"The Grey Zone" Sonderkommandos at Auschwitz

Sokar · Post by **Sokar** » 2003-04-22 03:27am

I recently saw the film adpatation of the tale of the Sonderkommando teams at the death camps, and was amazingly moved and equal parts horrified at may points in the film.

For thoes unfamiliar , Sonderkommandos were Jews who were given better food, accomodations, and a few more months of life, in return for being the main labor force responsible for 'processing' thoes Jews condemmed to the gas chamber and crematorium.

My question is two fold, could you , would you make that choice, to do the 'dirty work' of the Holocaust in order to live just a little bit longer?
Secondly , do thoes who decided to deserve our contempt, or our pity?

For me, I can't imagine being faced with such a choice, I would hope that I had the courage to spit in the selection officers eye and tell him to go to hell, but like many I think I would be too terrified and would follow Satan himself if he offered me a way out , even temporarily from that malestrom of terror and death.

For the second part, they recieve my pity. They were presented a choice in the middle of the most horrifying experience in their entire lives, no rational man could have ever thought the worst stories of the German 'relocation' camps were real, until that horror stared him right in the face. I think they made the only choice a rational person could, life, only to realize later how truly damned they really were.

If you have any intrest in the Holocaust, check out this film , I also reccomend reading Primo Levy's "The Drowned and the Saved" which is an amazing history and accounting of the Holocaust and contains a chapter entirely devoted to the Sonderkommandos.

Alyeska · Post by **Alyeska** » 2003-04-22 09:41am

I recomend the book series Maus. It is about a particular Jew and how he survived the war. He might have been classified as one of these Jews you mention, but his life wasn't all that easy. He did what he had to survive and he used every influence he had to save his friends and family.

Enforcer Talen · Post by **Enforcer Talen** » 2003-04-23 02:38am

I see the comic maus at my school pretty often.

and, about the commandos - you had enough to eat, but you died in three months. guarenteed.

Frank Hipper · Post by **Frank Hipper** » 2003-04-23 03:00am

Of course the Sonderkommando deserve our pity! They were victims as as much as the lifeless corpses they threw into the the crematoria were. I can't imagine the burden of guilt they would have. I would have dificulties understanding anyone's rationale for judging them, as well. Especially anyone as removed from the death camps as we are.