo was a prisoner picked out by the Nazis and was placed in charge of administrative tasks and supervision. Prisoners were expected to make their “beds” and then went through a process called the Appell. The Appell was a process in which Nazi officials forced the inhabitants to stand still for hours at a time, in any type of weather, while reading off orders or selecting the weak for extermination. If they weren't selected, they would go to the restroom, which consisted of holes in slabs of concrete, which was extremely insanitary. After, it was time for breakfast, and if one did not have their bowl, it meant death. Their breakfast consisted of watery soup or if they were lucky, a small piece of bread or sausage. During this, the kappo would enjoy messing with the prisoners by throwing bread on the ground and watching people fight for it. Throughout the day, everyone was expected to work at full speed and if they did not, they would be beaten. On the other hand, even if they did, there was still a chance of abuse. If one were to faint during their work, they would be killed by the SS. With long, tiring working conditions, they barely received any breaks and if they did, they would most likely would be beaten during them. At the end of the exhausting day, there would be a roll call. This roll call was primarily used as a selection, which means that anyone could be picked to be exterminated in the chambers. The kappo would make people do physical activities or simply stand there for hours, and if anyone were to fail at this, they would be selected to die. After the roll call, some nights they would receive dinner, other nights they would not be as lucky. By nightfall, all prisoners were expected to be in their barracks, which are guarded by blockfuhrer. The blockfuhrer can harass, abuse, and mistreat anyone they wish for no

Life during the Soviet Gulag was not a very pleasant experience. Throughout the mid Twentieth Century in Russia individuals would be imprisoned, punished, and penalized daily not to mention, that extra ten years could be added for doing absolutely nothing. In addition to, imagine having to survive day after day in a Siberian labor camp where you were forced to work outside regardless of the weather conditions or better yet, your own health conditions. Ivan Denisovich Shukou, an inmate of the labor camp in 1951 shared his experiences as well of thoughts in detail. Throughout this book he manages to express his daily struggles on what it is the idea of surviving with dignity. Shcha-854 was the code given to him for identification as a prisoner where the corrupted prison system treated their inmates as slaves. In the book, Ivan fights the freezing cold, mediocre food, and the thoughts of hoping that his prison sentence is not extended for another ten years for a petty reason. Having spent several years of his life at the

Soviets do so by inserting “constant fear, servitude, secrecy and mistrust, universal ignorance, squealing, betrayal and lie as a form of existence, corruption, cruelty, and slave psychology.” Fear was instilled into the captives’ bones as they “always knew that it would take only one careless work or gesture and he would fly off irrevocably into the abyss.” Being held as a captive does not fear them, but the detailed security questionnaires do. This is similar to Frankl’s fear of being sent to the gas chambers instead of towards other labor. To survive in the Soviet camps, people were to constantly spy and lie to each other as “anyone who burst out with a sincere protest was predestined to loneliness and alienation.” The citizens have never known anything as peace of

Prisoners of the Gulag were intentionally starved by the guards and head of the camp. Holm illustrates this through a line in her novel, “David was used to drastically short amounts of food,”through this she implies to the reader the short amounts of food given to prisoners. Jacque Rossi author of the article, “Many days, many lives, “states that, “Prisoners during their non-work hours were given slight amounts of non-nutritious food.” Rossi tells us that prisoners were in fact given very slight amounts of food and starved intentionally. Holm is able to demonstrate the lack of food and starvation problems that prisoners of the Gulag face.

Across the globe, companies and people flood our lives with information that could be perceived as true to the naked eye. While most articles hold up to a fact or credential check, there are those out there who are written by morons on the subject. People often agree with articles despite knowing nothing about where the information is coming from. Having the ability to fact check an article could prevent someone from having misinformed opinions from less than credible publishers or people. Looking at the publisher, writer and ability to reference facts and examples is the simplest way to determine if the information in the article can be perceived as believable. The articles in question, How to End Hunger and Feats of Will, are

The year is 1945, World War Two has just been concluded with an allied victory. Josef Stalin is the General Secretary of the USSR and possess greater dreams for his country. This In turn leads to a several decade engagement between the world's largest superpowers, ironic that peace would result in war, but that is the world we reside in. Josef is set upon a communist ideology for his people. When he would travel across the soviet state, upon arrival the first person in his welcome crowd to stop applauding him was set to execution or work camp. This was rule under the Stalin, the man of steel.

In the labour camps, the prisoners were given food on rations and had to dine with their gang. The workers were given a “ration of bread” and “mush out of magara… it was one solid lump…” (Solzhenitsyn, 13). Ivan Denisovich Shukhov managed to salvage extra bread and keep “half inside his clothes… [and the other half] inside the hole in his mattress [for later],” (Solzhenitsyn, 114). This shows that food was even bigger issue because he had to hide it from the guards and the other prisoners. Shukhov was only able to get his ration with the rest of his gang at the same time as all the other prisoners; “when the manager was there he never let anyone through if he wasn’t with his own gang.” (Solzhenitsyn, 115). However, in Scott’s work, from the beginning of part two, he indicated that there was a lack of food available to him because all he had was “tea and a few potatoes,” (Scott, 9); indicating a shortage of food from the beginning foreshadows that the shortage of food will be a common challenge he faces throughout his memoir. Scott mentioned that the workers were given food cards which had the “numbers from 1 to 31 around the edge of the card” (Scott, 30) which allowed them one meal per day. The food they were served included hot soup and black bread, which was not enough, because the men ate “two or even three dinners to get a really adequate meal,” (Scott, 79) to survive working in harsh climates. The shortage of

Chronic food shortages affected a lot of prisoners. The privileged few, however, escaped food paucity by bribing corrupt officials. The others would tend to turn very desperate. An example of this is of a prisoner called Fetiukov, who is despised and referred to as the Jackal by his fellow prisoners. He would lick the leftovers of the other zeks and would beg for almost anything he could get, in turn losing his self-respect and dignity among the members of his squad. There was also a lot of corruption in the kitchens. The cooks would eat ‘as much as their belly would’, and offer extra helpings to those who would help them do their work, like collecting plates and

One day in the Life of Ivan Desinovich by Alex Solzhenitsyn, published in 1962 describes the Gulag as a prison used by the Soviet government under Stalin to dehumanize it’s prisoners. Despite being in the Gulag, Alexander Solzhenitsyn manages to survive these experiences and describes them through the use of Ivan and his fellow protagonists. Solzhenitsyn explores this topic by employing vivid imagery while appealing to the Russian people with his symbolism and allegories. The combination of themes and motifs communicate to the Russian people how a few prisoners managed to survive in such a prison that was meant to take away their humanity and transform them into mindless slaves.