The Holocaust: From Dehumanization To The Jews

The Holocaust which was one of many of the controversial events that have happened in the history of our world demonstrated a significant amount of cruelty and dehumanization. Because of such a controversial event, many have suffered through physical and unfortunately psychological upheaval and distress. With previous knowledge and novels’ read on the Holocaust, it came to be known that the event was triggered through obedience and conformity due to the not specifically the Germans’ beliefs of anti-Semitic and propaganda, but more of leader Adolf Hitler. The time of the Holocaust was used to dehumanize which enhanced the understanding of mental health and human psychology. During the Holocaust, many psychological principles affected individuals forever. The principles include groupthink and of course knowing the outcome of the event. Such principles sooner explain the reality of life because it stresses how individuals react due to their past experiences like the Holocaust and most importantly how traumatic events build them as who they are today.  Innocent Jews went through starvation, terrible working conditions, and the elimination of race through torture such as gas chambers. Furthermore, the history of this controversial event is now being used to be alert of the health and wellness of those who have gone through such events that sooner change their behavior and mentality for the better or even worse.

Throughout the duration of the Holocaust numerous tragedies transpired. Among these tragedies was dehumanization, the process by which Nazis gradually reduced the humanity of the Jewish population. In Night, a memoir by Elie Wiesel, Elie depicts the dehumanization he experienced and the devastating effect it had on his life while on the transports to Auschwitz, again in the concentration camps, then finally and perhaps worst of all, on his father’s death bed.

Dehumanization the process of stripping people of their human qualities. In the novel night by Elie Wiesel the author uses many dehumanization scenarios to show what the jews experienced during the holocaust. They were stripped of their clothing and number like cattle for that fear was more important than food. The ss went though all of this for the exterminating the jews race.

During the Holocaust, German Nazis slaughtered Jewish people and held them prisoner as well. While they were held captive, the Jewish people were often dehumanized. Dehumanization is defined as the process of depriving a person or group of human qualities. Throughout the book Night by Elie Wiesel, there is many examples of dehumanization, like taking away personal identities, starvation, and being forced to watch others be murdered that helped Adolf Hitler achieve his ends.

Beginning on January 30, 1933, the Holocaust had begun. 11 million people were killed during the Holocaust, and within the 11 million deaths 6 million of them were Jews; that means that more than half of the people who died due to this genocide were Jews. This genocide was also known as the Holocaust. Fortunately, this massive genocide ended on May 8, 1945. There are many other genocides, such as the Rwandan genocide that had 800,00 deaths and only lasted about 100 days. The most captivating one is the Holocaust because many people died and during the period of the Holocaust not a lot of people knew what was going on. There were many victims of the Holocaust, and most of which could not get help. The Nazis were able to get away with a massive number because they had a secret weapon called dehumanization. Dehumanization is the process of depriving a person or group of positive human qualities. Many wonder how the Jewish population became dehumanized; circumstances such as propaganda, experimentations, and the Jews always being blamed for everything show how the Nazis dehumanized the Jews easily during the Holocaust.

“For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high [places]”- Ephesians 6:12. This verse from a book of the Bible holds true in the event of the Holocaust. Dehumanization is the process in which the Nazis reduced the people of Jewish religion to nearly nothing just because the Nazis viewed the Jewish people as a nuisance. The horrendous effect of this process reduced the Jews not only in number, but also in spirit through many different unethicical actions. This helped the Nazis in many different ways. The German persecution of the Jewish as well as many other groups, had a generarion gapping effect on the people of

Dehumanization means to deprive one of their human qualities. Dehumanization is a very harrowing act that the Nazi soldiers used to create fear in the Jews. After creating this fear in the Jews, the Nazis would force them to obey their orders. The fear that comes from dehumanization makes one more likely to obey, because how can someone take a stand and say that they are not going to listen when they have been brought down to a point where they feel as if they are nothing. By using Dehumanization, the Nazis were reducing the Jews to no less than objects, positions which meant nothing to them, belongings that were just a nuisance. In Night, it is quoted that “I was nothing but a body. Perhaps even less…” (pg. 52). The minorities of society fell victim to dehumanization at the cruel hands of SS guards and the inhumane camp where they were held captive for what seemed to be endless periods of time.

While examining the works of Elie Wiesel and Primo Levi it becomes apparent that the holocaust was a horrendous time in our human history. However, although both writers went through similar experiences during this time; both seem to reflect and dwell on things differently such as their point of view and lives in the camps as well as the different themes they focus on. In this analysis the stories of the two authors will be compared and as stated above will also focus on how they recount their experiences.

To dehumanize someone is when you deprive a person from human qualities, personality, or spirt. That’s what the Nazi’s did to multiple types of people in Europe during 1933 through 1945. They specifically did this to people of Jewish religion because they didn’t agree with their beliefs. In the memoir Night by Elie Wiesel, his father, fellow Jews, and himself were slowly being dehumanized by the Nazi’s when a son was fighting his father for food because of starvation, tattooing of numbers on the prisoners, and packing them into wagons to transport them from place to place like animals.

Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel once stated, “No human race is superior; no religious faith inferior. All collective judgements are wrong. Only racists make them.” Imagine being discriminated against for something you couldn’t control; like the way you look or talk, what you believe in or the way you live, how would that make you feel? Now imagine being dehumanized for that something you can’t change. It may sound preposterous, but during the holocaust that’s precisely what happened. The dehumanization of the Jewish midst the Holocaust is vital to learn about because it enlightens us on the unfair bigotry, ghastly living conditions, and how the Jewish had their identity stripped away.

Dehumanization is the act of taking away someones identity. The Nazi's and SS officials would make the Jews wear a star to symbolize that they are a Jew. The Nazi's would also shave off the hairs from the Jews and use the hair to sell it. Lastly, the Nazi's or SS officials would make the Jews wear the same stripped clothes and the Jews had to wear it every single day. On winters, the Jewish people did not have much to cover themselves up except their stripped clothes. They would not be given much to eat either, just a bowl of soup and bread. Overall the Jews suffered and got their humanity taken away by

The circumstances were given to the point where most would die. For example, “She looked so like a skeleton” (Spiegelman 56). The Germans, mainly the Nazis, starved the Jews to the point where they looked like a skeleton. The Jews were dehumanized because they were purposely starved and abused (beat). The Jews suffered and suffered, but the only reason for this was because the Germans thought of them as just “things”.

According to Dictionary.com the definition of dehumanization is to deprive of human qualities or attributes. In the late 1930's and early 1940's Nazi Germany was thriving by dehumanizing people who had different ideas or beliefs, such as: gypsies, homosexuals, war criminals, and the Jewish population. In the novel, Night, by Elie Wiesel the author explains the harsh conditions people had to go through whilst living in the concentration camps run by Nazi Germany. A few examples of this is when the people in these camps were no longer actual humans, they just became workers with numbers for names, as well as when they became vicious beasts and attacked each other in order to get food, and how the sight of family members, friends, neighbors and

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Known as one of the most horrific events in history, World War II (WW2) caused tremendous adversity and suffering amongst the lives of people across the globe. However, what is most concerning about the war, was what happened behind closed doors, specifically within Germany. The Holocaust is still considered one the worst ethnic cleansing attacks in the world. Although there is an endless amount of research and hard evidence of the Holocaust occurring, certain groups of individuals strongly reject it. Known as “Holocaust Denial”, this conspiracy theory has always been personally intriguing due to several reasons and will be analyzed more thoroughly.