Abstract

Conversations with my father over many years reveal how genocides unfold invisibly in front of ethical witnesses. In August 1943, he was deported as a forced laborer by the French Vichy regime to work in the construction of the IG Farben petrochemical factory at Auschwitz, where he was recruited into a resistance group. His precise recollection of exactly what he knew or did not know, and what resistance acts he and his companions undertook demonstrates how terror can make uncertainty a strategy for survival as well as resistance. My father dissects multiple contradictory interpretations of ethical motivations for everyday acts of kindness and betrayal. He refuses to identify clear heroes or villains, ultimately condemning only those in power, especially Allied leaders who had the knowledge and logistical capacity to intervene, but instead allowed the trains to run on time. Primo Levi's concept of the Grey Zone alerts us to how institutionalized brutality overwhelms the possibility of human solidarity. What genocides and Grey Zones are we missing today?

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