The Holocaust

        When some refers to the holocaust, they are talking about the mass genocide of Jewish people in Europe by the Nazi regime.  The holocaust started in the sense of genocide began in 1941.  But before that, they put Jews in these Ghettos, which wear basically these small “towns” that in most cases would be surrounded by barbed wire and constantly under super vision of the Nazi’s. The Jewish people in these ghettos, were treated like dirt.  They would instantly kill any Jewish person that tried to oppose them.  But eventually Reinhard Heyrich  (Man appointed by Hitler to eliminate all the Jews in Europe.) realized that it was taking too long, so instead they sent all the Jewish people to these death camps that were located in Poland.  These death camps were horrible; they would kill all of the weak (such as pregnant woman, the elderly, and kids.) then they would put all of the men to work. They would work them to death.  Two out of every three Jewish people living in Europe were killed.  But the Jewish people weren’t the only people targeted there were also other political opponents, members of resistance groups, homosexuals, dissenting Christians, Gypsies, the physically handicapped and mentally retarded, Soviet prisoners of war, Jehovah's Witnesses, anti-Nazi clergy, trade unionists, and psychiatric patients.            
               How did all of this start? There are a lot of beliefs to why Hitler decided to target the Jewish people, the most popular one is that Hitler was rejected twice to Vienna's Academy of Fine Arts as well as many other problems in his life. But the excuse he used was that he was getting back at the Jewish people because of the assassination of a German official.  Before the Holocaust began all Jewish people were forced out of Germany, and had no were to go.  One Jewish kid, who was still a teenager, was fed up with the Nazi regime so he decided to killed a Nazi official.  Which started the “Night of Broken Glass” In two days, over 250 synagogues were burned, over 7,000 Jewish businesses were trashed and looted, dozens of Jewish people were killed, and Jewish cemeteries, hospitals, schools, and homes were looted while police and fire brigades stood by.  After that he used the teenager as an excuse to kill 6 million Jewish people.

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It was a beautiful summer day, the wind was blowing and the sun was shining.  The day was almost perfect; I was waiting outside my friend’s house leaning on his black metal fence that was rusting and in obvious need of repairing.  I was staring at the road ahead of me, it was cracked and the paint that separated the two lanes where barely visible.  There was an empty lot directly across the street from where I stood.  It was nothing but a big patch of land that was filled with dirt and a few weeds. I remember thinking to myself how awesome the day was going to be, I was planning to play baseball all day and couldn’t wait to go to the park. As my friend came out of his house, there were shouts coming from down the street.  Before my friends mom pulled me inside I saw one man running, while five men were in close pursuit, their clothing was very baggy and it looked as though they were having trouble running because of their baggy pants.  We heard three very loud pops and even more shouts.  I peaked outside to see a man lying on the cracked street, blood covered his clothes.  Everything happened so fast the sound of sirens filled the air and suddenly the street that I was once standing right next to had become a crime scene.  Then suddenly the day that was supposed to be perfect had turned into a nightmare.  From that day on I could never look at the world the same, my childhood innocence had faded and now the world was suddenly a scary place. 

Propaganda 2011????

  

                 These two pictures are prime examples of propaganda that governments would use to get there citizens to join their military.  They would basically put these posters everywhere just like advertisements that we all see today.  Such as Soft Drink advertisements and posters for cars.  Common media for transmitting propaganda messages include news reports, government reports, historical revision, junk science, books, leaflets, movies, radio, television, and posters. Less common nowadays are letterpost envelopes examples of which of survive from the time of the American Civil War. 

                Now the big question that I thought would be important is “Is there propaganda that is aimed toward getting people to join the military?”  And the answer is very obvious and it is yes.  At first I thought that there want really any propaganda but then I watched T.V and there were tons of things that we all see that is an advertisement to join the military.  Such as all of the Navy and air force commercials that we all see, the phrase they use is “The few, the proud, the marines.”  Not only that, but there is also video games that influence kids to join the military.  The biggest one is “Call of Duty”, they are one of the best selling games out there.  All these games are basically about being in the military and being a war hero.  I know that all Call of Duty games are for 17 or older, but a lot of children play this game by the time they’re 8.  I personally think that these games are great, but I think that children, who are easily influenced, should not play this game.  So as you could see there is still plenty of propaganda around us today and the best thing you could do is be aware and be smart.

Beat Street!

So this week’s blog is on a movie called Beat Street.  I have watched this movie three times now, twice when I was younger and once in my American Literature class.  This movie is alright but I personally think that “Breakin” is a way better movie. It is kind of like beat street except that there is a lot more dance battles with better characters.  Either way both movies inspire you to get up and start doing flips and become a break dancer.  I know that when I was young I wanted to be a break dancer and I used to practice doing windmills, which by the way I never learned to do.  Even today I still try to practice break dancing, even though every time I attempt to do a windmill I fall straight on my back.  It is fun and it also looks cool when you’re able to do flips and tricks.  I think that Beat Street is a great movie and should be watched more often, because everyone that I know has never even heard of the movie. People are weird, and you know what is even crazier?  People said that they don’t like the movie.  They were obviously hit on the head with a rock and must hate everything about Hip-Hop.  Beat Street has so much music, dancing, and art that it is hard not to like it.  The characters are also very cool, such as Ramo who lived for art, even though it was on the side of a train he still loved it and died defending it. RIP Ramo

Hungry????

Richard is a very complex person, you never know what he is going to do next.  He sets the house on fire and even kills a kitten.  And why does he do these things?  Maybe it is because he is lonely or because he doesn’t feel close to his family.  But what we know for sure is that he is hungry for attention.  His family doesn’t give him the attention that he needs, so he does these bad things in order for people to pay attention to him.  This behavior can be very destructive in the future because what if he starts to do drugs or commit crimes just to get attention.  Richard likes to get all of this attention but once he gets it he doesn’t know what to do with it.  Like when he sets the house on fire he thought that this would give him some attention from his parents but instead he almost gets beaten to death by his mom.  He also kills a kitten out of anger to his dad. His dad told Richard to kill the cat, but not to literally kill it, but to shut it up.  And since Richard wants all of this attention he killed the cat.  He didn’t get in trouble but his punishment was to bury the cat and pray for it with his mother.  Even though Richard is strange in many ways, he is still a kid like every other kid in the world who is just curious about life.