Viewing the Holocaust

Quote:  "I have decided to devote my life to telling the story because I felt that having survived I owed something to the dead.  And anyone who does not remember betrays them again." -Elie Wiesel


     A lot of people do not like to remember the Holocaust.  It was a very terrible and depressing time.  Many Jews all over Europe were killed in only a few years.  Now, years later, many people still don't like to talk about it.  All that most people want to remember about it is that it was a very important part of history, and they choose to believe that something like that will never happen again.  But as I write, genocides still happen today.

     In the quote above made by Elie Wiesel, he gives his reason for telling his story about surviving the Holocaust.  He wants people to hear his story since others who died in the Holocaust can not tell theirs.  He also says that whoever chooses not to remember the Holocaust will betray them all over again.  This means that people today act like the family and friends of those who died, who did not do anything to help the Jews.  I agree with Wiesel because I can relate to a similar situation.  When a kid views a particular group in school to be popular or "cool", he would do anything to be with them including betraying his old friend.  He would rather trade his old friend for the new group in order to appear "cool" to other students in school.  This situation proves Wiesel's statement to be true of people's betrayal of others.  It is not right for someone to betray a friend in order to become popular, safe, or benefit from someone else's misfortune. 

     Here are some images that I think of when I read Wiesel's passage.

The two dogs used to be friends until the dog sitting betrayed the dog standing and got a new cat friend.

Judas has betrayed Christ.

The picture shows Wiesel's reason why he wanted to tell his story.  Wiesel should tell his story because the other Jews in the Holocaust can not tell their story.  Wiesel "owes" it to the Jews to tell his story.

The girl is cheating on the guy in orange, betraying him for someone else.

The red person represents Wiesel.  The blue people represent the Jews who died in the Holocaust.  Wiesel is holding his hand up because he is choosing to tell the story of Jewish life during the Holocaust.

     This is my view of the Holocaust.  What 's yours?

Elijah Waldon