Visitors to Auschwitz listen to the words of a tour guide with suitable expressions of disgust. I’ve tried enlarging the eyes of the guy with with sunglasses, and I can’t discern whether he is leering at me for taking his photo, or looking straight ahead. Photo by Eric Francis.
[Editor’s Note: This article was originally published Oct. 8, 2006. For a more detailed introduction to this series, please see this link. The approximately eight articles and 15 photos in this series will be published evenings at about 6 pm Eastern Time.]
AS I LEFT Auschwitz, the original camp, I stopped to study and photograph the reactions of people gathered near the entrance listening to tour guides tell the story. This photo, taken from inside the camp gate looking outward, pretty much sums it up: a combination of disgust and shock.
These folks look sixtyish, so what they are hearing about happened in their lifetimes or very close to it. This the thing we need to remember: the Holocaust happened recently, in a society just like ours, where a lot of middle class people wanted to enjoy their lives and not be bothered with the affairs of the government.
This is why we need to keep it in mind, and watch to see if any patterns are repeating.
One of the framers of the U.S. Constitution once remarked that the time to start worrying is not when all your rights are gone, but rather when the first of them is threatened. I have noticed that it’s finally becoming less taboo to “be political,” as we figure out that “political” is about OUR lives, our futures. We might want to think of more creative ways to do that, how to raise awareness and how to take action.
Tomorrow night we will begin exploring Auschwitz ii – Birkenau, and see if the history of this place, the Nazis’ most cherished mass human extermination complex, holds any clues for us today.
I’ll catch you tomorrow.
Sign before the electric barbed wire fence at the perimeter of Auschwitz, camp 1.
Auschwitz ii – Birkenau photo surveillance photo, 1944, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.