My experiences in Mr Gallagher's FH+O

I have taken Facing History and Ourselves because I love history. Since I am a senior I have a lot of room in my schedule to fill with electives and I wanted to take as many history courses as I could so along with AP European History I decided to take this course. I had heard it was the best course at the high school from multiple people and it had no homework, which sounded like a nice break since I gave myself a pretty difficult schedule this year. I will be attending the University of New Hampshire next year to major in Environmental Engineering, but I will still be very passionate about history and continue to read many history books. I feel as though I can never get enough history because it tells so much about who we are, and this course has taught me who I am.

This course is about looking at the past and present to discover who you are. The three main topics that are discussed are the Armenian Genocide, the Jim Crow Era, and the Holocaust. One of the most important aspects of the course is how things came to happen. The course goes over the events leading up to and the events after these tragic times. After learning all these things you will have a clear understanding on how to prevent things like these from reoccurring. The subjects also make you, as the student, decide your opinions on many events in history and what you would do if you were living in that time. This course will teach you who you are, and who you will be as a future participatory member of the United States of America.

This semester I have been exposed to horrific things, and although it made me sad, each and every scene of the movies I have watched has taught me something. Facing History and Ourselves is, by far, the best course I have taken in my four years at Westborough. It has gotten me to open my eyes about history and today’s world. Mr. Gallagher and his course not only changed my perspective on history, but also me as a human being.

From movies like “The Upraising”, I have learned of the bravery, the courage, and the determination of the Jewish people and seen their blood, sweat, and tears. I have seen the suffering of people and their will to survive, and I have learned what it means to stand up for what is right. Throughout my education in Westborough I have learned of the Holocaust and the killing and oppression of the Jewish people but I had never learned of any resistance efforts. Each and every time I watched a movie of the Jewish people fighting back, I wished I could be right there fighting beside them, making a difference and willing to risk my life to stand up for what is right.

“The Boy in the stripped pajamas” was the saddest fiction movie that we watched all year although it was very historically accurate. The way that Gretel became absorbed in the idea of evil Jews and the Nazi party showed how children became the Hitler youth and how they were groomed to be future party members. When the mother discovered what the father was doing to the Jews was incredible. She didn’t like Jews and just thought that they had been put into the work camps, but when she discovered crematories and realized that the Jews were being exterminated she began to see how evil the Nazi were and what her husband was actually doing as a soldier. I think that this showed how many people were unaware of what was going on with the extermination of the Jews. The young boy, Bruno, showed that putting bias aside made the Jewish people seem normal and not evil. He had no understanding of why Germans thought Jews were evil and therefore had no reason to believe so, which led him to befriend Schmuel and realize that Jews were good people. When Bruno went into the camp and no one identified him as a non-Jew it showed how they were no different and that even the Nazi’s couldn’t tell the difference between the two boys. For me this movie showed me how sometimes adults aren’t right and I don’t have to believe what I am told. I want to be Bruno in life and put aside everything I have been told so that I can make my own character judgments in life and not generalize and entire race.

The movie on the “Milgram Experiment” has taught me that each and every person is capable of being a perpetrator, and doing what the Nazis did, and because I now know what I am capable of, I refuse to let it happen. The fact that anyone given power can and will abuse it to a certain point, even if that means the harm of other people, was astonishing to me. One would not think that people could be so cruel and obedient. Everyone just listened to the man in the lab coat not questioning anything he said, few people refused to continue with the experiment, and many went up to the highest voltage the machine could administer. The most interesting “teacher” was the man that only continued to administer shocks once the man in the lab coat said he was responsible for anything that happened to the learner. This was obviously untrue, that teacher had moral obligations, and if he had been administering real shocks and the learner died his blood would have been on not only the lab guys hands but also the teachers. I have learned that anyone can do bad things, but also anyone can stand up and do what is right. Every single on of the Nazis did not have to obey orders and listen to Hitler saying the Jews were bad and needed to be killed, and everyone has the capacity to be a Nazi. After learning this and becoming aware of how these things can happen I know that I will never allow it to happen to myself.

“The Triumph of the Will” showed me how people in German got to the state of mind making them think they were better than others. Propaganda is a very powerful thing and by using powerful propaganda the Nazi party got many German citizens to support the “final solution”. “A class divided” showed that by labeling people you are automatically making some people feel superior and others inferior setting the stage for discrimination. The Triumph of the Will did exactly that making Germans seem like the purest people in the world and made them believe that they were better than everyone else. These two films helped me understand how propaganda and labeling led to the holocaust.

One specific thing from the course that I will forever remember was the picture from Auschwitz of the Nazis and the girls standing around smiling proudly. I will never forget their faces; the smiles on their faces were sickening. They thought they were doing the right thing and they were proud of their killings. Those faces represent what happens when people think they are superior. After seeing that picture I will never put myself above another human being.

This course has prepared me to go out into the world more than any other class could ever take. Throughout high school I have been taught basic study skills, facts, and the bases for college courses, but this class was special. After taking Facing History and Ourselves, I am entering the world with the knowledge of its serious past mistakes so that I can help stop them from happening again. I am entering the world knowing I will stand up for others and what I believe in, and I am entering the world knowing who I am.

My experiences in Mr Gallagher's FH+O

Wednesday, May 18, 2011

Introduction

What Facing History and Ourselves Ment to Me

Works Cited