How The Holocaust

Changed The World

By Emily Anderson

December 14, 2015

SNHU Modern World History

 Take a moment to think about your idea of the most devastating event in history. For me,

the Holocaust comes to mind. Taking place during World War II, the Holocaust lasted for over

ten years, with over six million deaths. No one can really know for sure how the world today

would differed if this tragic event did not occur. The millions who died can not be resuscitated,

and history can not be rewinded.

By fall of 1941, Adolf Hitler and the S.S. had built many concentration camps for Jewish

people in pursuit of his ultimate goal of building up an Aryan master race. The largest

concentration camp that the Jews were shipped off to was Auschwitz-Birkenau, located in

Poland. They were piled into cattle cars and sent to the extermination sites from all over Europe

to the East. Nazis used the latest technologies such as the notorious Zyklon B gas to kill millions

in gas chambers. Approximately six million jews died, over half in the chambers. The other half

died from execution, starvation, or exhaustion. The Nazis not only discriminated against Jews,

but also gypsies, homosexuals, and communists. Deportations to the death camps continued until

the very end of World War II.

The millions that died, and their potential contributions to progress in technology and the

world we live in today, could never be precisely determined. With the overwhelming number of

people that lost their lives in the Holocaust, there was a great chance for scientific and

technological contributions that may have influenced the world today like cures for a variety of

diseases.

Without the Holocaust, the war could have possibly been more contained. Germany

attacked England, Japan, and the United States. Thus, involving the United States in this global

conflict. It is also quite possible that World War II would have lasted longer, due to the amount of
soldiers there would have been. Also, there would not be such a great amount of anti-semitic

perceptions of Jews today, and they would not be viewed as subhuman. People often reference

the Holocaust when mocking Jews and make jokes ridiculing them in their daily lives. It is

comparable to slavery; if people did not have a reason to view Jews differently, they would not

be seen as inferior today. Nobody would have the mindset of the Nazis either. Anti-semitism

would not be as prevalent. The prejudice against Jews as an ethnic or religious group would

likely have drastically decreased.

Imagine that all of the horror surrounding the Holocaust had never occurred. What some

regard as the most tragic event in world history never happened. Those millions of people never

died. Although anti-semitic slurs may have decreased from day-to-day lives, possibly the

greatest legacy of the Holocaust was that it forced people to see the consequences, evil and

stupidity of unreasonable hate and discrimination. Overall, racism of all sorts may have been

more acceptable if the terrible deeds of the Holocaust were not so well-known. The Holocaust is

a significant topic learned in schools for a great purpose: we must learn from history or we are

doomed to repeat it.