Religious persecution is an incredibly large stain in the history of our species. People are
treated differently whether that be in the form of receiving hateful comments, unfair wages,
missed job opportunities, or even physical threats to their safety. The struggle is constant, people
are hurt daily and it is only getting worse. These stains in history have turned into a massive
streak that seems to never end, however, one stain, one spot on this streak in history looms over
them all.
The Holocaust was a devestating series of events that happened in World War Two. Jews
in and around areas of German control were sought out and put into concentration camps where
they were forced to do back breaking labor or they would be killed. Towards the end of the war
Germany sought to cover their tracks and not have to deal with a rising prison population so they
instead began sending Jews to death camps rather than work camps where they would be
executed, but that is not even the right word. Jews in the Holocaust were mercilessly slaughtered
like they were not even humans, and to the Germans they were not, they were just sub-human
monsters that were supposed to take the blame for all of Germany’s failures, they were used as a
scapegoat. While looking through the stories of survivors from the Holocaust museum one theme
reigns true, that of creating fear. The Germans seemed to want to create an atmosphere of fear
for the Jewish people, they wanted them hurt, they wanted them broken not just gone. I see
stories of torture happening, human experiments leading to excruciating deaths, and families
being separated to never see each other again. What I learned from seeing this was that the
Germans did not care that they were doing this, sure you had the oddball here and there that felt
remorse, but many were having fun, they enjoyed inflicting the pain. These Germans were really
truly monsters in the fullest sense of the word and they were showing the world that. The
German war machine cared about nothing but inflicting as much pain and suffering to those that
stood in the way and to them the biggest obstacle were Jews. I personally am appalled whenever
I revisit the subject of the Holocaust cause really all around it was an atrocity, there is no good
point of view, eleven million people were slaughtered. Looking at the Holocaust, though, I think
there is a lot to learn, we cannot forget our past because the moment we do we begin to repeat it.
This repetition of history is a serious issue because as we look at hate groups within the
U.S. we see the following continuing to rise and groups are gaining more support than ever.
Looking around I am seeing more and more anti-lgbtq groups which is so odd when it is
something that is becoming more widely accepted by our culture. Another group that is large and
on the rise is nation of Islam, a black superiority group that pushes anti-semitism and anti-lgbtq
ideas. One common thing I keep seeing is the rise of anti-lgbtq groups in Ohio and that disturbs
me. Ohio historically is a conservative state but that does not mean that there need to be people
actively seeking out and discouraging or fighting against the lgbtq community, to share my point
of view I am a christian man that has my own opinions of that community, I never think anything
bad of them or that they are worse for it, I do not agree with it. I personally take the philosophy
of if it is not creating a problem for me or hurting anyone then why should I care. I hate that
more people cannot see the world like this, if people were willing to be accepting of others rather
than attacking those that are different then the world would be such a better place. The sheer
scale of hate groups in the U.S. is terrifying, they are, at this point, quite literally everywhere you
look and they are only spreading. Over time these groups have grown to such a scale that they
really have some power and pull in this nation which is a terrible thing. The trend has been that
rather than the overall scale of hate groups going down we instead are seeing the concentration in
certain areas dropping and the overall area increasing, spreading out the numbers. What strikes
me as odd is that we have actually seen what seems to be a recession of hate groups in the south,
although there are still many.
In my visit to these two sites I have learned so much about religious persecution and hate
groups as a whole, stuff that is honestly kind of frightening. The fact that we have not learned
from history is a terrible thing, the Holocaust was a tragedy, millions were slaughtered and yet
there are still groups seeking these types of effects. I sit back and watch this happen around me
and hope that one day, somehow, someway, people realize that our differences are not something
to be a weakness for society but rather as a strength. With these differences we get to see so
many different points of view and we get to learn from each other, it is a benefit to humanity. All
we can do is hope that people realize this and make the change that needs to happen.