I recently visited Bergen Belsen Concentration Camp in Germany. The infamous place where Anne Frank and her sister Margot died. I have read the diary of Anne Frank and it is a truly heart wrenching story, however I was rather disappointed when I watched the video and took the tour at the concentration camp. The emphasis placed on Anne Frank’s book completely shadowed the fact that millions of other people died during the houlocost. I was baffled to find that Anne and her sister had a “gravestone” in memory of them in the center of the field directly in front of the main memorial. I stood in awe as people walked past mass graves, where thousands of innocent people had been buried, to get their picture taken next to the memorial grave marker. Do people really need to personally relate to another to feel sympathy. Is Anne Frank’s life more important than any of the other six million + mothers, fathers, or children in the unmarked graves just feet away? By no means is her life any less important, but why do people need to read a book about someones life before they take an interest in the fact that they lost it?
“A single death is a tragedy; a million deaths is a statistic.” – Joseph Stalin
Concentration Camps are a rough ride. I would be similarly incredulous. At the one camp I went to, no one took pictures next to the memorial to the hero of the camp that had been there. But maybe I went on an off day.
You really buy into that whole “6 million people” thing. I really doubt it was that many. Alot of them, according to some, weren’t even jewish. You know what they say though, the squeaky wheel gets the grease, (or gets israel).
Actually, the statement of six million people is a terrible one! It was actually somewhere between seven and nine million people, six million of which were Jews.
Exactly.
Yes, I think so. She sort of became the spokesperson for all others that died the same way.