Jeff Breidenbach wrote in <CAHjiUbqj5Asx1rE+4MO_a_0wO0i8cWoBz8iuoS+CRxHHQJn=z...@mail.gmail.com>: |As I've mentioned in the past, Mail Archive is alive and well in most |respects. The one exceptions is customer support, for which I am
That is adorable. |The service is hosted in the United States, and you might have heard |about an upcoming election in this country. There is a chance that |this may include confusion, chaos, and especially disinformation. If |such things reach our tiny corner of the internet, please tell me so I |can take whatever action is necessary. | |I want to say something else about this election. Back when dinosaurs |roamed the earth and I was a teenager, I was full of questions. One |thing that confused me was the idea of hate crimes. If someone does |something bad, the penalty is usually more severe if it is part of a |hate crime. Why? If it was murder, the victim is equally dead either |way. How could this possibly be fair? | |Eventually, I decided that people are naturally susceptible to us |vs. them thinking. I am Jewish, with a German last name. So for me, I |think back to World War II. What we now call hate crimes was once |mainstream thinking. I think we made these laws to be extra |vigilant against falling back into that trap. Dear Jeff Breidenbach, beside your personal matter, that of your family, and the very much understandable and supportable thinking and feeling of your own. And letting aside the history of the United States a bit. Maybe. I think it is a structural misunderstanding, intellectual, but surely emphatical failure to compare the world leading (some say suppressing) super force U.S.A. with the Germany of the 30s, may Americas public discourse have ridden this comparison (sic) or not. Doing so surely is cold cruelty, is abuse, is murdering and torturing millions of people a second time. You should not say things like "What we now call hate crimes was once mainstream thinking". For one hate has always been, and always will be, unless all human beings of the world listen to the philosophical outcome and truth of our forefathers and mothers that lived many thousand years ago. Or like the Dalai Lama said in the interview of his 50th anniversary in India, "it is all there". It is all there, for thousands of years. I am happy that you think that modern U.S.A. has the solution to finally make it happen, i personally am not convinced. As your family seems to originate in Germany, you should remember or learn that Germany was a rising middle force by the end of the 19th century, with a population that almost doubled over thirty years, with leading (in the sense of being in the front line of the forwarders, of going forward) human beings, in science, in culture, architecture, but also philosophy etc. Like Lebensreform. The age was so as such, it was called Belle Epoche. White humanity started truly penetrating chemistry, biology, and healing for terrible illnesses slowly came in sight. If you realize that 30 percent of all Germans at that time seem to have died from Tuberculosis -- just imagine how coughful that time must have been --, .. unbelievable. Much could be said indeed, English Wikipedia for example is very much focused on the "German Naval Race" against the Britons. (Of course lots of the world did so, Argentina, Brasil, also U.S.A. i think. Due to the tremendous technological improvements what was top today was too old tomorrow.) I never read there that many ships were build for the Ostsee, nor that the target was to have about 60 percent of the Naval of the Britons, nor that Germany build wonderful civil ships which' fame lasted for hundred years and more, like the beautiful Flying P-Liners, and "dream boats" for crossing the Atlantic, setting new speed and interior marks. The beauty. The refinement. The culture. The optimism. Much could be said on Germany by that time, also negative things of course, but mind you that dark brains always exist, and the question is how to handle them. Our Emperor, and our Princess, the most beautiful in the World (;-), they spend money on poor Children. And that is also true literally. Anyhow, the sharpness increased everywhere, and contracts were made, in the end made family members fight each other until death. You know many Royal Families around Europe were tightly related. Especially England, Germany and Russia. But the storm of life blew heavy, and there was nothing anyone could do against it. It happened. So here we are at the begin of World War I., where all of Germany stood together almost for the first time, in history. You could count the war against France, started by France, in 1870/1. You know how terrible the French raped and plundered through Germany a few decades before that. I do not say that German's are Angels, mind you. But after Bismarck was removed by our still young Emperor, wasn't it only social improvement, science, discovery, and culture? Colonies you might say, and you are right; much of what happened was done by local tribes however, and in Namibia the native tribes started by slicing people, and i do not know what could be done by that time with the transport and communication and the few number of military if your own people get sliced .. but running away or answering equally bestial? Really?? Nonetheless once Trotha returned he was not seen by our Emperor, was he. What can be done about this? It was mass murder, that much is plain. So the small and isolated Germany stood against France, England, Russia, all at the same time. Our Emperor practically knew in the speech from the 6th of August 1914. The military leader crashed one month later with "the war is lost!" once the only chance there possibly would have been to win it / end it quick etc could not be taken. The war continued for over four more years. They gave it all, "all the Germans", including the Jewish. Years were rules were broken as everybody knew, still U.S.A. entered war on the side of England, the same England that misused the U.S. flag when attacking German submarines, on the side of those which used a devilish propaganda against Germany right from the start. Much is to say. Germany was starved to death over years, many attempts to end the war until at least 1916 were not granted, maybe the speech asking for the stop was to offensive, i do not want to defend too many high ranked Germans here, but i would give all for many of them, too! By the end of the war Germany alone was considered guilty by the many winners, and starvation continued for some time. It was furtherly plundered and suppressed, it was occupied for way over a decade. With all side effects it can have if armed occupiers are present. Some may say that in Elsass before 1918 Germany was an armed occupier, but then again it created lots of architecturally outstanding infrastructure that is still in use today, and also not few people there are German friendly aka have German roots. How good that the winners were so much smarter after WWII with Japan. They totally failed in the German case. Could Hitler and the small-minded have succeeded if that would not have been the case? I do not know. But if you say |vs. them thinking. I am Jewish, with a German last name. So for me, I |think back to World War II. What we now call hate crimes was once |mainstream thinking. I think we made these laws to be extra then this feels very bitter. How can you compare the inner problems of the U.S. society after more than hundred years of being the absolute and sole world leader, some say suppressor, with people of a beaten country who want to rise above living under the shoe sole of for example France? After being such a fine -- why not say golden? -- country, and giving all including millions of lives in WWI, the starvation, the hunger, and then a decade of being so crushed? That is sheer arrogance and brutality. Jews unfortunately had to face pogroms over centuries. Of course this is all wrong, if one reads "Jew" as an allegory, like most of the Bible surely is an allegory, then how small minded do you have to be to actually search and destroy people with the Jewish religion? But there are a lot of small minded people, and always have been. The catholic church maybe was also not helpful with their prohibitions against what Jews may do, people do not forget. Of course, the hangman of the Vatican was also not allowed to leave the Vatican state, and may he as well as all the heavily circumcised Jews of the Middle Age have found the real Israel, which is of course not the state we now see in the middle east, but also an Allegory. No? Of course many of the Nazis were the Scum of the German people, but how could they rise. Comparing this to the U.S.A. felt terrible. Much more could be said, unfortunately my English is restricted, especially my vocabulary, and of course i wear German glasses, mind you, but so many brave especially purely hearted people there were and are. I just could not leave that standing. I wholeheartly admit i am very happy that this year did not see War on Iran, i think bashing Russia and China, and making war on them and Cuba and Northern Korea, and much much more, is more than just enough. I wish you a nice Sunday from Germany. P.S.: as i see things, many, many Germans knew war and death would be coming, and another total crash. They preferred this over their status quo. So deep they must have felt that unbelievable unworthy destruction after WWI. The older i get the more i understand if memorial stones are changed to mention WWI _and_ WWII names, something i totally -- totally! -- declined when i was younger. --steffen | |Der Kragenbaer, The moon bear, |der holt sich munter he cheerfully and one by one |einen nach dem anderen runter wa.ks himself off |(By Robert Gernhardt) _______________________________________________ Gossip mailing list https://www.mail-archive.com/gossip@mail-archive.com https://www.mail-archive.com/cgi-bin/mailman/options/gossip
