Holocaust Museum
The United States Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC honors those who died under persecution of the Nazis during World War II. The museum serves as a constant reminder of the atrocities that took place, memorializing the victims who suffered due to other men's lack of humanity. Over the weekend, I had the opportunity to walk through the exhibits, getting in touch with a time that my generation can not forget and must learn from, so that we may never let a political party gain the control to spread hatred the way Nazi Germany so successfully did.
The museum possesses aura of depression, as its walls hold the secrets to the most despicable war crimes of all time, but what was most interesting to me was how those responsible rose to power. The beginning of the exhibit walks you through the process of how the Nazi party raised support in Germany during the 1940s.
Auschwitz concentration camp, arrival of Hungarian...
English: Interior of a Holocaust train boxcar used...
Interior shot of the glass bridges within the Unit...The use of propaganda primarily against Jews and other groups such as Catholics, gypsies, and homosexuals disturbed as Hitler put his plan of "social cleansing" into effect. Newspapers, radio programs, pamphlets, and books injected the warped ideas into the German pop-culture that these groups were to blame for the country's economic misfortune, and much more.
Perhaps most disturbing were the graphic depictions of the barbaric war crimes. The mobile "killing mobiles" and ruthless SS officers running the gas chambers and incineration factories were murderers, and nothing less. The exhibit exposes to the world the atrocities that went on behind the gates of Auschwitz and other concentration camps throughout Europe.
My trip the Holocaust Museum was very enlightening yet depressing. Learning of what the 18 year olds of that era went through, whether being stationed in an army or being relocated to a ghetto, humbled me...