I've spent over 50 years trying to understand something that is never going to be comprehensible. Of course, there are more modern and less hideous examples of the Holocaust, such as the episodes of ethnic cleansing we've witnessed in places like Rwanda and Bosnia. So to that extent, we do intellectually understand the capacity for evil and atrocities mankind is capable of.
But its the question of conscience that I've never been able to resolve in my mind. How could an advanced Western nation allow their country to be hijacked by a government that would not only execute crimes against humanity but had no sense of remorse in doing so? How in the hell could a freakish character like Hitler able to pull off injecting so many with the toxins of hate?
Looking back over 75 years, it's still inconceivable that a highly educated citizenry believed he was brilliant to be "Der Fuhrer?" How could they accept that he was always right? How could they read drivel like Mein Kampf like it was a Scripture, much less defend the lunacy, and align with it? Those in the Third Reich ended up murdering living, breathing, innocent humans by the millions. It was gradual at the outset but it accelerated rapidly once Hitler was appointed Chancellor in 1932.
Looking back over 75 years, it's still inconceivable that a highly educated citizenry believed he was brilliant to be "Der Fuhrer?" How could they accept that he was always right? How could they read drivel like Mein Kampf like it was a Scripture, much less defend the lunacy, and align with it? Those in the Third Reich ended up murdering living, breathing, innocent humans by the millions. It was gradual at the outset but it accelerated rapidly once Hitler was appointed Chancellor in 1932.
It began with words, where a false narrative repeated often enough shifted objective beliefs, then distorted observable realities. The propaganda then shifted to creating a phantom enemy to blame for usually fictional crises like the Reichstag Fire. It was fed by grievances beginning with the myth that Germany had lost World War One because it was "knifed in the back" by some grand conspiracy led by Jewish people. By the 1930s that alleged "cabal" was said to be getting ahead by leeching off of hard-working every day "Good Germans."
By creating a straw man to blame for everything, the door was opened to the dehumanization of the targets. That stage made it easier for the next progression, which is the commitment to destroy "the others" by any means necessary. That made for this fatal dichotomy, evil under the guise of patriotism, and the preservation of righteousness masquerading as a great crusade to rid their lives of evil, by epitomizing the same.
Then (as always) came the creation of a heroic larger than life leader and the selling of the savior. The mythology of the indispensable leader, the one person who will fearlessly do what others couldn’t and wouldn’t dare do, leads into a personality cult. The utter audacity of the messaging, the consistency of the propaganda, caused millions of people to forsake critical thinking and quiet even their own divergent thought.
Then (as always) came the creation of a heroic larger than life leader and the selling of the savior. The mythology of the indispensable leader, the one person who will fearlessly do what others couldn’t and wouldn’t dare do, leads into a personality cult. The utter audacity of the messaging, the consistency of the propaganda, caused millions of people to forsake critical thinking and quiet even their own divergent thought.
The built-in confirmation bias of a state-controlled press, ultimately caused a rush to join the leaders obviously winning team, increasingly populated by those who were dying to breathe in the referred power. Ultimately it caused everyday citizens to assent to despicable things they wouldn’t have ever thought about on their own. Eventually, the sheer numbers of those echoing the party line led to the assumption that everybody else could not possibly be wrong.
Sometimes with the Holocaust so rightfully fixed in our minds, we forget the level of domestic terror that went down in Germany. Gay people, neighborhood oddballs, those with intellectual challenges, even gypsies were targeted. There were crazy and cruel medical experiments in eugenics, and into the effects of varied weapons on the human body. The society was in the throes of terror down to the granular level, with the state's system of block wardens where the "Good Germans" were encouraged to drop a dime on friends, family, and whoever might have pissed somebody off.
The Holocaust was hideous beyond all telling. But what is the most awful aspect, is that it should have been stopped. Hitler was certainly the great catalyst, but there had to have been a widespread predisposition to a hatred that Hitler was allowed to validate. This era seems increasingly aspect as those who lived through that time pass away.
From our modern viewpoints, it seems impossible to believe that such a level of mass delusion could ever happen.. It doesn't make sense until you remember successor events and regimes, that have embarked upon ethnic cleansing in places like Bosnia and Rwanda and against the Kurds in Iraq. It is cancer that has never truly receded, and over 80 years later we have seen it happen again and again, but in places under the radar screen of mass consciousness in much of the developed world.
From our modern viewpoints, it seems impossible to believe that such a level of mass delusion could ever happen.. It doesn't make sense until you remember successor events and regimes, that have embarked upon ethnic cleansing in places like Bosnia and Rwanda and against the Kurds in Iraq. It is cancer that has never truly receded, and over 80 years later we have seen it happen again and again, but in places under the radar screen of mass consciousness in much of the developed world.
Now it just may be happening before our eyes. We certainly went through some troubles in the 1960s. In 2020 we see people occupying the highest offices in the land pouring kerosene on the conflagration. The wedge issues of race and class are used to split us apart for political gain as never before, contributed to by some great degree by our nation's foreign adversaries. Though the presence of protests in the streets points to the fact that the American Experiment is not going to go down without a fight, what a horrible thing to see in the "land that we love." Still, I cannot understand why so many can blow off the blatant racism, be willfully ignorant of what we are seeing, in support of Four More Years of the turmoil's driving force.
Of course, we cannot just sit by and just let it happen. Joe Biden is an imperfect vessel for us to pour our hopes into this ticket (if elected) to markedly improve things. But the alternative is a binary choice that is the ball game if you care about civil liberties, racial justice, and domestic tranquility. To those who believe we are not looking at the rise of a potential dictatorship with a Donald Trump unfettered by worries about retention, with something in hand that resembles a mandate (plausibly secured by voter suppression and mail snafus), think again.
No matter how much Americans may seek to deny certain undeniable truths, try to spin it around to fit a narrative that the danger is not as bad as it is, even present a reality with pretzel twisted logic in lieu of facts, there are too many parallels to the 1930s in front of us to ignore. The future is going to written about this time and the history we leave behind the next few weeks. The question for each of us to answer for ourselves is simple, which side will we choose? Either way these days will be remembered. To those tempted to drink from the chalice once more, can you unconditionally say you are not abetting the rise of authoritarian rule if Trump succeeds? Can you look us in the eye without doubt and say that you are not facilitating the rise of a dictator?
MANY BLESSINGS- NOEL
