post this week

     In English we are taking a a detour and using our social studies topic to write a research paper. I have to admit, I am slightly overwhelmed; however, I think having a research paper will majorly benefit me when I present at national history day. I got to choose any topic that was obviously back in time, that dealt with human rights. I searched for a while and couldn't find a good one until Mrs. Baggett suggested the Lodz Ghetto. I was open minded and decided to go with it. I decided on it because I soon found out there were tons of cases where children were killed and I was very interested to learn more and educate myself on how terrible those poor children lived and what they experienced. Basically the people in the "ghettos" had no rights, especially the children. Gas chambers and other tortuous creations were used to kill. The children had no choice besides getting killed, experimented on, or forced to work. It was randomly chosen, but none of the options were fair. I am really finding myself thinking about this topic because I am so puzzled how humans could treat other humans that poorly for no reason. Jews were mainly focused on to be captured which then ties racism into the mixture. The rights were slim to none and it's interesting to read the survivors blogs and documentaries about their experiences. I am now more appreciative of how we are free in America, and those poor people forever remain in my heart.

     When first faced with the task of choosing a history topic involving human rights, I was unsure of how to begin or what to research.  A suggestion from Mrs. Baggett led me to the Lodz Ghetto, which first interested me because it involved the death of many children close to my age and even younger.  As I continued to research this topic, I found multiple documentaries and images illustrating the personal experiences of people who survived the terrible conditions they faced while living in the Lodz Ghetto.  Although the Nazis originally intended this ghetto to be a temporary holding place for the Jews, the Lodz Ghetto became the place where the Nazis confined over 230,000 Jewish people to a very small area and subjected them to extremely horrific conditions, oppressing their basic human rights from 1940 until 1944.  Not only were these people starved and deprived of water, but they were also forced to do manual labor and basically work themselves to death if not killed first.  Each story I read provides a slightly different perspective and teaches me something new about the oppression of human rights in the Lodz Ghetto, as the survivors’ stories vary in the gruesome details with the same sad ending and theme of torture and death.  This topic has taught me about how poorly some humans were treated in the past, especially in some ghettos, such as the Lodz Ghetto, where their rights were not recognized or respected at all.