Response to "What Happens to humans beings in concentration camps?"

After reading, “Total Domination,” the better question is… “What does not happen to humans in concentration camps?” It seems as though answering this question would lead to a much shorter essay, for just about any in-humane, horrible, and de-humanizing action was carried out in concentration camps. I believe, the best description of a concentration camp is a place where masses of humans are cut off from the world, just like they no longer exist, and they, even though are technically “alive,” are forced to work themselves to death. When they do die, they are just replaced by another inadequate soul, in the eyes of their oppressors, until each and every one has been exterminated. “Concentration camps can very aptly be divided into three types corresponding to three basic Western conceptions of a life after death: Hades, Purgatory, and Hell,” says Arendt (Arendt 96).

This quote is one of my favorites, because it clearly sums up how concentration camps work and she expresses them as easy to understand concepts for a reader such as me. Arendt then goes on to state that each level represents a different type of concentration camp; meaning, Hades is considered the DP camps, Purgatory represents the Soviet Union camps, and then the worst of the three, Hell represents the Nazis camps. In concentration camps it is clear that total domination does, in fact, occur. The idea of horror is imposed on to the camp’s poor members and they are treated not as the individual they are, but as a mass of one characteristic. At such camps, humans are stripped of their individuality and are worked and murdered. Arendt states, “Here, murder is as impersonal as the squashing of a gnat (Arendt 94).” If that is not a powerful statement of how oppressors felt towards their victims, I do not know what is.

Reading “Total Domination,” gave me a new way to look at concentration camps. I have always been taught that they are horrible places, and humans there, if they even made it through, were not the same people after; but now I see them for everything they are. Which is not just one race believing they are superior, so oppressing another to work for them to get a job done, oh no, not just that. Concentration camps, explained by Arendt, are places where racism and prejudice run in high amounts, where humans are transformed into “uncomplaining animals (Arendt 89).” I think it is such a sad day that our world could be so cruel and unresponsive. It is ludicrous just to know there used to be places of such terror. Although, we no longer see the use of concentration camps, I think a relative to the idea still lingers today. Such examples would be the suicide bombings we experience in today’s society. The only difference is there is no “higher race opinions,” only a cult leader, if you will. This “cult leader” persuades persons of low morals and who lack their own opinions, to believe in his cause, and get them to come together and start attacking many parts of the world by suicidal bombing missions. Although suicide bombings are technically forms of terrorism, I think they are a close relative to concentration camps. After my reading and analysis of the reading, I can only ask this question, will terrorism ever stop? Will it, like concentration camps, eventually loose its power and seize to exist? I suppose I can only hope.

Works Cited

Arendt, Hannah. "Total Domination." From The Origins of Totalitarianism. A World of Ideas: Essential

Reading for College Writers. Ed. Lee A. Jacobus. 7th ed. New York: Bedford/St. Martin's, 2006. pp 85-

97.