Violence and murder became prominent in European imperialism in Africa and left the supposedly lower races destined for extinction, which would be brought about by any means, including intentional extermination of entire populations like with the Holocaust. Attempts to dehumanize the Jewish people and Africans were also very similar in structure with both authorities using a three-pronged approach. They first stripped the Africans or Jews of their identity, then physically tortured them, and lastly, redefined their humanity such that it became unrecognizable to even the Jews or Africans themselves. Many of the very factors that make us human include aspects of our personal identity, which shape our values, morals, and humanitarian duty, but upon hours of arriving at Auschwitz, the prisoners were completely robbed of all the factors that made them unique and reduced to a less than human state. They were reduced to ignoble slavery, without hair, without honor, without names, beaten every day, more abject every day. Levi reiterates that his appearance was reflected in that of thousands of others who had all been molded into miserable and permanently scarred puppets. This lack of personality and a sense of emptiness within themselves rendered to be extremely mentally draining for not only the prisoners, but also the Africans in Conrads Heart of Darkness, which describes the Africans as dying slowly it was very clear &. they were nothing earthly now — nothing but black
shadows of disease and starvation, lying confusedly in the greenish gloom. The subjected individuals were also severely deprived of food, sleep, space, and medical attention that made them lose all sense of even their basic needs for survival, with Levi mentioning an example of a young man who has not even the rudimentary astuteness of a draught-horse, which stops pulling a little before it reaches exhaustion. The young mans inability to recognize even the fact that he needs rest, shows that the Nazis have completely robbed him of his basic human instincts, reducing him merely to a labor beast. Conrad also shares how the first slaves Marlow (his storys protagonist) encountered were with that complete, deathlike indifference of unhappy savages. Discontentment was a common theme among the prisoners and Africans in Levi and Conrads stories, but the final blow came with the social isolation and internal desolation the Jews and Africans had to face. In both the Heart of Darkness and Survival in Auschwitz, it was shown that recognizing the claims and needs of other humans not only keeps us connected to them, but it also lets us remain in touch with our own humanity. However, in the camps and Africa, most individuals held no such civic ties, and therefore were reduced to become beasts with no sense of compassion for those around them. Without being able to forge connections with other human beings, these individuals were deeply isolated and paved their own way to hollowness.