Nidia Bermudez Tonya Wertz-Orbaugh English 1103-008 21 November 2013 My inquiry about Sociology in the Holocaust My research inquiry

started with me researching everything online about the Holocaust and the sociology of the Holocaust. I wanted to know more about how the society of Germans and the society that Hitler ruled could allow the Holocaust to happen knowing that Hitlers actions were not the social norm. I started with the broad topic of sociology but it was too broad so I started to narrow down to Hitler and the German society versus how the Jewish society reacted. I was very interested in conformity and how authoritarian powers can influence people so much to get to the point of killing for pure blood and really no reason. It seemed insane that no one said no and formed a rebellious group or destroyed Hitler. I found online websites that were reliable and could aid me in my inquiry work. I found a website called The Lucifer Effect and I was very interested in the point made that if someone didnt step up and rebel, informative ambiguity would occur, such as in the Stanford Prison experiment: where authoritarian power had all control of the prisoners/victims and even had the effect of making them crazy. The Stanford experiment was conducted by Philip Zimbardo, the subjects were assigned roles as guards or prisoners. The ones assigned as guards gradually adopted cruel and demanding characteristics because they became the social norm in the situation (Zimbardo). This is what happened in the Holocaust, people who one would have

thought to never commit such atrocities that were committed, actually went along because of the peer pressure and need to survive. I realized that what happened in this experiment could happen in both positive and negative situations. In the Holocaust the authoritarian leader, Hitler, used this to exterminate Jews, which is the negative situation. In a positive scenario, someone could have rose against Hitler to create other followers and caused worldwide attention to stop the Holocaust. It makes me sad that if this was all it took to stop so many people from dying, why didnt it ever occur to someone? In reality the Holocaust was not that long ago in the timeline of events occurring recently, and it is so scary to think that Society was not that much different than now! I realized that leaders, such as political leaders, still had the same control Hitler had, to make people follow him or her. It baffles me how much we talk about the Holocaust but not how we can prevent it from happening again. I stayed on this website and discovered advice on how to resist the powers of group conformity. This came as a shock to me that if these steps were taken back in time of the Holocaust, millions of lives would have been saved. If the Nazi party would have known what they were really standing for, if the Jews realized that there were other victims like themselves that could form a union and rise up against Hitler, if the Nazi party would have thought about how their violent actions were going to affect the future generations, especially of victims (Jews, Gypsies, Homosexuals); something could have been done and the Holocaust could have been stopped much sooner than it was. I read from some other sources that some people, especially Jews tried to rebel and confront Hitler, but they were unsuccessful and killed and only led to more bloodshed. In the extermination camp, Sobibor, there were several attempts to escape and many of them failed, but some were successful. The consequence was that even if some succeeded the Nazi regime would

kill even more prisoners to get vengeance and to create even more fear to eliminate all the ideas or thoughts prisoners had of escaping: In the summer of 1943, prisoners came together and planned a big escape. Many Soviet Jewish prisoners of war arrived at the end of September, 1943. This movement was led by Leon Feldhendler and on October 14 of 1943, prisoners managed to kill 11 SS men and several Ukrainian guards, around 300 prisoners were able to escape, but many were captured and killed, 50 escapees survived the war. After this the Nazis destroyed Sobibor (Camp Rebellions). This information made me realize how even thinking of rebelling or going against the social norm was basically impossible! Death was unavoidable and this makes me so sad because I realize that the only way that the Holocaust could have been stopped is through the outside world. Fortunately, this is how WWII ended but I think that many lives could have been saved if actions were taken sooner. Hitler was behind all of this torment and pain and this led to me wanting to find out if and how many people tried to kill the man behind it all. I visited the Holocaust encyclopedia online and I found one sentence that to me is very significant: Despite being vastly outgunned and outnumbered, some Jews in ghettos and camps did resist the Germans with force. The spirit of these efforts transcends their failure to halt the genocidal policies of the Nazis (Jewish). I agree with this quote completely because these rebels, or anti-conformists may have failed at destroying Hitler, but their spirit of courage and their desire to stand up against such a powerful and dangerous man leaves behind a very strong legacy of people who will fight until their death.

I found a website called The Hitler Pages and it appealed to me because it had a list of failed attacks on Hitler. I can understand why people would want to destroy someone with such awful tactics and the root of the Holocaust. I dont mean that killing anyone is a way to solve an issue, but I feel a sense of amazement at how close some enemies of Hitler were to killing him. There are many accounts recorded but some really got my attention: In 1933, at Obersalzberg, a man with an SA uniform came into Hitlers home or near it with a loaded gun, but was arrested. Another time, a student from Switzerland, named Maurice Bavaud, wanted to kill Hitler and went to find Hitler many times but every time Hitler was somewhere else. At the putsch remembrance he was unable to shoot because of the large crowds. He decides to go back to Switzerland after this last attempt, but he didnt have a ticket and got arrested. Unfortunately, when he was questioned maps and a gun were found and he was later beheaded on May 14, 1941 (The Failed Attacks). Realizing that all of these people risked their life to take down such a horrible leader and killer of so many races makes them very courageous people. They didnt conform to society and to Hitler; they disagreed and took the extreme risk that lead to their death. Hitler killed so many innocent victims; he killed 5.9 million Jews, just because of their race and religion, aspects of a persons life that they are free to choose. In the chart below, the number of victims that were killed in the Holocaust is displayed. To try to start and understand how such a large number of people could have disappeared without the world acting earlier and stopping such atrocities is beyond me.

(Grant) My inquiry has lead me into a great direction and I have learned a lot of information that I may not have thought about as in depth if I was only doing a typical research paper. My major in Sociology has to do with the Holocaust in many ways and through this paper I have a better understanding of my major. Although my search has come to an end, my curiosity continues and I would like to discover more about Hitlers history and his reasoning behind killing all of these people, and most importantly why he was this way. This paper was very successful and led to much more in depth thoughts than I anticipated and I am very happy with the outcome.

Works Cited Camp Rebellions." Concentration. London Jewish Centre, 2011. Web. 20 Nov. 2013. <http://www.theholocaustexplained.org/ks3/responses-1933-1945/palestine/camprebellions/>." Grant. "The Brothels of Auschwitz." Hankering for History. Hankering For History, n.d. Web. 2o Nov. 2013. <http://hankeringforhistory.com/the-brothels-of-auschwitz/>. "Jewish Uprisings in Ghettos and Camps, 19411944." Holocaust Encyclopedia. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, 10 June 2013. Web. 20 Nov. 2013. <http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10005407>. "The failed attacks on Hitlers life." MURDERING HITLER. Web. 18 Nov. 2013. <http://www.hitlerpages.com/pagina69.html>. Zimbardo, Philip G. "Why we conform." The Lucifer Effect by Philip Zimbardo. N.p., 2006 . Web. 18 Nov. 2013. <http:/www.lucifereffect.com/guide_conform.htm>.