Cycle of Racism
Within the graphic memoir Maus Artie Spiegelman discusses the controversial theme of racism during the Holocaust. Tim Holden once said, “The Holocaust illustrates the consequences of prejudice, racism and stereotyping on a society. It forces us to examine the responsibilities of citizenship and confront the powerful ramifications of indifference and inaction.” Artie’s father Vladek was a Jewish prisoner during the war; he experienced cruel and unusual punishment, harsh treatment, and abuse simply because of he was Jewish. After experiencing racism first hand it seems surprising and ironic that Vladek would be racist and try to generalize a person because of their ethnicity. Despite being a victim of racism during the Holocaust Vladek doesn’t have racial tolerance.
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In book two chapter three Vladek makes racial remarks to a black hitchhiker that gets into the same car as him.
During the car ride Vladek adopts the same mindset of Germany Nazis and many Polish citizens. “She lost her head…I just can’t believe it! There is a Shvartser sitting in here” (Spiegelman, 259). Vladek didn’t want to be in the presence of the black hitchhiker, the same way the Germans and some Polish didn’t want to be in the presence of Jewish people. “A Jewss [sic]...There’s a Jewess [sic] in the courtyard! Police” (Spiegelman, 139). The Germans evacuated the Jews out of their homes because Jews weren’t considered humans to Germans, and yet Vladek looks down on the black hitchhiker as if he’s less of a human. ”It’s not to even compare the Shvartser and the Jews”(Spieglman,259). Many of the Polish people sought out Jews including Vladek, very few opened their home to Vladek in his time of need. Vladek was fortunate enough to find Mrs. Motonowa to open up her home to him, but he refuses to let a hitchhiker of a different race into the same car as him during their time of
need. Vladek makes a generalization about the black hitchhiker, Vladek assumed he would steal the groceries out of the back seat. “But how dare you generalize and say all blacks steal… Just stop, yes? You only don’t know them”(Spiegelman, 260). This is shocking and ironic that Vladek would make a racial generalization because he was a victim of racial generalization during the Holocaust. “The mothers always told so: Be careful! A Jew will catch you to a bag and eat you”(Spiegelman, 151). Vladek seems to have become a product of his environment. After months of being treated so harshly by Germans who saw themselves as a superior race, Vladek seems to have adopted a certain level of racism and racial intolerance to others. I think Artie put the scene with the black hitchhiker and his father into book to show the readers that racism is one of the biggest threats to mankind. Civil rights activist Alveda King once said, “Racism springs from the lie that certain human beings are less than fully human. It's a self-centered falsehood that corrupts our minds into believing we are right to treat others as we would not want to be treated.” The Holocaust started from a single twisted belief that Germans were superior to other races, this level of racial intolerance grew into something that still shocks the world today. The scene with Vladek and the black hitchhiker shows of how a single racial intolerance can grow into a generalization of an entire group of people.
After listening to a testimony from Ralph Fischer, a Holocaust survivor I have gained a new level of understanding to what happened in those few years of terror when the Nazi party was at power. On top of that I have learned that they are just like other people in many different ways. As a child, Ralph went to school, played with friends, and spent time with his family. All that is comparable to any other modern-day child. However, as the Nazi party rose to power he was often bullied, left out, or even beat for being Jew. Although not as extreme, I have often been mistreated because I was different, and it’s easy to understand the pain of being left out just because you are not the same. Eventually he had to drop out of school and then had
When the author of Night, Elie Wiesel, arrives at Auschwitz, the Jewish people around him, the Germans, and himself have yet to lose their humanity. Throughout the Holocaust, which is an infamous genocide that imprisoned many Jewish people at concentration camps, it is clear that the horrors that took place here have internally affected all who were involved by slowly dehumanizing them. To be dehumanized means to lose the qualities of a human, and that is exactly what happened to both the Germans and the Jewish prisoners. Wiesel has lived on from this atrocious event to establish the dehumanization of all those involved through his use of animal imagery in his memoir Night to advance the theme that violence dehumanizes both the perpetrator and the victim.
By means of comic illustration and parody, Art Spiegelman wrote a graphic novel about the lives of his parents, Vladek and Anja, before and during the Holocaust. Spiegelman’s Maus Volumes I and II delves into the emotional struggle he faced as a result of his father’s failure to recover from the trauma he suffered during the Holocaust. In the novel, Vladek’s inability to cope with the horrors he faced while imprisoned, along with his wife’s tragic death, causes him to become emotionally detached from his son, Art. Consequently, Vladek hinders Art’s emotional growth. However, Art overcomes the emotional trauma his father instilled in him through his writing.
Murders inflicted upon the Jewish population during the Holocaust are often considered the largest mass murders of innocent people, that some have yet to accept as true. The mentality of the Jewish prisoners as well as the officers during the early 1940’s transformed from an ordinary way of thinking to an abnormal twisted headache. In the books Survival in Auschwitz by Primo Levi and Ordinary men by Christopher R. Browning we will examine the alterations that the Jewish prisoners as well as the police officers behaviors and qualities changed.
The comic implies that surviving the holocaust affects Vladek’s life and wrecks his relationship with his son and his wife. In some parts of the story, Vladek rides a stationary bike while narrating his story (I, 81, panel 7-9). Given the fact that it is a stationary bike, it stays immobile: no matter how hard Vladek pedals, he cannot move forward. The immobility of the bike symbolizes how survivor’s guilt will never let him escape his past. Vladek can never really move past the holocaust: he cannot even fall asleep without shouting from the nightmares (II, 74, panel 4-5). Moreover, throughout the story, the two narrators depict Vladek before, during and after the war. Before the war, Vladek is characterized as a pragmatic and resourceful man. He is resourceful as he is able to continue his black business and make money even under the strengthened control of the Nazi right before the war (I, 77 panel 1-7). However, after surviving the holocaust, Vladek feels an obligation to prove to himself and to others that his survival was not simply by mere luck, but because h...
Many different responses have occurred to readers after their perusal of this novel. Those that doubt the stories of the holocaust’s reality see Night as lies and propaganda designed to further the myth of the holocaust. Yet, for those people believing in the reality, the feelings proffered by the book are quite different. Many feel outrage at the extent of human maliciousness towards other humans. Others experience pity for the loss of family, friends, and self that is felt by the Holocaust victims.
Racism is not only a crime against humanity, but a daily burden that weighs down many shoulders. Racism has haunted America ever since the founding of the United States, and has eerily followed us to this very day. As an intimidating looking black man living in a country composed of mostly white people, Brent Staples is a classic victim of prejudice. The typical effect of racism on an African American man such as Staples, is a growing feeling of alienation and inferiority; the typical effect of racism on a white person is fear and a feeling of superiority. While Brent Staples could be seen as a victim of prejudice because of the discrimination he suffers, he claims that the victim and the perpetrator are both harmed in the vicious cycle that is racism. Staples employs his reader to recognize the value of his thesis through his stylistic use of anecdotes, repetition and the contrast of his characterization.
"Victims of the Nazi Era: Nazi Racial Ideology." United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. United States Holocaust Memorial Council, 10 June 2013. Web. 05 May 2014.
“Never shall I forget that night, the first night in camp, which has turned my life into one long night, seven times cursed and seven times sealed…“(Wiesel 32) Livia-Bitton Jackson wrote a novel based on her personal experience, I Have Lived a Thousand Years. Elli was a Holocaust victim and her only companion was her mother. Together they fought for hunger, mistreatment and more. By examining the themes carefully, the audience could comprehend how the author had a purpose when she wrote this novel. In addition, by seeing each theme, the audience could see what the author was attacking, and why. By illustrating a sense of the plight of millions of Holocaust victims, Livia-Bitton Jackson explores the powerful themes of one’s will to survive, faith, and racism.
Many topics present in the novel Unwind by Neal Shusterman are relevant in today’s society. One of these topics is racism. While race does not usually play a role in deciding whether or not one should be unwound, the idea of treating a person differently due to something he or she cannot control is shown in both topics.
By stating, “racism itself is dreadful, but when it pretends to be legal, and therefore just, when a man like Nelson Mandela is imprisoned, it becomes even more repugnant” and “one cannot help but assign the two systems, in their supposed legality, to the same camp” (Wiesel, p.1), the Holocaust survivor is creating solidarity within two separate decades that are connected by the government’s tyranny. The rationale behind constructing a system of unity is to ensure the lives of the oppressed, regardless of their personal beliefs and cultures. Mandela is not affiliated with the Holocaust, nor is he a Jew – rather the former President of South Africa who stood up against anti-black movements – but he is still bound by a common
Since the start of the Civil War, the United States has slowly been winning the uphill battle for racial equality. It is easy to look at authors such as Zora Neale Hurston and Brent Staples and wonder why there are problems with racist behaviors in our country when we seemingly have come so far. While Staples blames the system for this and not the people doing the acts, Hurston does not condemn anyone, but the implies black community turns themselves into victims. Although there are things that are better ignored than attacked, systematic racism cannot be overcome without calling attention to it.
Zusak’s portrayal of discrimination within the book delivered by the Nazis was shown to be extremely blatant and shameless, the author revealing and reinforcing the stereotypical German concept that the Jewish people were treated as bug-eyed cesspools...
Art Spiegelman’s Maus is a novel about the Vladek and his experience as a Polish Jew during the Holocaust. It narrates the reality of the Holocaust wherein millions and millions of Jews were systematically killed by the Nazi regime. One of the themes in the story is racism which is evident in the employment of animal characters and its relationship with one another.
If This Is a Man or Survival in Auschwitz), stops to exist; the meanings and applications of words such as “good,” “evil,” “just,” and “unjust” begin to merge and the differences between these opposites turn vague. Continued existence in Auschwitz demanded abolition of one’s self-respect and human dignity. Vulnerability to unending dehumanization certainly directs one to be dehumanized, thrusting one to resort to mental, physical, and social adaptation to be able to preserve one’s life and personality. It is in this adaptation that the line distinguishing right and wrong starts to deform. Primo Levi, a survivor, gives account of his incarceration in the Monowitz- Buna concentration camp.