A requirement for one of my history classes is to teach a day in the high school. So I taught yesterday- I really enjoyed teaching. I am still a rookie for sure, it was only my second time. Last semester I taught on the Ancient Olympics. That was a lot of fun. The students seemed to thoroughly enjoy the topic- and let me say it is interesting to say the least- Did you know if a married woman attended the Ancient Olympics they would be thrown off Mt. Typaeum? Yep, there is a lot of stuff you probably wouldn't know about this interesting topic. This semester however, my topic wasn't as "fun" but I really enjoyed digging in and finding out more and more about the Holocaust. What an interesting topic! It broke my heart to read all the first hand accounts of the millions and millions of people: people who perhaps watched a friends die, walked the hundreds of mile on the Death March, or maybe attempted to hide a Jew away- but they were caught and hung in public as a warning to others. I was even able to find some videos of people who gave first hand accounts of what happened in those Death Camps. I encourage you to read into this. The more I read the more I became disgusted with those Nazis...what was wrong with them...I read one story in particular... a young teenage boy describes what he saw the day his family was taken to the Death Camp. He says:
"...And everything went so fast: Men separated from women. Children torn from the arms of mothers. The elderly chased like cattle. The sick, the disabled were handled like packs of garbage. They were thrown in a side together with broken suitcases, with boxes. My mother ran over to me and grabbed me by the shoulders, and she told me "Leibele, I'm not going to see you no more. Take care of your brother.” And I never did."
The more accounts I read, the more disgusted I became. I read phrases describing the elderly and handicapped as worthless, good for nothing, and unprofitable to the society. After all, how would they help Germany become racially pure. They were unwanted. Did you know 80,000- 100,000 thousand elderly and disabled were killed during the Holocaust. Why? Because they were no longer useful to the society, that's why....Hmmmm.... Sound familiar??? Does it remind you of this man:
How easy it is for us to be disgusted at the cruelty of the Nazis. But what about us...what about our Health Care Plan. Are we really much better. Is Obama really much different than this man:
You see..they both believed people like this:
were no longer useful. After all they can't contribute to society any longer. After all, they have lived a long enough life, it is simply time for them to die....Maybe I am taking this a bit out of context, I don't know. But the more I read about the philosophy of Hitler and his army the more I thought about Obama and his Health Care....Am I really making too big a contrast??? Where will America be in 25 years???
