Ask students what it means to be a perpetrator, to perpetuate a crime. Ask them who the perpetrators of the Holocaust were. Explain that today you are focusing on how seemingly small decisions contributed to the perpetration of the Holocaust, even if that was not the person’s intent.

Listen to the audio file, “Do You Take the Oath?” by Facing History and Ourselves.

Think-Pair-Share.

Think: Have students spend a few minutes writing down their response to this question: Why did the man in the recording sign the oath? (3 minutes)

Pair: Have students talk to the person next to them about their answers. Do they think the man should have made a different choice? Why was it hard to make a different choice?

Share: Use this exercise to engage in a discussion about Holocaust perpetrators. Was the man a perpetrator? How does he seem different from the Nazis seen in the movies? In the final wrap up to the lesson, the teacher should highlight that the Holocaust required the consent and participation of many different people, including business people, doctors, nurses, architects, pastors, teachers, store owners, and laborers. Some of these people participated because they agreed with Nazism but other people acted with self-interest and ended up strengthening Nazism.

Read this quote by Holocaust historian, Raul Hilberg, from “Destruction of the European Jews” to the class. “In retrospect it may be possible to view the entire design as a mosaic of small pieces, each commonplace and lusterless by itself.” (Hilberg, 1885, P. 263)

Ask students, What could have happened if one of these “mosaic pieces” were to refuse an order?

This lesson has been simplified from a lesson created by the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum (full lesson can be found here). Distribute this worksheet and the caption-less photographs to students in groups of three. Explain to them that they will first receive a photograph without any context and that they will be asked to answer the questions as best they can.

Provide each group with a photograph without a caption and a worksheet. There are seven different photographs, depending on the size of the class some groups may be examining the same picture.

Allow students some time to look over the picture and answer the questions in Section 1 of the worksheet. When everyone is finished, hand out the same photograph this time including the caption. After looking over the photograph and caption, ask students to answer the questions in Section 2 of the worksheet.

Have each of the groups share what they learned from their photographs. If possible, project the pictures on a large screen so the entire class can see the picture the group is describing.

How does looking at the pictures after receiving the context change how you feel about the photo?

Prepare students by telling them the preface of the Stanford Prison Experiment; that it was a social psychology experiment to investigate the psychological effect of perceived power and dehumanization of the “other.” While this study was put into the context of a standard prison, it has often been used to help explain the psychology of perpetrators during the Holocaust.

Explain that many perpetrators signed up to work at a concentration camp or killing center and that there are countless stories of unnecessary brutality from many of the SS guards.

Play the BBC Documentary about the Stanford Prison Experiment (29 minutes). Explain to students that while this was a real study that took place, the ethics of it were questioned and regulations for social experiments have since been put into place. Some question the validity of this study as some students may have been playing up their roles to give the researcher “something to work with.” However, even if some actions were played up, it can still help to stir a conversation about the effects of dehumanization and authority.

After the video, open up a class discussion about what they saw. Many students will have strong opinions about this video, so the discussion may be led in different directions. The questions below are meant to guide you, but you can also let the conversation flow naturally. It is most important that the conversation is brought back to the context of the Holocaust.

1. What did you find the most shocking?
2. What were the effects on the guards? On the prisoners?
3. As mentioned in the beginning with the example of Milgram’s experiment, how does the presence of an authoritative person “taking the blame” affect how people act?
4. How can this be related to perpetrators of the Holocaust?
5. What sort of tactics did they use to dehumanize the prisoners?
6. How did the uniform the guards wore help to disconnect them from the prisoners? *Hint* Think about their eyewear.
7. What role do you think “herd mentality” (the act of adopting certain behaviors based on influence from peers) played in people’s participation?

Read this quote by Holocaust historian, Raul Hilberg in “Destruction of the European Jews” to the class:

“An administrative process of such range cannot be carried out by a single agency, even if it is a trained and specialized body like the Gestapo or a commissariat for Jewish affairs, for when a process cuts into every phase of human life, it must ultimately feed upon the resources of an entire community…. The machinery of destruction was the organized community in one of its specialized roles.”

Ask the students to take a moment to think about what it is saying. What are some things that come to mind? Have them jot down some notes for two minutes before asking them to share. This does not need to be a lengthy discussion, just call on a few people to get class started.

Direct students to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum online exhibit, Some Were Neighbors: Collaboration and Complicity in the Holocaust. Allow students and opportunity to explore the site, become familiar with navigating around it. See what they hone in on as they do so. At the bottom of the page there are different tabs featuring different categories of collaborators. Some were: Neighbors, Workers, Teenagers, Policemen, Religious Leaders, Teachers, or Friends.

Divide the class into groups of three or five. Assign each group a category: Neighbors, Workers, Teenagers, Policemen, Religious Leaders, Teachers, or Friends.

Each group should prepare a brief presentation on their category. The presentation does not have to be a visual presentation, just ask the students to discuss their category with the class. They do not have to describe all of the pictures, just ask them to pick a few that they found the most compelling. If possible, allow students to project some of the pictures they chose to show the class.

Provide students with the following points to help structure their presentations:

1. What group are you presenting? Summarize some of the information you have gathered.
2. What do you think made people in this group participate?
3. Were there opportunities to resist or opt out?
4. Were they acting as part of their job?
5. What role do you think peer pressure had on their decision to act?