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The world holds more than seven billion people, and that number is rising. So, naturally, society is full of people of different backgrounds, race, ideas, etc. Naturally, people of similar ideas group with each other; those who don’t fit in would be better off finding another group of people to go along with. In times of conflict, in times of war, certain groups are attacked physically and mentally. In World War II, it was no different. For example, Nazis sentenced Jews to death through concentration camps, and the United States government put Japanese-Americans into internment camps with unfavorable conditions, depriving them of their civil rights. For such extreme situations, several people united under one effort to help the
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Unifying people can be the best way to respond to conflict. In the novel The Boy in Striped Pajamas written by John Boyne, there are examples showing that unifying people can be the best way to respond to conflict. The novel is based off of the Holocaust and the internment camp Aushwitz. In the novel, Shmuel is currently living in the internment camp Aushwitz. They have harsh living conditions and most prisoners are worked to death or killed as soon as they arrive. In all internment camps prisoners are not treated like humans, they are not being fed properly and they are systematically being killed. Bruno goes to his fridge and starts to eat. He sees Shmuel staring while he was eating and offered him some. Shmuel was cautious about eating it because he didn’t want to get in trouble from Lieutenant Kotler. Bruno insisted and Shmuel gave in and shoved all the food in his mouth and gobbled it down. In the text, it states, "Wait there, I’ll cut some off for you,” said Bruno, opening the fridge and cutting another three healthy slices.”The boy stared at the food in his hand for a moment and then looked up at Bruno with wide and grateful but terrified eyes. He threw one more glance in the direction of the door and then seemed to make a decision, because he thrust all three slices into his mouth in one go and gobbled them down in twenty seconds flat.” The fact that Bruno gave food to Shmuel shows that people no …show more content…
This scenario occurred with many people throughout WWII, when the Japanese-Americans were put into Internment Camps. According to, http://www.ushistory.org/us/51e.asp, More than 127,000 Japanese Americans were interned.This situation occurred not because of crime, or unlawful acts, nothing but being born into the wrong family or race. People turned racist towards the Japanese-Americans during World War II. They believed that the Japanese living in the U.S. acted as spies for the Japanese government. In this situation, several non-victims grouped together to help out children in the internment camps. An excellent example is the story Dear Miss Breed. Miss Breed helped children in Internment Camps out by sending letters to the children in the horrible situation. The effect? The letters helped get the children’s mind off of the horrible situation. They were also able to send letters back to Miss Breed. Many responded about their experience in internment camps. The audience can interpret from these letters, the harsh treatment in the internment camps. In the short excerpt in Dear Miss Breed, provided by StudySync it says, “ P.S. There is no water on Sundays. The electricity is also turned off. Sunday morning everyone eats before 6:00 A.M. Water and electricity turned off between 6:00 A.M. to 6:00 P.M. on Sundays. Very Very inconvenient.” This shows that people interned in these camps suffered horrible situations..
Throughout humanity, human beings have been faced with ethnic hardships, conflict, and exclusion because of the battle for authority. Hence, in human nature, greed, and overall power consumes the mind of some people. Groups throughout the world yearn for the ability to be the mightiest one. These types of conflicts include ethnic shaming, racial exclusion, physical and verbal abuse, enslavement, imprisonment, and even death. Some of these conflicts were faced in all parts of Europe and the Pacific Region during World War II. During this dark time in history, people like Miss.Breed from Dear Miss Breed took initial action in what she thought was right, and gave hope to Japanese Internment Camp children by supplying books and
After listening to a testimony from Ralph Fischer, a Holocaust survivor I have gained a new level of understanding to what happened in those few years of terror when the Nazi party was at power. On top of that I have learned that they are just like other people in many different ways. As a child, Ralph went to school, played with friends, and spent time with his family. All that is comparable to any other modern-day child. However, as the Nazi party rose to power he was often bullied, left out, or even beat for being Jew. Although not as extreme, I have often been mistreated because I was different, and it’s easy to understand the pain of being left out just because you are not the same. Eventually he had to drop out of school and then had
In a portion of Jeanne Wakatsuki Houston’s memoir titled Farewell to Manzanar, Jeanne’s Japanese family, living in California, is ordered to move to an internment camp called Manzanar. Society impacts the family in many ways, but in this segment of the story we primarily see its effects on Jeanne. The context and setting are as follows: the Pearl Harbor bombing was a very recent happening, the United States was entering into war with Japan, and President Roosevelt had signed Executive Order 9066, allowing internment. Anyone who might threaten the war effort was moved inland into defined military areas. Essentially, the Japanese immigrants were imprisoned and considered a threat; nevertheless, many managed to remain positive and compliant. Jeanne’s family heard “the older heads, the Issei, telling others very quietly ‘Shikata ga nai’” (604), meaning it cannot be helped, or it must be done, even though the world surrounding them had become aggressive and frigid. The society had a noticeable effect on Jeanne, as it impacted her view of racial divides, her family relations, and her health.
This book is called Boy in the Striped Pajamas by John Boyne. Two of the main characters are Bruno and Shmuel. The placements of the book are Poland and Auschwitz. Bruno and Shmuel are both eight years old and have the same birthday. Although, they have their differences between each other. Bruno and Shmuel are different than alike because Bruno thinks life is jolly and happy for everyone. Shmuel, on the other hand, sees reality in life. Shmuel lifestyle is lower class. Bruno lifestyle is upper class. Bruno has freedom because of his religion. Shmuel is caged in and has so little freedom because of his beliefs.
Children have often been viewed as innocent and innocent may be a nicer way to call children naive. Since children’s lives are so worry free they lack the knowledge of how to transition from being a child to becoming an adolescent. Their lack of knowledge may be a large part of their difficulties growing up, which could be a few rough years for many. In books like the boy in the striped pajamas the story is told from the point of view of a little boy, this way we get a full view of how innocent he is. In this book the writer shows the reader first hand how a child viewed the holocaust and how his innocence cost him his life. Then in books like the perks of being a wallflower Charlie is a teen whom is struggling with the transition from being a child to becoming an adolescent. In this book the writer gives a first hand look at how difficult it can be to transition into an adolescent. Charlie has many difficulties in this book; he is in search of his identity and how to fit in.
Superiority and discrimination have been the underlying problem in many world-wide events throughout history leading into present day. Whether it be a caste system issue or a race issue, there’s always a group that labels themselves greater than that of another. This affair was apparent in 1940s Germany. The German people would be persuaded into a dictatorship led by Adolf Hitler, who while in power would give rise to Nazism, allowing the mistreatment of Jews to commence. This extermination would be known as “The Holocaust” translated to “sacrifice by fire” and would affect many different people groups during and after the event.
The Nazi slaughter of European Jews during World War II, commonly referred to as the Holocaust, occupies a special place in our history. The genocide of innocent people by one of the world's most advanced nations is opposite of what we think about the human race, the human reason, and progress. It raises doubts about our ability to live together on the same planet with people of other cultures and persuasions.
Throughout history, there have been many noteworthy events that have happened. While there are many sources that can explain these events, historical fiction novels are some of the best ways to do so, as they provide insight on the subject matter, and make you feel connected to the people that have gone through it. An example of a historical fiction that I have just read is The Boy in the Striped Pajamas by John Boyne, a story about the life of a German boy who becomes friends with a Jewish boy in a concentration camp during the holocaust. The author of The Boy in the Striped Pajamas portrays the historical period well,and uses many details from the real life holocaust to make his story more believable. This book is a classic, and is a very good look on how it feels to be living in Nazi Germany.
One example of the way the Japanese Americans were treated inhumanely was throughout the war the Japanese Americans were trying their hardest to protest against the way they were being treated in the internment camps. The Japanese Americans wanted and insisted to be recognize as loyal American citizens (Library of Congress). To add on to that the conditions at the internment camps, they were notably difficult and traumatic, leaving the worried mothers with only a few options but to provide not only emotional support, but also physical support. While all the Japanese Americans could do was hope for the best (Dusselier [Page 12). Along with, the abuse the Japanese Americans in the eyes of the Americans viewed them as aliens forcing abuse on them whether it b...
An example of this feeling is when Louie, a POW, has been sent to Ofuna, a “high-value” prison camp. “They can kill you here, ‘Louie was told. ‘No one knows you’re here.”(Hillenbrand 147) This quote drills into Louie a sign of dread that there is nothing the prisoners could do in this situation, no one had known that he was there. Another example from the same book, Louie had been isolated for a week with no correspondence with other friends or captives. “Louie had been on Kwajalein for about a week when his cell door was thrown open and guards pulled him out. Terrified, thinking he was about to be beheaded, he was marched into a building.”(Hillenbrand 141) This shows how long he has no contact for and the terror built up in him as he was driven to the edge of his mind as well as the forceful pulling to march him into the building digs him even deeper. Miné and her brother were assigned a family number when they were being sent to the intern camp. “...they were assigned collective family number 13660, and were never again referred to by officialdom by their given names.”(Curtin 2) The quote is an example of invisibility and dehumanization by reducing their names a number and to be never again referred to by the “officialdom” by their names. Many events happened to POWs
This sense of difference provides a motive or rationale for using our power advantage to threaten the ethnoracial Other in ways that we would regard as cruel or unjust if applied to members of our own group. The possible consequences of this nexus of attitude. and action range from unofficial but pervasive social discrimination at one end. of the spectrum to genocide at the other. . .
"The Boy in the Striped Pajamas" explores the beauty of a child's innocence in a time of war:
Are certain kinds of people as bad as our family and society raised us to believe? What lengths must one go through in order to learn the truth? In The Boy in Striped Pajamas, the story is about Bruno, an adventurous and naïve eight year old German child living in Berlin in Nazi Germany. Since Bruno’s father, Ralf, received a promotion as the Commandant of a concentration camp, Bruno and his family were relocated to the countryside next to the camp for Ralf to oversee. Having left his friends behind in Berlin, Bruno despises his new home as he has no one his age to play with. Later, Bruno discovers what he believes to be a “farm” (the concentration camp) in the distance. Although Bruno’s parent forbade Bruno from getting close to the camp,
Many racial and ethnic groups are treated cruel, which contributes to the problem of discrimination. The inhumane treatment inflicted onto different racial and ethnic groups is provoking horrific violence around the world. The film The Boy in the Striped Pajamas, gives us an insight to the cruel treatment endured by Jewish people in World War II. Jewish people were taken from their homes, separated from their families, and placed in concentration camps where they were expected to die. They were exposed to extreme levels of abuse, such as starvation, physical beatings, and emotional torture. The fear and terrorizing the soldiers used on the Jews is shown in the scene when Lieutenant Kotler catches Shmuel eating a cookie: “Are you eating? Have you been stealing food?
“If society exists through relationships with one another, then it is guided by the rules of conduct that apply to those relationships” (Pearson 18). The authors explains about the expectations of college students in a classroom. There were three students who would not stop talking during the lecture. The rest of the students encouraged them to stop talking. The professor did not have to tell the students to quiet down. Instead, the other students told them for the professor. Racism can also be like this situation. For an example, Adolf Hitler is the professor, the quiet students is Germany, and the talkative students is the Jewish community. Hitler does not need to kill the Jewish community, instead, his country does the killing for him. To solve racism with social norms, a larger group who is not racist can tell and teach a smaller group how not to be. The smaller group will notice the larger group is not racist and may