According to Primo Levi's Survival in Auschwitz, how did Auschwitz systematically dehumanize the prisoners - Essay Example

Assignment of Dehumanization of the Prisoners in Auschwitz Introduction Primo Levi was an Italian Jew who took part in anti-Fascist resistance during the reign of Mussolini. He was conscious about the international developments of that time, and he might have been preparing to protect his countrymen and community people before the Fascist onslaught would take an anti-Semitic form following the footsteps of Nazi Germany’s hysterical urge to capture and destroy the Jews after labeling them as war mongers, conspirators, anti-Christian, and finally, Untermenchen or sub standard human beings. The extent of racial discrimination and related torture culminated at proving the Jews to be a fallen people in their own eyes. The process of humiliation and torture at Auschwitz concentration camp culminated at this quest of destroying or demolishing each and every human being. Research Question In the book Survival in Auschwitz, on page 26, Primo Levi writes: “Then for the first time we became aware that our language lacks words to express this offence, the demolition of a man.” Much of his Holocaust memoir describes exactly this process by which camp life led to the destruction of human beings. How did Auschwitz systematically dehumanize the prisoners? Discussion Primo Levi’s Survival in Auschwitz is a real life account which has been based on the memories of the writer. The writer introduces himself as an Italian Jew. Anti-Semitic activities had become forceful in the Inter-War Europe of late 1930s. Situation was deteriorating for the Jews in countries like Austria, Czechoslovakia, and particularly, Germany. Being fairly educated and cultured, the Italian Jews in those days were aware of the socio-political developments of Central Europe. Like his community people, Levi also knew that Italy had entered in a coalition with Nazi Germany. So when the Jews were isolated and prepared for deportation by the Fascist government of Italy, these people were less astonished and more horrified, as if they knew a horrible fate awaited them. Levi was particularly aware of what was probably going to happen, since he was the member of an anti-Fascist resistance. He was arrested by the Fascist militia who later transferred him to the SS. SS was the German force who generally handled the affairs of concentration camps. These camps were spread across the occupied Europe and Jews were going to be the main group of prisoners here. As the account of those dark days begins, Levi vividly describes a scene of deportation where before a group of isolated Jews waiting in some station, a notorious transport train came and halted. Levi was one of these unfortunate people, and he writes that the “goods wagons closed from the outside, with men, women and children pressed together without pity, like cheap merchandise, for a journey towards nothingness, a journey down there, towards the bottom.” (12-13) So what did this bottom mean? Was it a seemingly endless see of grief, wherein the unfortunate Jews were being thrown to explore the so called bottom? To reach this bottom, each and every prisoner was to be transcended through a definite process of systematic torture. This was the avenue of Nazi torture and related contortion tactics to humiliate the otherwise cultured and generally well-to-do people … Europe’s Jewish people. Nazi concentration camp administrators divided the captured and/or deported Jews in different groups mainly as per their working capabilities. Levi was put in the group of mostly young adult males, who could be used as forced labor under conditions of strict bondage. This bondage extended from mere enslavement to continuous subhuman living. The prisoners were kept on minimal food. They were subjected to terrible cold. They were forced to denude before each other and bath together in a crowded manner. They were to stand in ankle deep ice cold water. Being a forced laborer, Levi was asked to do various sorts of works by the Officers at different times during the detention period. And in Auschwitz, the most notorious Nazi concentration camp in Poland, biting cold was particularly painful and hunger was terrible. At every step … bathing, working, eating, lining in queues, etc. the prisoners were systematically made to believe that they were Untermenchen (the German word for sub human). As far as the officers and guards were concerned, “they were particularly pitiless, vigorous and inhuman individuals” (Levi, 81). The Jewish prisoners were not criminals or convicts. They were not under trial. Unlike Levi, majority of Jews were apolitical working class people or business owners. So humiliation and feeling of guilt were hard to befall them. But the Nazis wanted the Jews not only feel sorry but also guilty for being Jews. They were shown as war mongers, incapable laborers, traitors, and finally, below average undeserving human beings. Hence Levi writes, “Then for the first time, we became aware that our language lacks words to express this offence, the demolition of man” (26). During work, the prisoners would go “limping in our large wooden shoes on the icy snow” (Levi, 58). They were to be beaten up for even the minor mistakes. They were to be shot or exploded by landmines if they attempted to escape. They were to be watched. Actually, Nazis wished the Jews to believe themselves as substandard human beings and feel not only sorry but also guilty for that. In this way, by continuously and consistently robbing off the Jews and other political/ethnic opponents to the Nazis, a process of dehumanization had set in. In his direct narrative without any attempt to cherish some prejudice or self esteem, Levi has given a terrible picture of the truth in Nazi concentration camp. In the chapter titled Chemical Examination (Levi, 92), the author has portrayed that how the Germans were making every attempt to convert the prisoners into living specimens for chemical experiments and working with dangerous materials. Levi has also described that how a Nazi guard would behave when a prisoner (or rather a Jew) attempted to talk to him or ask some question: “It was pointless wasting one’s breath asking him questions; he would not have replied, or else he would have replied with kicks and shouts” (192). The most grimly fact about this scenario was that the prisoners still did not know that whether their relatives, particularly the women and children, were alive or not. They did not know that while the able bodied adults were mostly being used for forced labor, most of the women and children were being suffocated to death in gas chambers. Conclusion In his book, Levi has demonstrated human condition in its extremes forms of distress and suffering, both mental and physical. The book is time and again required reading for various courses and curricula all over the world. The book remains a thought provoking literary classic that tells us about one of darkest periods of human history. Levi has done an important work in demonstrating how evil some humans could be to some other humans. Auschwitz was a systemic laboratory cum culmination point of Nazi philosophy, where the SS guards had not only targeted the Jews but also did heinous crimes against Slavic peoples, Gypsies, homosexuals, etc. Auschwitz teaches us that how humans can be destroyed in a step by step manner. But even then, survivors like Levi remain symbols of resistance and humanism. The real story of Auschwitz prison camp delivers a lesson to the contemporary world that if we don not control the racial prejudices within proper limits or eliminate them altogether, racism may start budding and lead to intolerable destruction of one human or group by another. Work Cited Levi, Primo. Survival in Auschwitz. New York: Collier Books, 1961. Print. Read More