In the spring of my junior year of high school, I began searching for a monologue to use for college auditions. Somehow I came across the play "The White Rose", which chronicles the arrest, interrogation and ultimate execution of a group of University of Munich students who distributed leaflets protesting the Nazi regime at the height of World War II. They called themselves The White Rose. I might add that none of the students were Jewish. I lived with that piece for the entirety of my senior year. My friends could tell you that this piece meant a lot to me. I felt such deep appreciation and connection to Sophie Scholl, who at 21 years old felt so strongly that what was happening was wrong, and died advocating for the basic human rights of others.
Today, I am proud to say that my school has a White Rose Society of our own that educates others about human rights issues affecting our world today. Today, 10,000 roses were passed out around campus to represent the number of people killed in a single day at Auschwitz.
The White Rose Society's message could not be more timely. Along with the roses we passed out is a message drawing parallels between what happened in WWII and what is happening in our world right now in 2016. I am attaching a picture of it below. We say "Never Again", but do our actions reflect our words?
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