Week #2
Connection Captain
Pages 72-127
"We should hang you right here on this spot!" (Page 51)
The quote shows the Nazi's attitude toward the Jews, but more importantly it shows the effectiveness of the Hitler and the Nazi's party's propaganda. The man truly believed that Jews were bad and that they did not deserve to live on this earth. The Nazi's propaganda clearly changed becuase the jews used to leave in peace and had no trouble in Germany, but once Hitler separated the Jews from the Germans and began to feed them lies their view clearly changed. This quote clearly shows that Hitler had successfully trick many people in to believe what he was doing was correct. It also shows how ruthless the Nazi's could be and how much danger the Jewish population was in.
Nazi Propaganda
http://www.holocaustresearchproject.org/holoprelude/images/nazsaprop.jpg
"The Gestapo came that afternoon" (Page 113)
This quote shows the survival instinct of humans and how it only focuses on ones self. A man had found Valdeks secret hiding place, Valdek decided to let him go and he later turned them in. The man clearly thought that he could survive if he helped the germans, but by doing so he selfishly put Valdek endanger. As you can clearly see survival instict kicked in and got the man to endanger another in an attempt to survive. Humans are like this by nature and this proves that Valdek can't even trust those in the same situation. He can only trust himself and if not he could be betrayed and killed. Due to this happening in the future Valdek will be more hesitant to trusting others for help which would explain Valdeks resistants to call a handy man help him and his resistants to Mala. In short Valdek is has trust issues thanks to this issue.
Valdek has trouble trusting someone with his life and or anything
http://www.ready2grow.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/TRUST-acrobats.jpg
Cian,
ReplyDeleteThat was a great post, it really pushed my thinking forward. I want to start this comment of by your seconds paragraph. I have already read Maus last year, it was my first book, and definitely the best one from all the books. It has a very powerful plot because of the holocaust. But, when I read your seconds paragraph I remembered a story called "The scorpion and the frog". I don't know if you've heard of it, but the story is: The frog wanted to cross the river and so did the scorpion. The frog asked if he could help the frog cross the river without stinging it. The scorpion said yes or they would both die in the river. The scorpion carried the frog halfway through the river and then stung him. The frog asked, why did you do that, now we are both going to die. The scorpion answered, its my nature." I connected with your second paragraph because of this story. It is a human nature to betray, lie, and hurt. But sadly, its something we cant control, only under certain circumstances. The man did make a mistake, but he was trying to defend himself. Like the scorpion, he did something he would probably not be willing to do at any moment. Also, imagine yourself at that mans place. What would you have done?
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ReplyDeleteCian,
ReplyDeleteThe first thing I thought about was no doubt, school. How some people are friends with each other, and get introduced into other peoples lives and feed them lies. I have seen so many people change friends rapidly because of what one person " fed " them. For example, I had this one friend and me and her were closest friends, then one day I introduced her to my other friend. It felt as if the new girl wanted to be a wall in our friendship, which she accomplished. She started feeding my friend lies about me, as if I was never the girl she knew. We never talked again after that, she had fed her so many lies that she didn't even want to look at me anymore. She hated me for the things that she was told but had never witnessed, she believed everything. Other than that, I have seen many people feed people lies because they put themselves first. People say lies to get what they want, they put themselves before everyone else, because they think they are superior. To accomplish what the want or need, they want to take a short cut by lying to many people
Your second connection was something I have experienced a lot. Some of these experiences were serious and some other weren't. For example, once I made a huge mistake to a friend. I found out it wasn't only me that had caused this mistake, but she started hiding as if she was never apart of it. She put herself first, so that I would gain all the consequences. She did what many other people would do to protect themselves. They contain so much fear that they do what is best for them, and don't think of anyone else but themselves.
Another example of this, one not so serious is hide and seek. There is always that one person, when they are caught, that rats out their friend. I was once playing and I was the last person needed to be found. Although the seeker found me rapidly and told me that the other person had revealed where I was hiding. Overall, this is a human instinct, to always think about yourself when you need to act fast. To always put yourself first, to protect yourself, or to accomplish something you need or want.
Cian,
ReplyDeleteI think that you first connection was very thorough. Like Bethany said, people who are determined to get something will do anything to accomplish it. They basically believe that the ends justify the means, just like Hitler must've believed. I have also experienced that myself. When I was younger, I was an enormous pain in the neck, and there were these three guys in my grade who hated me more than anyone did because of it. consequently, whenever someone new came to visit or joined our grade, they would tell them all of the bad things about me, as if I were a virus that they should stay away from. Although in the end, it was better for me because it helped me hang out with the good friends that I already had and I forged some lifelong friendships.
On your second connection, much like the first one, I think it was very thorough. In my view, I think that humanity is bent on selfishness, like Machiavelli did. And when you look at those oil companies, and those 200 billion dollar company empires, you see that it is quite true. The deepwater horizon oil spill, was in many ways, caused by BP. They refused to pay for the safety check of the equipment there. And the sad part is that it was only 120,000 dollars, which is relatively a very small amount of money for an oil company, and because of that 11 people died or were never found. This is also something that I experienced. When I was in 6th, grade me and some friends had royally screwed up. We we had been sent to the principals office and he came to talk to us, and one of my friends made up an entire story to save his own skin while me and one other guy got suspended, and he got away with it. This is one of the oldest human instincts, and it is horrible that in todays society, after 30 thousand years, we still have it.