Alfred Tibor's Speech Last Thursday @ ODU

So last Thursday I went to see WWII Holocaust survivor Alfred Tibor speak here on campus. It was unbelievably good. You always read about the WWII and the brutality, but you're still removed--the experience is only page deep. To a certian extent, the Holocaust for our generation is just another terrible "historical" event, not too much different than the brutality of the French Revolution, or Napoleon's war campaigns.

But seeing Mr. Tibor speak gives you an entirely different perspective. His experience was so astoundingly personal--34 of his immediate family members died. Think about that. Look: IIIII IIIII IIIII IIIII IIIII IIIII IIII

That's 34 slash marks. Imagine each one being your mother, father, sister, brother, aunt, uncle, etc etc. That's pure insanity! Which really gets you thinking about all the other Holocaust victims. There are probably a lot of stories like this. We just don't frame it in this way. We see the number 6,000,000 plopped down on the page (the estimated number of Holocaust victims), but never the individual back stories.

To top it off, Mr. Tibor has zero hatred. That was actually the point of the speech--to stop what he called the vicious "circle of hatred" in everyday life. He is also a sculptor. He has pieces throughout Ohio ( I know he said there's one in Bexley). I'd like to check them out if I get the chance. Carved into the base of the one sculpture is: "For the 11 million who perished." 6 million jews died in the Holocaust. The other 5 million, he said, is for the German guards--kind of like a Jesus' "forgive-them-they-know-not-what-they-do" kind of thing. How powerful is that? Try representing that with slash marks.