Tough Day
Today we visited two museums: the one at Checkpoint Charlie - mostly about the individuals who fled the east, their escape attempts and extraordinary stories of survival, and the Topographical Museum of Terror - basically the rise of Hitler, the Nazi apparatus, and the terror and persecution waged on those who were not ethnically pure (read: Aryan).
I spent all day trying to understand the level of hatred, the capacity of one human being to hate another for no real reason other than someone told them to. A man rose to power in a government of consent - the Germans let Hitler happen. And almost overnight a diverse young democracy became subverted by a crazed fascist and his chosen minions.
Paralyzing terror will make you go to any lengths to survive or protect your family. Think about what you would do for freedom and a better life. Would you curl up in a speaker box or the trunk of a car for eight or nine hours while a "helper" was trying to get you across the border? Would you throw your child over a wall in a homemade zipline chair - fingers crossed that she wasn't shot on the other side while waiting for you? Would you try to run through a narrow passage, only to be snagged on barbed wire long enough for someone to take aim at you?
Imagine being afraid of looking different, or being sick or handicapped. If you couldn't listen to music not approved by the government (the Nazis equated Jazz to Negro Music, and if you listened to it, you were likely subhuman and on the next train to gasville). God forbid you were gay or in love with someone from Poland or Russia; if you were not the perfect white, blonde-haired, blue-eyed specimen, there was reason to fear and hate you.
Jews, Freemasons, slavs, gypsies...there's a whole list of people the Nazis hated - and wanted everyone else to hate, too. Fast forward, you could easily insert the poor, unions, and blacks and Hispanics in our current language of hate. In many nations today, this same rhetoric floods the body politic. Media is an enemy of the people, the democrats want to hurt you, the immigrants are rapists. It's more than a little frightening.
I guess what today taught me is that there are those in the world who hate at a level I cannot even begin to comprehend, and I will stand up against them in hopes that my country doesn't end up on a plaque in museum someday.
I spent all day trying to understand the level of hatred, the capacity of one human being to hate another for no real reason other than someone told them to. A man rose to power in a government of consent - the Germans let Hitler happen. And almost overnight a diverse young democracy became subverted by a crazed fascist and his chosen minions.
Paralyzing terror will make you go to any lengths to survive or protect your family. Think about what you would do for freedom and a better life. Would you curl up in a speaker box or the trunk of a car for eight or nine hours while a "helper" was trying to get you across the border? Would you throw your child over a wall in a homemade zipline chair - fingers crossed that she wasn't shot on the other side while waiting for you? Would you try to run through a narrow passage, only to be snagged on barbed wire long enough for someone to take aim at you?
Imagine being afraid of looking different, or being sick or handicapped. If you couldn't listen to music not approved by the government (the Nazis equated Jazz to Negro Music, and if you listened to it, you were likely subhuman and on the next train to gasville). God forbid you were gay or in love with someone from Poland or Russia; if you were not the perfect white, blonde-haired, blue-eyed specimen, there was reason to fear and hate you.
Jews, Freemasons, slavs, gypsies...there's a whole list of people the Nazis hated - and wanted everyone else to hate, too. Fast forward, you could easily insert the poor, unions, and blacks and Hispanics in our current language of hate. In many nations today, this same rhetoric floods the body politic. Media is an enemy of the people, the democrats want to hurt you, the immigrants are rapists. It's more than a little frightening.
I guess what today taught me is that there are those in the world who hate at a level I cannot even begin to comprehend, and I will stand up against them in hopes that my country doesn't end up on a plaque in museum someday.
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