The Scars of USHMM Part Four- Silenced By The Night But You And I Are Going To Rise Again

My favorite song by the English band Keane has a line in it that goes, "We were silenced by the night/But you and I are going to rise again/Divided from the light/I want to love the way we used to then."

In part four of my series on the USHMM I'm going to be talking about what the museum might call the impact "beyond their walls"- what happens after you leave. In part two I wrote about grief and processing but this post is about how the museum changes the way you think about genocide, your behavior towards others, and even the world around you.

I'm very much a realist, so when I left the museum I knew I wouldn't or couldn't change the world. That said, I could however assist in a change by telling people about what I witnessed and speaking out against genocide and human rights violations. I am actually awaiting an email from the superintendent of Fulton County with regards to opening a fund for county schools to make educational trips down to the Breman or the Anne Frank exhibit. The museum taught me that there was no way I alone could change the way we view crimes like the slaughter of others different from you but I could help, and that's enough for me.

Right now, the museum is featuring stories of people around my age in Syria. I actually did some research on the conflict over there since I didn't really know what was going on. A common anecdote is that history is doomed to repeat if we do not learn from it and that is what's going on over there. These teens the museum features have dreams that someone like me would be free to pursue in America if I wanted, but over there they have had to put their survival in their war torn country before anything else they think about and grow up fast. These teens are living a life no one should have to live and my heart breaks for them.

Does that sound like it has happened before? It sounds a lot like 1930s Germany to me. Although Hitler wasn't as smart as Al-Assad is the two regimes look eerily similar in their use of terror to keep people in line and that, to me coming from a country borne out of the concept of liberties afforded to everyone through a Constitution, is not an ideal country to live in at all.

So why are we not doing more? We need to be doing more so that no group of people should ever be forced to hide themselves because they are afraid of the country they live in.

You might not change the world, but why not help change it if you can?

The museum made me realize how much we as Americans take for granted this country we live in and our natural rights. We, as the upcoming generation, need to help make sure history is preserved rather than repeated.