THE BIG STORY
Yay! We’re Not Nazis!
KONK LIFE STAFF WRITER
There isn’t much good in the legacy of Hitler and the Nazis. In fact, all I can think of is that when I’m feeling bad about what some country, especially our own, is doing wrong, I can always say, “Well, at least it’s not as bad as the Nazis.” So thanks, Adolf, for cheering me up when I’m feeling down.
I am indeed feeling a little down about our nation’s popular response to widespread police brutality and our CIA’s extensive use of torture. I’d guess around 75% of my fellow Americans are in favor of both.
I just watched again, the 1961 movie, Judgment at Nuremberg, about the trial of four German judges. The central speech is by the single judge who admits his crimes and tries to understand and explain what went wrong in Germany under the Nazis.
Basically, the country felt it was in trouble after the punitive Treaty of Versailles, so harsh measures were necessary to get Germany back on track. For “love of country,” people overwhelmingly went along with increasingly violent actions by their government. Even when it got to their doing things they knew in their hearts were terribly wrong.
I feel close to this because my father was born in Germany. Grandpa immigrated when my dad was 3 to work in the Upper Michigan mines that produced the copper shells for the bullets that killed his own relatives. Grandpa got two of his brothers over, but the other four died on the Eastern Front. Before they died, they probably committed atrocities. The remaining family over there does not discuss the war.
The Germans were a cultured people in the 1930s and are so again, as well as extremely peaceful. The way they went wrong is a threat to any people on earth. Like us. We, too, talk of getting our country back on track, of justifying any horror because of 9/11 and the continuing threat of terrorism. Police departments bolstered with war armaments. Shooting to kill. Swarming on guys in the wrong lane or selling single cigarettes. Torturing one guy for 47 days before even beginning to interrogate him. Allowing drones to kill 20 innocents in order to get one “high-value” target.
In Germany, National Socialism and its own harsh measures were overwhelmingly popular, as ours are in America today. But unlike them, we are allowed to protest. Millions of marchers in cities across the nation have filled city streets, well covered by national media. The protests may not change anything, but it is comforting to see so many go on the record for good.
But not so much in Key West. I have struggled to come to terms with the fact that so many of the nice people I mingle with daily support torture and police brutality. At least the “Yay, we’re not Nazis!” is a start. And then I realized I have some violent-inclining opinions that others might find just as troublesome.
I am on record writing that we should pre-emptively bomb Iran’s nuclear weapon facilities. I’ll add to that my agreeing with Louis Petrone about the nation’s going overboard with the vilification and punishment of the black football players’ beating their wives. It is clear a larger percentage of the people and media would punish these black men for causing injuries than would punish the police and CIA for killing and torturing innocents.
So there. I am not on such a high horse of righteousness. I want to employ our Sound of Freedom F-18s to bomb cities and I am defending wife abusers. I live with you, and you live with me. Especially in Key West, where we have chosen to enjoy a magical fantasy land, so are less likely to get any more involved with depressing realities than citizens of the real world. Let’s hug, and relish our fine weather.
Note the following regarding the recent controversy over saying our police “killed” Charles Eimers. It’s from page 11 of the National Association of Medical Examiners’ Guide For Manner of Death Classification: “Deaths due to positional restraint induced by law enforcement personnel or to choke holds or other measures to subdue may be classified as Homicide. In such cases, there may not be intent to kill, but the death results from one or more intentional, volitional, potentially harmful acts directed at the decedent (without consent, of course). Further, there is some value to the homicide classification toward reducing the public perception that a ‘cover-up’ is being perpetrated by the death investigation agency.”
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Than you for pointing out how our moral limbo bar has been set so low as to take comfort in the fact we are not NAZIS….Yet.
Rick, as always, your article is spot-on and insightful. I too, often reference the Third Reich as an analogy to what is happening today or what can happen when we do not learn AND APPLY lessons from history. When we ask ourselves, “How can that happen,” we only need to examine our nature as humans. The good that we can extract from that horrible era in history is to understand the why and how, apply the safeguards, and realize that, without vigilance, frightening history will surely be repeated.
Notwithstanding, generations who have not lived through such horror have neither the vivid memories seared into their minds nor the torturous pain crushing their hearts to be vigilant enough. If we look around us today, we see only indifference and apathy which makes your message of hugs, respect and enjoyment of each other so important.
Though I agree with your statement, “The protests may not change anything, but it is comforting to see so many go on the record for good,” I am frustrated. Why SHOULDN’T things change when citizens protest? I’m am thrilled that folks are paying attention and taking action but why, when citizens speak loudly for change, does the government ignore? Do not the people rule in this country? the uncomfortable truth is that we DO NOT.
History indeed has its lessons but not just for the do-gooders. Evildoers also learn how to better manipulate our fears and spin us for their own benefit. For example, all presidential administrations after Nixon learned from Watergate how to better cover up, limit and control scandal. What did the President know and when did he know it? That became simple for Reagan to dodge. He simply didn’t remember.
Readers, you may not be as jaded or tend to suspect an underlying agenda in controversy, but when you see a termite in your home, you can bet there’s a hidden nest eating away your foundation. Don’t let that happen to America. Be vigilant. be outspoken and be active. That’s what our founding fathers did and that’s what a patriot does.