Draft:Behind closed doors in Deaf school during the holocaust

Behind Closed Doors in Deaf Schools During The Holocaust
Behind every door lies a Victim. Even after having to live with learning a whole different language, having to “fit” into society, and having to live in a place where you are seen as “abnormal” it still isn’t enough suffering for those in the Deaf community during the Holocaust, especially Deaf schools. By every second every single student that attended that Deaf school, their faith is taken away from humanity. Imagine having no say in what goes in or out of your body and having to live with constant pain to which you didn’t even consent. These are what the students in the Deaf schools had to live with for the rest of their lives.

1817 was when the first ever American School for the Deaf opened. However, even after having to struggle with having to teach one another to learn a language, there has been something deeper that every deaf student had to live with. During the overtake of "Adolf Hitler " The deaf community was wiped out by those who advocated, teachers, and National Germans in the 1930s and early 1940s, leaving behind a broken and complex history of the deaf throughout the Holocaust. Teachers and directors of Deaf Institutes reported numerous cases of deaf children enrolling in those programs. Instructors cooperated in the Nazi desire of growing the race by tracking, forcing, and occasionally sending students to hospitals. Children were often forced into sterilization while being taken to hospitals under false make-believe for other strategies' On the other hand Deaf individuals were attacked during the Holocaust by the Nazi regime for a variety of reasons depending on their discriminatory grounds victims ranged both age and race. They have done terrible things to deaf students in Nazi Germany. One of the things was forced sterilization. They used to take kids from their classes and examine them. They would test them to see if they were hereditary deaf or not. If they determined they were then they would either do the operation there without the parent's or students' consent or they would send letters saying that their student needs to be sterilized due to the law and their parents would have to bring them to a doctor to have it done. Both ways would be very gruesome and many survivors said they had the surgery and were sent home immediately, with no time to recover. Sixty percent of deaf people who were sterilized stated that their operation wasn't even done by doctors. These statistics can be found in the book "Crying Hands" by Horst Biesold.

Force Sterilization in Germany ended around 1945 after they had already sterilized an estimated amount of 300,000 to 450,000 people. This was not the last forced sterilization. The last sterilization was in the U.S.A. in 1981 in Oregon. This was known to be the last recorded force sterilization.

In the end, although the Deaf community has come so far there are still a lot of things in which schools and society need to be held accountable. It is necessary to reflect on and recognize these crimes to honor the memories of those who suffered and guarantee that such tragedy never occurs again. 19 For these students suffering many of these students will be remembered for the amount of faith they were taken away from their freedom and success.

How were teachers involved with Deaf Sterling during the holocaust?

 * 1) Compliance: certain teachers followed Nazi government demands, such as identifying disabled kids and participating in the selection process for sterilization or death. They may have seen these behaviors as required or felt compelled to comply out of fear of consequences.
 * 2) Resistance: Despite the dangers, many teachers opposed Nazi policy and fought to protect their deaf children. It might take several forms, including refusing to cooperate with the authorities, offering more assistance and care to vulnerable students, and even hiding or assisting students escaping danger.
 * 3) Education under threat: Many instructors continued to educate their deaf kids under highly difficult circumstances. Despite the current environment of fear and rule, some instructors continued to provide instruction and assistance to their students, even at tremendous personal danger.

Overall, teacher experiences with deaf students during the Holocaust differed greatly, reflecting the complicated moral choices and tough conditions they faced. Many showed incredible courage and determination in the face of unthinkable tragedy, while others, unfortunately, became involved in the persecution of defenseless people.

Estimated more than thousands were forcibly sterilized
–The actual number of Deaf people who were forcefully sterilized during the Holocaust is difficult to know with certainty. Records from that era are incomplete, and precise information on the sterilization of Deaf people may not have been constantly documented or maintained.

–The ages of individuals targeted numerous although they frequently included children and adults. Youth with disabilities were occasionally removed from their homes and placed in institutions, where they experienced neglect, abuse, and, in some cases, death.

–In some cases, Deaf people were sterilized without their consent, frequently because their deafness was inherited, and keeping them from reproducing would possibly raise the population's general genetic quality. These behaviors had dangerous effects on the people involved, their families, and the Deaf community as a whole.

What is sterilization when it comes to the Deaf community?
When it came to the Deaf community and sterilization their whole "mission" was to somewhat "abolish" and that said Adolf Hitler like many others back then were again Adolf Hitler and the Nazi dictatorship carried out a sterilization program to cleanse the German people following their flawed belief of white supremacy. They saw certain groups, such as those with problems or genetic problems, as threats to their vision of a genetically "pure" civilization. In 1933, the Nazis established an official sterilization program known as the Law for the Prevention of Hereditarily Diseased Children. This law targeted people with disabilities, mental diseases, and other alleged genetic flaws, such as deafness. Their justification was to prevent these individuals from passing on their characteristics to future generations since they considered them as undesirable for the "health" of the German community.

The Timeline of Deaf Sterilization during the Holocaust
1933- The Law for the Prevention of Hereditarily Diseased Offspring is passed in Nazi Germany. This law allows for the forcible sterilization of people who are thought to have inherited defects, such as physical and mental disability such as deafness.

1934-1939: Thousands of people, including the deaf, are forcefully sterilized under this rule. The sterilization treatments were often carried out without consent from the participants and were part of a purposeful bring to remove specific characteristics from the population.

1939-1945: As the Nazi administration increased its attempts at national "cleansing" and the execution of its eugenics program, sterilization of people with disabilities, including the deaf, continued. However, with the outbreak of World War II and the Holocaust, the government's focus changed to more severe methods, including the mass elimination of specific populations considered undesirable, such as Jews, Romans, and others.

The forced sterilization program in Nazi Germany was not only a severe violation of human rights, but it also marked a dark period in medical history and morality. It serves as a reminder of the risks of sterilization and the importance of protecting all persons' dignity and freedoms, regardless of their ability or believed genetic features.