Unnecessary Treachery

Prompt: What is the impact of the ghetto (in both the old sense and a contemporary sense) on the people inside and the people outside?

The Jewish ghetto, once packed full of people striving for some sense of a normal life, is now much more desolate with only tourists trying to picture what once was.  Walking around, I found it hard to believe that the places I saw which were radiating with beauty were once full of gloom, filth, and unjust discrimination.  Though the ghetto in the old sense was a place of suffering and unhappiness, the contemporary ghetto is a place full of history shouting to the current generations to learn from the past and make a difference for the future.  Observing the ghetto with my tour group, I saw enlightened faces, renovated buildings, and artifacts of the past- the past which tormented endless numbers of lives.  Today people look forward to getting inside the ghetto as they stroll along on their pleasant vacation away from the work they so gladly left behind.  However, in the past people wished nothing more than to get out of that ghetto and go back to the work they were forced out of. 

In the past, from an inside perspective, the ghettos impact was horrific.  You cram into rooms that are not your home or no longer belong to you, are put in a foreign job, and try to pretend that life is what it used to be.  However, life is surreal and not what you have been accustomed to.  You realize that you cannot wake up and that your worst nightmare has weaseled its ugly way into your daily life.  The nightmare is inescapable and no pinch will bring you back to what once was.  As the tour guide explains, the ghetto only fills with more and more people so much that there is no way to build living spaces but up.  The Jews are cramped, have markings on their clothing as if they are ravenous animals that need to be steered clear of, and stripped of all that made their life familiar and normal.  Not only are the basics taken but the attempt is made to even wipe out their very foundation.  The religion they have learned all of their life can no longer be taught and they must attend mass instead of being in the comfort of the temple.  They are forced to secretly pray and hope for God to snap away the pain.               

Moving on into the contemporary sense, the ghetto impacts us with astonishment and awe at the human behavior that was exhibited.  Though I found it particularly hard to picture the set-up of the past and how the buildings were, I found it easy to imagine how poorly the Jews must have felt.  The teachings given now throughout the Jewish ghetto and the museum allow people to take a step back into the footprints of those of the past and empathize with those who suffered.  The largest powers turned their back on innocent people and nobody was there to take a stand for what was right.  Whether speaking of the ghettos which existed from about 1555 to 1870 or history repeating itself during the Jewish persecution during the Holocaust, we are taught to not continue the cycle of pointless hatred (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_Ghetto).  The same goes for those which existed outside of the ghetto.

We learn today that we should take a stand because those that lived outside of the ghetto did not.  The people living outside did not destroy the walls, make objections, or aid those living there.  Though there may have been some exceptions, the ghetto lasted for hundreds of years, portraying that efforts were clearly not widespread or enough.  Those that walk by the ghetto still today and remain on the outside have yet to learn from those that lived there before.  Learning about history of all kinds is vital, and by remaining ignorant people can only pave the pathway for disaster.  Does one have to actually witness the inside of the ghetto to understand its importance?  The answer is probably not.  However, the aid helps and as long as we continue to teach one another and evolve to higher levels of understanding and acceptance, we will restore humanity one piece at a time.  The nightmare of the past shakes us awake to the reality of what could happen if we allow histories unnecessary cycle to perpetuate.