What are some good questions to ask a holocaust survivor?

Question

im goin to LA's holocaust museum for a class trip tomorrow. we have been invited to ask questions but i dont want to insult them or bring up any bad or... awkward memories.

Answer 1

I would ask them non specific open questions- that way they have the chance to tell their story and can focus on the bits that they are comfortable talking about.

Questions like "What was your experience like?"

"How did you end up where you are today?"

Answer 2

What was life like before the n***s put their policies into effect?  

Did you have many non-Jewish friends and colleagues?  

Did you feel any sort of anti-Jewish sentiment leading up to the war?

When did you first start to feel scared about the n**i policies?

What was life like in the days, weeks and months after you were liberated?  Where did you go?  Did you stay in Germany?

Answer 3

Let them know that you can only imagine what their experience was like to live through and would like very much to learn as much as you can about that so you can be more able to try and understand their memories of such a horrid event.

Answer 4

Ask his opinion on holocaust denial.

Answer 5

Ask them about the Human Condition. Why some people act in abhorent ways, how a dehumanizing environment can turn ordinary people into machines.

Ask if it were possible that had history been different, and they were rounding up n**i's, etc.. if it would be possible for them to be the oppressors.

Answer 6

ask him/her for an opinion on the bombing of Dresden.

Tired of the notion that jews have a monopoly on WWII suffering.

Answer 7

" Are we approaching another holocaust today with our increasing reduction of freedoms, secret prisons, domestic spying and the dumbing down of our societies ?"

Answer 8

Ask why the Jews didn't make more of a stand as their rights and property were taken from them.  They lived in a democracy, it is a person's duty to make themself heard.  They should have fought back.