Something on my mind
Sep. 28th, 2004 11:46 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dream_labyrinthThere is a big discussion in my home town right now.
The problem is rather difficult to explain, especially as I kind of missed the start of the discussion.
But it is something like this:
There were 117 people killed in a Soviet prison in a town in Saxony, and buried anonymously. An interest group had them buried recently on a cemetery here in town, with a plate stating that they were victims of the Soviets.
And then the trouble started.
Apparently, some of the people killed were Nazis and were involved in crimes committed during Nazi times. And now there are people saying that not only should all 117 people not be honored, but also that the group who wanted the burial did so because they wanted to commemorate the Nazis.
This reminded me of something that was going on a while back. When Schröder was participating in D-Day celebrations. (I don't think that was appropriate behavior, because it still is celebrating Germany's defeat, no matter how necessary the defeat was.)
There was the problem with going to soldiers' cemeteries in France. And one cemetery was said to be impossible to go to and put down a wreath and whatnot, because there weren't only Wehrmacht soldiers buried there, but also members of the SS.
For both things, does it really matter that much? Can the regular young German soldier on a cemetery in France not be commemorated because of the person buried next to him?
And can somebody who died because he did not agree with the Soviets not be commemorated because some Nazi died at the same time?
Also, isn't this a way of making things too easy? black uniform = bad, Nazi = bad.
We are treating officers like Stauffenberg as national heroes (as much as we treat anybody as a national hero at all), and are quietly ignoring the fact that they were working with and for the Nazis for a long time. How else could they have gotten close enought to Hitler to place that bomb?
In history, things are never so easy as good and bad. If you absolutely feel like labelling people, you need to place at least four different labels on each person.
The Nazis and the SS soldiers did have families, too. Are these people supposed to ignore their ancestors forever?
It's hard enough to live with a name everybody connects to a face at a Nuremberg trial, or a picute in a history book, labelled "monster". At least give them the right to remember their ancestors, even if that includes putting down wreaths next to the grave of an SS officer.
The problem is rather difficult to explain, especially as I kind of missed the start of the discussion.
But it is something like this:
There were 117 people killed in a Soviet prison in a town in Saxony, and buried anonymously. An interest group had them buried recently on a cemetery here in town, with a plate stating that they were victims of the Soviets.
And then the trouble started.
Apparently, some of the people killed were Nazis and were involved in crimes committed during Nazi times. And now there are people saying that not only should all 117 people not be honored, but also that the group who wanted the burial did so because they wanted to commemorate the Nazis.
This reminded me of something that was going on a while back. When Schröder was participating in D-Day celebrations. (I don't think that was appropriate behavior, because it still is celebrating Germany's defeat, no matter how necessary the defeat was.)
There was the problem with going to soldiers' cemeteries in France. And one cemetery was said to be impossible to go to and put down a wreath and whatnot, because there weren't only Wehrmacht soldiers buried there, but also members of the SS.
For both things, does it really matter that much? Can the regular young German soldier on a cemetery in France not be commemorated because of the person buried next to him?
And can somebody who died because he did not agree with the Soviets not be commemorated because some Nazi died at the same time?
Also, isn't this a way of making things too easy? black uniform = bad, Nazi = bad.
We are treating officers like Stauffenberg as national heroes (as much as we treat anybody as a national hero at all), and are quietly ignoring the fact that they were working with and for the Nazis for a long time. How else could they have gotten close enought to Hitler to place that bomb?
In history, things are never so easy as good and bad. If you absolutely feel like labelling people, you need to place at least four different labels on each person.
The Nazis and the SS soldiers did have families, too. Are these people supposed to ignore their ancestors forever?
It's hard enough to live with a name everybody connects to a face at a Nuremberg trial, or a picute in a history book, labelled "monster". At least give them the right to remember their ancestors, even if that includes putting down wreaths next to the grave of an SS officer.
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no subject
Date: 2004-09-28 03:47 am (UTC)We are more alike than we are different. We are all born with the same skin. The evil and the good that our fellow humans do has the capasity in all of us. Yes, the Nazis did great great evil, but if you were in chaotic post war Germany in 1923 who is to say what you would have done, or allowed to have been done though inaction. If you kid yourself that you are too angelic to do such a thing you put yourself in danger of repeating the offences today in the name of, say, "Homeland Security".
That truth should both scare you and set you free. Free will is the greatest gift and the heaviest burden. We are all brothers and sisters nonetheless.
no subject
Date: 2004-09-28 04:22 am (UTC)I like to picture myself as a Résistance type fighter when I think of how it would have been to live in Nazi Germany, but the truth is it is far more likely I would have been all nice and quiet and pretend I didn't see what was going on.
Valueing free will and the human rights higher than your own comfort is a lesson we still need to learn, I think.
no subject
Date: 2004-09-28 06:45 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-09-28 06:58 am (UTC)