The Gray Zone

For Social Justice and Peace Studies (SJP) we had to read an article called The Gray Zone by Primo Levi. He states that in Nazi Germany during WWII in the concentration camps, there is no clear defining line between persecutors and victims. Here's a little history for you:

While the Jews and others who were hearded into these concentration camps had to endure the horrendous conditions and many ultimately faced starvation, some were also forced to kill their fellow Jews, gypsies, etc. Within, they had these Special Squads (SS) who were the ones doing the mass killings. At first, they mainly consisted of the Nazis, but soon, they were comprised of Jews with the supervision of the Nazis. What the Nazis did was they carefully examined the prisoners and then picked the most vulnerable and the ones they thought were likely to collaborate and do what the Nazis told them. So essentially, the idea behind this was to dehumanize the Jewish people even further to the point where they were willing to kill themselves. Now members of the SS were segregated from the rest of the prisoners and were kept away from the ouside world as well. The purpose for being in such a position was A) it bought a little more time, allowing a glimpse of hope for survival, and B) there were certain privileges such as getting a little bit more to eat than other prisoners (emphasis on little because it would only amount to maybe a ladel more soup, if that, and if you can call it soup).

The members of the SS were utlimately killed every so often. Meaning they would have one SS, and then a week later (that's just my number...it's not specified in the article) a second SS was formed who would go in and kill the first SS in order to keep confidentiality and to prevent witnesses from later telling of the events that took place.

So, where does the gray zone come in? Well the gray zone is neither the victims nor the persectors. The gray zone consists of those who began as the victims, but turned into the persecutors (so basically the Jews who were members of the SS). Levi says that we cannot judge them because no one knows what they would do in that situation. Well, I'm going to go ahead and say that I really don't think I could knowingly kill hundreds of people just to survive. Not with this kind of knowledge at least. Death would seem much sweeter than the mere chance of survival, and if in fact I did escape death, the emotional, psychological, mental, etc. distress that I would have to live with afterwards. It just does not seem worth it. Granted, yes, this is speaking from the comfort of my bedroom and my secure little world.

Looking at this from an apodictic moral standpoint, one would conclude that it does not matter, they killed another human being, and not by accident either; it was purely for personal gain. But, I think that this whole situation should be looked at more casuistically. Desperation pretty much erodes any sense of moral judgement. Who can say what they would do in that situation? Man, just thinking about the inhumane things these people witnessed on a daily basis while being subjected to the murder of their fellow beings, it's inconceivable. Not to mention being forced out of your home for things that were pretty much inherent. "I was born Jewish, or I have brown hair, or darker skin, therefore I must die". Gee, that doesn't seem very uplifting. Being Jewish, I'm sure they were wondering where God was in all of this. Therefore their whole basis for morality was probably thrown right out the window and survival was the main focus of the collectives in the Lagers (as Levi calls them).

I'm still not sure where I stand on this whole issue. Whether they can be catagorized as victims, or persecutors, or if Levi is on to something with this gray zone, I'm not sure. I'm leaning towards agreeing with Levi, but it is still difficult to ignore that they did have a choice. But then on the other hand, their whole construction of the world had been severed and then reconstructed to form this sick and twisted reality that was created for them. I don't know. The whole thing is rather disturbing and it is hard to conceive that human beings, people that share 99.9% of the same genes as us, were brutalized in this way, including every other mass genocide, ethnic cleansing or whatever other label is put on human destruction.