I have just finished watching a series of programmes on BBC Television about the Nuremberg Trials of 1945/46. Starting after the end of World War Two, twenty-one surviving members of the National Socialist government of Germany, which had ruled the country between 1933 and 1945, were put on trial for crimes of war, crimes against peace and crimes against humanity.
As is well documented, the Nazis, led by Adolf Hitler, adopted a paranoid ideology, which blamed the Jews for all the woes of Germany. It stipulated that only the so-called Aryan race was superior, and that any inferior races should be rooted out, lest they contaminate the super-race. The final solution was the gas chamber, in which 6 million people were murdered, for being Jewis, or not fulfilling the crazy requirements of the Nazi ideology.
A number of leaders of Nazi Germany committed suicide at the defeat of their state in May 1945. The 21 survivors were put on trial, a trial that lasted for 284 days. Ten were sentenced and put to death. Eleven were imprisoned, up to a life sentence.
It was a stark reminder of the evils of racism and discrimination (either way), and that we should never forget. Not the 6 million Jews and hundreds of thousands of others; nor the tens of millions of Russians who lost their lives.
I fight intolerance where I can
Terrible is not it? I think racism is still strongly among us every where. Not only the jews were exterminated but also the disabled, the mental defected. It has not stopped with Hitler although the gas chambers, thanks God, did. I see prejudice and discrimation everyday in more subtle way, much more like a drop of water fall little by little from a tap, something we hardly see or notice but the one affected does, and it is loud for them. I wonder what you were doing in that period of time and where you were?
ReplyDeleteValerie
Valerie,
ReplyDeleteI am of the post-war generation
So much evil in the world still today. Will people ever learn to live in peace with each other? I walked along that railway track in the photo above, it's a horrible place which still smells of death. Jeannette xx
ReplyDeleteSort of a chilling photo when you know where it was taken, almost as though the place was haunted, which it probably is. I used to read all the books and experiences I could find on the subject, the most recent being Elie Wiesal's (sp) account of being in a camp at 15 along with his father, and trying to help keep him alive. Oh so sad. Gerry
ReplyDeletePhoto is haunting...
ReplyDeleteI watched the show "paper clips" recently...paperclips.com
Interesting movie...Holocaust survivors sent the school a paperclip to represent someone they knew that died...a small hick town took this on...What stood out in my mind was this one holocaust survivor who spoke...he said something that had never occured to me...He told the kids that this is the last generation that will be able to talk to a Holocaust survivor..the oral history will be gone..and we will have the books....That made me think, considering how many wackos dear to say it never happened... Most of them are very old now...a part of you wants someone always around who went through it...how many will trust the history books in 100 years...
~Raven
http://journals.aol.com/rebuketheworld/RebukeTheWorld/
oops.........TYPO
ReplyDeleteThat made me think, considering how many wackos DARE to say it never happened...