Auschwitz, will we ever learn?

Yesterday the participants of Steemfest 3 had the opportunity to visit Auschwitz/Birkenau. The German concentration camp in Poland. I read a post about this visit from my son Exyle and also the comments he received from various Steemians. Everyone who participated in this visit was very impressed, more than very impressed, stunned that something like that really happened

(both photos are from Pixabay)

As a historian, I know it is very difficult to learn from the past. But to visit a concentration camp like Auschwitz helps enormously because you experience for yourself the horror of such a camp. You also experience the horrors of what extreme nationalism or whatever extreme political or religious fanaticism can do to 'non-believers' or to people, individuals or as a group, who get the blame because they are different or in the way.

It has been the case during history, think of the witch hunts or the inquisition or the way black slaves were treated, and native peoples like Indians, Maoris, and Aborigines.

Jews have been prosecuted for centuries and centuries, even now there are a lot of people who are anti-Semites, remember the shooting only last week in de U.S. I think they, as a people, have suffered more than any other people in history.

The scale in which it happened in the second world war (6 million Jewish victims) is overwhelming. We must never forget that has been done, and only some decades ago!

But we have not learned from it and in many countries, minorities, or people who believe differently than the majority (for instance the Christian woman in Pakistan) are being persecuted.

Even in my country, the Netherlands, there are people with strong feelings against letting refugees into the country. Or, many people say yes, they are welcome, but not as my neighbors, not in our village. This happened to Jewish refugees in the years just before 1940 who tried to escape prosecution in Germany, and it happens now in 2018.

We live in one of the wealthiest countries in the world. I hope we will learn how great this is and that we, as a people, will learn to share with less fortunate people.

Let us never forget what happened in the past, let we try to learn from it (as much as we as individuals can because countries don't) and let's never forget that living in a rich country is not a merit but luck because your cradle stood there and not somewhere else.

I wish you all a good Sunday.
Clio