Holocaust Survivor Stories

By Sara Lennon

Is social media dangerous or beneficial?

Debates around social media’s impact on children and teenagers have entered the political arena, with lawmakers considering guardrails, regulations or even bans of the popular apps that consume so much of children and teenagers’ time each day. The issue of social media’s impact on youth is complex, with dangers and benefits to be considered. On one hand, there is bullying, addiction, isolation and algorithms that feed potentially dangerous content. On the other, young people find welcoming communities, and appreciate diverse talents easily shared on these open forums. One unequivocally positive development is the use of online videos to educate a new generation about historical events not taught in school, including the Holocaust. A recent survey found that 63% of Gen Z (those born between 1996 and 2012) did not learn about the Holocaust in their classes at school.

Antisemitism is rising at an alarming rate.

Concurrently, antisemitic language, hate speech and violence is rising at an alarming rate. While antisemitism has existed for centuries, the internet and social media has made amplifying the dangerous stereotyping, bigotry and othering far too prevalent. The ADL tabulated 3,697 antisemitic incidents in the United States, a 36% from 2021, and the highest number on record since the organization began tracking antisemitic incidents in 1979. They write, “Ten antisemitic incidents a day. During the decades ADL has been releasing our annual Audit of Antisemitic Incidents in the United States, we’ve never seen numbers like that. An average of ten times a day adds up to 3,697 incidents in all a 36% increase since the previous audit. It means that on average last year, someone was harassed every few hours. Or a synagogue was vandalized. Or someone faced physical violence fueled by anti-Jewish hate.” Social media has played a role, considered by many to be an instigator and accelerant to the alarming rise of bigotry and hate speech both online and in person.

TikTok is both a problem and solution.

MDPI (Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute) conducted two studies in 2020 and 2021 and wrote a report on its findings highlighting “an alarming presence of extreme antisemitic messages in video clips, songs, comments, texts, pictures, and symbols presented in TikTok’s content. Algorithm make it even more disconcerting since it leads to a spiral of hate: it pushes users who unintentionally view disturbing content to view more. Considering TikTok’s young demographic, these findings are more than alarming; TikTok even fails to apply its own Terms of Service, which do not allow content “deliberately designed to provoke or antagonize people, or are intended to harass, harm, hurt, scare, distress, embarrass or upset people or include threats of physical violence.”

98-year-old Holocaust Survivor Lily Ebert speaks up.

Fortunately, others are using the platform to educate, inform and influence the younger generation on facts, and personal stories of survivors. A few influential TikTokers are taking it upon themselves to educate millions of followers. 98-year-old Lily Ebert a Holocaust survivor, uses TikTok to discusses her experiences in Auschwitz, explaining to her now 1.9 million TikTok followers the horrors she witnessed. Dov Forman, Lily’s great-grandson, started recording her stories and posting them, including one in which she explains the tattoo on her arm that garnered more than 22 million views. TikTok allows survivors to speak directly to those who know little about the Holocaust—or other genocides occurring in the world today. Ebert, who was on one of the last trains carrying Hungarian Jews to Auschwitz in 1944, and Forman, are among a growing group of influencers and regular people using social media to educate others.

The personal stories are popular at a time when the number of living survivors is dwindling and Holocaust educators are trying to figure out how to reach a new generation in a way that is accessible and moving. Ebert and Forman’s top five most popular videos have been viewed by over 50 million people. The two have published a best-selling memoir, Lily’s Promise and appeared on international radio and television, giving interviews to over 180 news outlets in more than 35 countries. And it all began during the COVID pandemic on TikTok when Dov was 16 years old. The reach and impact on social media has given renewed optimism to educators, scholars and historians.

Montana Tucker’s documentary, “How To: Never Forget”

Likewise, Montana Tucker, who has 8.7 million TikTok followers from her dance videos. When she realized how many people are unaware of, or worse deny, the existence of the Holocaust, she created a documentary series of ten 2-3 minute videos entitled “How To: Never Forget.” The granddaughter of two Holocaust survivors, Montana teamed up with Zak Jeffay, an education guide with JRoots that takes students to Jewish sites around the world. Together they visited the places where her grandparents endured, and ultimately survived, the genocide. The series leads up to visiting Auschwitz, where her grandmother Lilly Schmidmayer was taken by train with her mother and aunt. When they arrived, Schmidmayer was separated from her mother, who was killed in a gas chamber. Tucker said. “I have this platform now where I can reach millions of people. I have a big Gen Z, younger following. This is now my responsibility to get out there because who’s going to speak for them in a few years when there are no more Holocaust survivors left?”

Meet Gen Z where they are, on social media.

The producing team of Israel Schachter and Rachel Kastner, with SoulShop Studios, shot over 100 hours of footage for “How To: Never Forget” and spent months editing the material. The granddaughter of three Holocaust survivors, Kastner made a full-length feature documentary “The Barn,” released in 2019, about her grandfather Karl Shapiro’s reunion with Paulina Plostkaj, the woman who saved his life by helping his family find a place to hide. While documentaries are a powerful way to share and preserve survivors’ stories, Kastner said, she believes Holocaust education must meet Gen Z where they are, which is on social media. “If we’re not innovating the way that we’re telling our stories, we’re going to find out that nobody’s listening,” she said.

The Holocaust is fading from memory.

As reported in a New York Times article: Thirty-one percent of Americans, and 41 percent of millennial, believe that two million or fewer Jews were killed in the Holocaust; the actual number is around six million. Forty-one percent of Americans, and 66 percent of millennial, cannot say what Auschwitz was. And 52 percent of Americans wrongly think Hitler came to power through force. Despite the gaps in the respondents’ knowledge, the study found an overwhelming consensus, 93 percent, that all students should learn about the Holocaust at school. Holocaust denial still remains very rare in the United States, with 96 percent of respondents saying they believe the genocide happened. But there is concern that as time goes by, fewer people will study and know about it, making indifference and denial more prevalent.

Preserving first-hand testimonials is crucial.

The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington collects comment cards from visitors before they leave. Said Kristine Donly, who sat on the board that developed the survey. “No educational experience that anyone has coming through here has as much of an impact as hearing from a survivor directly,” And so, across the country and around the world, museums and memorials are asking survivors, witnesses to tell their stories—in audio, video, even holograms—to preserve these personal testimonials for future generations so history will be preserved, remembered, honored. And not repeated.