How students today completely misunderstand the Holocaust

Photo of Auschwitz main camp taken by student on recent trip

My 1998 photo of kitchen building in Auschwitz main camp

Notice that my 1998 photo above shows the same scene as the student photo, but the student did not mention the antique sentry box that is located near the camp kitchens.

This quote from the news article is what the student wrote about her visit to the kitchen buildings:

Begin quote

Of the many barracks we visited, one stands out in my mind — the kitchen house where Jewish musicians would play for the amusement of the SS men. I could easily imagine the musicians, their trembling lips on a trumpet, their skeletal fingers dancing a bow on the violin, creating music, a solitary remnant of beauty in a living hell. “

End quote

Nice writing, but the trip to the main Auschwitz camp, which is a historic place, was completely lost on this student because all she could think about was how the Jews were murdered by the Nazis. She didn’t even notice that there were several kitchen buildings. The shutters on these buildings are now closed so that students can’t see the huge stoves and the pots that were used to cook the food for the prisoners.

The following quote is also from the news article, cited above:

Begin quote

Life has a knack for continuously shaping our perspectives, for changing how we view the world through exposure to new experiences and ideas. These changes can be gradual or arrive in a sudden rush of mind-blowing revelation, as happened when my life was changed by my visit to Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp.

A history buff, I had been looking forward to this day for months. It was summer last year. I was taking a fun school course in Europe with a great class. At first, this was just another destination, albeit a momentous one.

But as soon as we entered [the main Auschwitz camp], my mood changed entirely. It was like a heavy weight was pressing down on me as I glimpsed the rows of barracks, barbed wire, the silent streets. I was haunted by the amount of misery, anguish and suffering that had occurred there, a sentiment reflected in the faces of those around me. Minutes earlier, everyone was chatting and enjoying themselves, even being a bit callous about what we were about to encounter.

End quote

The news article continues on with this quote from the young student:

Begin quote

But as soon as we set eyes on the gate [into the main Auschwitz camp], an unprompted hush fell on us all. 

The arch above the gate bore the words “Arbeit Macht Frei — Work will set you free.” In retrospect, it seems fitting that such a place should have a twisted and deformed motto. After all, who would create such a place as Auschwitz except those utterly twisted and deformed of mind?

End quote

The truth is that, with their “utterly twisted and deformed mind[s],” the Auschwitz main camp was originally built by the Germans as a camp for migrant workers. From Auschwitz, the workers could get on a train and travel to any place in Europe. Auschwitz was literally a major “cross road” of Europe.

The news article continues with another quote, written by this young student:

Begin quote

It is astounding how meticulous the Nazis were. Nothing was wasted or left to chance, not even the geographical position of Auschwitz. Away in Poland, the Nazis could continue to hide the truth of the concentration camps from the rest of the world. [Auschwitz was far from hidden. It was a major railroad hub in Europe.]

Families were ripped apart, screaming children were torn from their mother’s arms. With a wave of his hand, an SS officer would decide a person’s fate: an instant agonizing death or the slow torture of the labour camps. But the deportees knew nothing of this. Instead, they saw each line split, people headed for the camp or the “shower room” to be “disinfected.” 

Those sent to the showers suffered a grim fate. Through the vents and shower valves, a gas was released causing a slow agonizing death. It took up to 15 minutes for a person to die.

End quote

What kind of “shower valves” can have Zyklon-B pellets flowing through them? Did this young student mean “shower valves” like the ones in the Dachau gas chamber, which is shown in my photo below:

My photo of the last remaining shower head at Dachau, which is now gone

The student did not include a photo of the gas chamber in the main Auschwitz camp. That could be because photographs are strictly forbidden in the alleged gas chamber now.  I took the photo below on a trip to Auschwitz in 2005.

My 2005 photo of the gas chamber in the main Auschwitz camp

That’s all she wrote, and she rubbed that out.

 

 

 

 

students and professors create a replica of an Auschwitz gas chamber

The title of my blog post today comes from a news article, which you can read in full at http://www.therecord.com/news-story/6694371-touching-the-horrors-of-auschwitz/

The following quote is from the news article, cited above:

The [Auschwitz-Birkenau] gas chambers’ heavy, airtight doors were completely destroyed at the war’s end, as were the columns used to release hydrogen cyanide inside, killing millions in concentration camps. [which camps other than Auschwitz-Birkenau?]

[…]

Proving the Holocaust happened became crucial to the [court] case [against David Irving] and Van Pelt used his expertise as an architectural historian to navigate through the proof: blueprints, letters written by Nazi architects and engineers, photos and contractors’ bills.

He [Van Pelt] wrote a book about it afterwards called “The Case for Auschwitz: Evidence from the [David] Irving Trial.”

“We knew this was something that needed to be done,” said Michael Nugent, an architecture student who was responsible for building the gas column replicas.

“It’s an important part of history that needed to be remembered.”

[…]

Based on blueprints, construction documents, architects’ letters and photographs, The Evidence Room brings forensic evidence of the Holocaust to life in the form of harrowing white plaster casts and monuments in a pure white room.

“What we wanted to do was [to] create a room people can touch. … We want people to touch everything,” said Robert Jan van Pelt, a UW architecture professor who worked on the exhibit.

He said the tangible nature of the exhibit makes it difficult to ignore.

“There will be no explanation of these things,” van Pelt said. “Really the idea is that we in some way relate with this, or the visitor relates to it through the gut.”

The architectural exhibit opens at La Biennale, an international architectural exhibition in Venice on Saturday.

Two constructed gas columns, an airtight hatch with a ladder and a heavy, gasproof door sit in the centre of the eerily white makeshift room.

The physical pieces of evidence cast in plaster by van Pelt and his team tell the story of what millions of people saw before they were killed.

End quote

Excuse me! Something is missing in this story!

Auschwitz-Birkenau was a huge place; it was 425 acres in size! The map below shows the location of the alleged homicidal gas chambers. Why have such a huge camp for the purpose of gassing people? And why weren’t the gas chambers hidden from view by people walking through the camp?

Map of the Auschwitz-Birkenau shows gas chamber buildings in red and disinfection chambers in orange

At the bottom of the map shown above, the train tracks can be seen going through an opening in the gate house on the left side of the drawing. Parallel to the tracks is the Hauptstrasse, or the main street of the camp. On the left side of the main street are the women’s barracks with two disinfection chambers shown in orange in between the two sections of women’s barracks.

Are you begining to see something wrong here? Why have such a huge camp, just to kill people, and then have disinfection chambers to kill the lice in the clothing of the prisoners who were waiting to be killed?

All of the gas chambers should have been used to kill the Jews; this would have eliminated the waiting of the Jews to die, as shown in the photo below.

Women and children waiting for their turn in the Auschwitz-Birkenau gas chamber

The women and children in the photo above are looking across the road toward the place where the Sauna building is located. The Sauna building had a shower room for incoming prisoners, and huge ovens where the clothing of the prisoners was disinfected with hot steam.

You can read the full story of Auschwitz-Birkenau on my website at http://www.scrapbookpages.com/AuschwitzScrapbook/History/Articles/Birkenau01.html

Don’t worry, the above web page is kosher, and suitable for both deniers and True Believers.