Holocaust Dropped from History Lessons: Teachers Don't Want to Offend

Math, Science, Geography, and History are just a few of the courses that every child is taught during their career in school. Each subject is taught for a reason, and each subject forms who and what type of country we are today. The world is not a pretty place, history teaches us of the French Revolution, the abolishment of slavery, the invention of the light bulb, the invention of the revolver, the creation of the draft, World War I, the creation of retirement insurance, and so much more, this means also including the Holocaust.

The Holocaust is an event in our history that tends to be either looked upon or looked over depending on if you believe it happened or if you don't. This is just the same as many other events in history that the current and some previous generations were not around for so in turn it can be deemed as something that has not happened.

The subject of teaching the Holocaust is beginning to be overlooked in schools. Many teachers are not teaching the history of the Holocaust because they are trying to stay away from offending the students from certain races and religions as well as trying to avoid teaching it in order to not distress those who do not believe that it had happened.

I believe that this is not appropriate. There are so many times in history where certain races and religions were the targets of some sort of battle. Take the American Civil War; this war is still taught and talked about and it is between the northern United States and the Southern United States. Many students from those areas or have had relatives who had fought in that war may take offense. Same goes for World War II. The Germans were part of that and there was many a conflict and death due to that war, but we don't stop teaching it in the curriculum just because we may offend those who are of German decent or even of a specific religion.

So why is the Holocaust such a touchy topic? Eleven million people died due to extermination if they were Jewish, Roma, Slavs, homosexuals, Jehovah's Witnesses, mentally or physically disabled or by medical experiments that were initialized by the Chancellor of Germany, Adolf Hitler. Basically those who Adolf Hitler's Nazi Party determined was living a life that was unworthy of life should be executed.

Obviously this is not a civil and humane way of going about the dream of becoming an all powerful leader; but that is another story. This subject should not be thrown out of the classroom based upon fear of offending someone's religion or culture.

Whether or not we teach it now or they find out later, something always offends someone and we shouldn't blind children from the harshness of the real world. Many of those who served in World War II who had a chance to witness this horrible sight first hand can tell you it is true. What about those who were victims and now are survivors of the Holocaust? They have these terrifying memories tattooed in their minds as well as tattoos on their bodies as proof they were there.

Millions of survivors around the world have such numbered tattoos, now of course this couldn't have been done for fun. Those who are in denial of the occurrence in history may be trying to save themselves from being punished or found out by the Nazi's and be taken along the same path as those who were victims. Well, for those of you out there who feel compelled to lie to yourself and fear for your lives; you're safe. Hitler has been dead since 1945 and when Hitler died, so did the Nazi party.

Auschwitz is real, Belzec was real, Sobibor was real, all of these death camps were real and our own President Eisenhower was part of the discovery of these death camps. Every war, every battle, every invention, every part of history has its conflicting stories or evidence, but that doesn't mean that it wasn't invented or it hadn't had happened.

Children need to be taught about our history. If schools are going to worry about conflicts of interest then we shouldn't have schools at all. If we start eliminating one part of our history from the school's curriculum, then how much more of our history is going to be removed or is going to be questioned in the classroom.

In conclusion, the school is a place for learning, not a place for hiding our history.