The Voices Are Fading Away

   Elie Wiesel, writer, Nobel Peace Prize Winner and Holocaust survivor, died last weekend. I watched a tribute on the CBS Sunday Morning show. I also read a snippet of an article that made me think. The article was about how his death is a double tragedy first because he was a "rare and unusual" man and also because the Holocaust survivors are dying out.
  This last thought caught me the most. The writer was correct. Those voices are slowly fading away.
   It is going to happen. Human lives are only so long. Eventually those who were survivors or have seen the horrors of World War II will die and their voices will be gone.
  It's a disconcerting thought to me. Those people are first hand witnesses to death camps, bombings and the inhumanity that comes with war. They were there. As long as they are alive you can't pretend these things didn't happen. There is living proof.
  Maybe it's me, but it seems like history is becoming less important. Learning or reading about the past is not as exciting as playing Minecraft or catching up on Facebook or Twitter feeds. When history is brought up it usually has to do with various groups of people wanting things to be eliminated because they are offensive.
  I worry that history will be rewritten with an eye towards political correctness or to favour one group over another. It used to be that the facts were reported. Now facts are slanted to favour the point of view of the one doing the reporting.
  I could be concerned over nothing. However I think of my two young adult family members who firmly believe that World War II was a war started by large companies in order to make more money. They don't believe that those who fought in that war deserve respect or honor for doing so. I'm not even sure they know or even care what the Holocaust was.
  Knowing history is important. The old adage about those not knowing history repeating it has a kernel of truth to it. It is important to know that many years ago in Europe, there was a man who rose to power in a country that had been beaten in World War I. Times were hard and people were struggling. He was able to convince people that their country needed to be rid of certain other groups of people in order to rise again. He was able to get enough power to attempt to literally kill off these groups without too many objections. He was able to fragment that country.
   At the memorial at Dachau you can see the words, "Nie Wieder". This is German for "Never Again". We must never let something like Nazi Germany happen again. We cannot allow hate and fear to rule us. We cannot strip others of their humanity and blame them for the challenges we are facing in our country at this time.
  The voices like those of Elie Weisel and those from that era are slowly fading away. Someday those first hand witnesses will be gone. All we will have is the words that they leave behind. We need to learn and listen to those voices.