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In hopes of creating a wave of change in this generation, an Edmond, Oklahoma local retold his parents’ journey through the tragic events of the Holocaust.
On Nov. 6, the University of Central Oklahoma’s chapter of the history honor society Phi Alpha Theta hosted Michael Korenblit, co-founder of the Respect Diversity Foundation, for a presentation based on his book “Until We Meet Again: A True Story of Love and Survival in the Holocaust.”
“It’s happened before and it happens today,” Korenblit said. “That’s why what happened 70 years ago to my parents is so important to each and everyone of us today.”
Korenblit said the story of his parents’ survival is a lens to see modern day oppression and bring the issues closer to home for his audiences.
“A lot of times we’ve been brainwashed into thinking that understanding history is names and dates and places and putting them in the right order,” Willie Steele, professor of language and literature, said. “For me, it’s about a great story. … A book like this frames issues of the Holocaust in a very personal way, where it makes it a very alive story that simply memorizing facts and figures and names and dates just doesn’t do.”
Korenblit’s presentation focused on the experiences of his parents, Manya and Meyer Korenblit, as they struggled to survive the Holocaust and the implications it had for his own upbringing in the United States of America.
“This is somebody that lives a few blocks away from this campus whose parents were resettled in Ponca City, Oklahoma after the war,” Steele said. “And as Michael is growing up in the civil rights era, his dad takes him to downtown Oklahoma City and shows him the different water fountains, different bathrooms and the different bus stations. Michael very quickly realizes that if he doesn’t confront these issues, the same type of thing could happen.”
The Holocaust was a watershed event in human history. Many of the issues raised by this event continue to have an impact on our lives and the world in which we live, even almost 70 years after the fact, he said.
“It’s important to understand not only what happened, but what we can learn from it today,” Steele said. “That’s the thing with Michael’s talk is he does a fantastic job at bringing it to the here and now of the 21st century and looking at things of political and religious genocide from around the world.”
One of the most recent of these events is found in ISIS, as they continue to kill religious minorities throughout Iraq and Syria. Korenblit praised the United States’ efforts to stop this particular situation as one of the only cases in modern history of proactive prevention of genocide.
“I didn’t expect how much he tied in the things that happen now in the United States,” junior Ashley Tackett said. “He gave a ton of examples of incidents that could have been stopped since the Holocaust. We overlook other things going on around the world and don’t view them the same as the Holocaust. It may not be 11 million people, but even one person should be too many to loose. It carried a lot of weigh in my eyes because things are still going on now, not just in history.”
Korenblit focused on three men that had the courage to protect his parents through their persecution in the Holocaust, concluding with the notion that everything we do as individuals matters.
“There’s a Jewish proverb that says, ‘To save one life is to save the world,’” Steele said. “People who think that they can’t do something, even if you help one person, you have no idea how that one act of kindness can have a ripple effect for years to come.”
Korenblit aimed to reintroduce the prevalence of the tragedy of the Holocaust by relating it to current times and using its thematic messages on a wide range of social issues.
“The ideas of the Holocaust are still very prevalent today,” junior Garrett Marshall said. “I think the greatest thing about history is that we can learn from it, no matter how far in the past it is. …The Holocaust is an even bigger impact because it is a little closer and it still affects people today who are alive.”
Korenblit founded the Respect Diversity Foundation with his wife Joan in 2000. He now speaks at schools around the country promoting respect to diversity, equality and acceptance.
“I think you can use the Holocaust as something that transcends the theoretical,” Charles Rix, associate professor of Bible, said. “When you talk about a center for recognizing diversity, what it’s doing is raising the awareness that we can’t get to the place in society where it’s acceptable to treat people as less than because they’re different.”
Korenblit said the Holocaust began with the “simple act” of bullying years before the textbooks mark as the beginning of the event.
“The Holocaust didn’t start with mass murder,” Korenblit said. “It started with simple acts of harassment and bullying.”
Standing up and speaking out against the marginalization and dehumanization of individuals requires knowledge of where the prejudices come from, according to Rix.
“I would encourage people to think about where their biases and prejudices come from,” Rix said. “Use this time to sort of think about whether or not they have been taught or they have absorbed an inclination to dismiss people that are different and to think about why that is.”
Korenblit urged his audience to make a difference by standing up for what is right in the world.
“All of you have the privilege of freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of religion, freedom to petition your government and freedom to be assembled here tonight,” Korenblit said. “Don’t ever allow any law to be passed that takes those rights away from you or anyone else.”
For more information about the Respect Diversity Foundation can be found here.
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