What Facing History and Ourselves Meant to Me
Facing History and Ourselves is a history class that teaches our past but more importantly it teaches us about ourselves. What each student gains from the class will change depending on the person. I thought that at the beginning of the class that this was just going to be another history class, I couldn’t have been any more wrong. The first thing that we are forced to think about is who are we. For most of us we think we know who we are but that certainly is not true after taking this course. I thought that I was just an average teenager who went to school is funny and likes to hang out with friends. I found that personally I am not the perfect person that I portray myself to be. We all have our flaws and looking back at history I don’t know if I would be that same person if I was put into some of those situations. This classed for me forced me to look at myself and really evaluate who I was. As a student I learned the actual hardships that Jewish, Armenian or even African Americans faced during their time periods. As a person I learned that I need to try and help these things from happening in the future. These acts of hatred towards a group of people should never be allowed to happen again.
The first piece of material that really was most meaningful to me was the movie we watched about the Armenian Genocide. This was a film that showed and talked about the hardships and violence a group of people faced just because the Turkish government did not like them. These Armenian people were forced from their homes and were massacred and starved to death. I thought that this was rea
lly meaningful because of the way these people were treated just because of human hatred. The Turkish government did not like them so they brutally assaulted and treated these people. I feel like it made me think about myself. Even though I have never assaulted someone or starved someone to death it made me realize that the Armenian Genocide was committed because of one simple though of hatred. I am ashamed of myself for ever having hatred towards something or someone else. It makes me realize that it might not be me who commits genocide or commits a big crime against someone. It is people like me who start genocides just because they hate someone else. This particular movie inspired thoughts that I need to not be so hateful and to accept people for who they are.
The second piece of material that was most meaningful to me was the movie we watched on the Jim Crow era. We watched a couple of documentaries about this era and the way that these people were treated in
America. The documentary we watched about the five or six African American students who were being transferred to a white school to be incorporated into a changing time period. We witnessed as so many white people resisted the African American people. The school was forced to be shut down and riots were breaking out all over the city, blacks were being harassed and beaten but still they persevered through the hate. All the African American people wanted were to have fair chances and have equal opportunities. Some white people felt that African Americans were not equal to them and they had a feeling of superiority over them. Looking back on the events of the Jim Crow Era which took place nearly forty or fifty years in the future I can see how that sense of superiority was stupid. I couldn’t really understand how they could hold such a feeling towards another human being. Then I started to think that myself and a lot of people today still have that feeling of superiority at one point in our lives. We feel that we are better or more important than other people. This is clearly not true we are all important in some way. No matter the situation, yes some of us have better or more opportunities but that does not make you any better than someone else. Just because you have a shot at something does not make you better. I admire African Americans who continuously put up with assault not only physically but also verbally and not attacking back. Those people had great self control and determination to get equality that they were willing to risk their lives to go to a white school. I wish that I could only have the same determination and control that these people exhibited.
The final piece of material that was most meaningful to me in this course was the final video that we watched of the German Concentration Camps. It was a documentary that showed what the ally forces saw when they first arrived. They were greeted with dead bodies and signs of ugly and heinous acts of violence to human beings. I thought I knew and understood what the Jewish people were put through at the camp, that is until I saw this video. It was an extremely graphic video that portrayed the hardships of the Jewish people. Seeing the conditions and the way that these people were treated made me sick and angry. I was angry with the Nazi party and angry and humanity itself. A lot of the world sat back and ignored the problem for a long time. I couldn’t believe the conditions and what Jewish people were forced to do to not only to them selves but to other Jewish people. This video really helped me get a better understanding of the conditions that people were forced to live in. I think that this video ties into the other film we watched which was “The Boy in the Striped Pajamas.” The reason that I say this is because the wife of the German Soldier who was in charge of the death camp didn’t know what her husband was actually doing in those camps. This I think was true for a lot of the people who followed the Nazi party. The concentration camps could have been in some of their back yards but they did not think anything of it. That is until they were shown.
Facing History in Ourselves is an elective offered at my high school. This is a course that will teach you some history but more importantly teach you about yourself. This course covers three major historical events. The course starts with the Armenian Genocide then moving to the Jim Crow Era and finally into the Holocaust. In this course you are forced to look at some disturbing images and films but they are used to give you a sense of what these actual people went through. The class makes you think about who you are and what you would do in certain situations. I am a 17 year old teenage boy living in Westborough, number of years after these events took place. Before taking this class I thought I understood the events we learned about. I was wrong after taking this class I learned how bad it actually was. It also asked me to think if I was in some of these people’s situations what would I do. Honestly I don’t know what I would have done. Some things that people did to survive was outstanding and brave and to me un-comprehendible, but they did it for the will to survive. I took this class for a couple of reasons, but the big one was to learn about who I was and whether I was an onlooker or someone who would step in. I honestly till this day could not tell you who I would be. The events that these people were put in were far to harsh and to hard to think about. I did learn a lot during though; I learned that there were fighters during the Holocaust and that African Americans have an extremely high tolerance against racism and violence and that a whole race of people can be massacred for no apparent reason.
