Sunday, February 24, 2008

Random Thoughts From A Shikseh

A shikseh, a Yiddish word, is defined as a non-Jewish girl or woman.
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Having grown up in a predominately Jewish community that was filled with first- or second-generation Holocaust survivors, their histories and experiences were widely shared, as well as taught in schools.
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Into the course of adulthood, I have read many accounts of the period of time to gain further understanding of the economic conditions that led to the rise of Nazism and the wartime reparations.
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The manipulation of the populace was masterful in creating a fearful people after the Burning of the Reichstag by an arsonist who later confessed that Hitler had paid him.
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Might one label it a terrorist act?
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And the successful propaganda campaign convincing of the evil of THOSE OTHERS.
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And the successful blaming of others to distract from failed internal policies.
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One must divorce oneself from humanity to read accounts of the medical experiments conducted by Dr. Josef Mengele and others.
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Reading accounts about the machinations of extermination with ever increasing efficiency, one must not allow recognition of humanity to intrude.
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During the rampage through Europe, extermination included Catholic Priests, Gays, Mentally Retarded, Physically Handicapped, Jehovah's Witnesses, the Romani, and many other groups targeted.
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wikipedia offers:
Medical experiments
A cold water immersion experiment at Dachau concentration camp presided over by Professor Holzlohner (left) and Dr. Rascher (right).
Romani children in Auschwitz, victims of medical experiments.
Further information: Nazi human experimentation
Another distinctive feature was the extensive use of human subjects in medical experiments. German physicians carried out such experiments at Auschwitz, Dachau, Buchenwald, Ravensbrück, Sachsenhausen and Natzweiler concentration camps.[19]
The most notorious of these physicians was Dr. Josef Mengele, who worked in Auschwitz. His experiments included placing subjects in pressure chambers, testing drugs on them, freezing them, attempting to change eye color by injecting chemicals into children's eyes, and various amputations and other brutal surgeries.[20] The full extent of his work will never be known because the truckload of records he sent to Dr. Otmar von Verschuer at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute were destroyed by von Verschuer.[21] Subjects who survived Mengele's experiments were almost always killed and dissected after the experiments.
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Victims
Killed
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Soviet POWs
2–3 million
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Politicals
1–1.5 million
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Serbs
600,000
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Poles
200,000+
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Roma
220,000–500,000
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Freemasons
80,000–200,000
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Disabled
200,000–250,000
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Spanish POWs
7,000–16,000
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Jehovah'sWitnesses
2,500–5,000
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South of Poland, between 500,000 and 1.2 million
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Wikipedia offers the following list of Jews exterminated by country:
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Country or territory
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Poland
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3,000,000
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Baltic countries
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228,000
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Germany & Austria
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210,000
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Bohemia & Moravia
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80,000
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54,000
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The Netherlands
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105,000
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Hungary
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450,000
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Byelorussian SSR
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245,000
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Ukrainian SSR
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900,000
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Belgium
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40,000
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Yugoslavia
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26,000
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Romania
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300,000
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Norway
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900
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France
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90,000
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Bulgaria
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14,000
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Italy
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107,000
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Total
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5,933,900
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In my life, I have spoken with Holocaust Survivors, as well as survivors of Japanese Concentration Camps, the Japanese Death March, those who fled Pol Pot, Kosovo, and South American dictators.
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For some insight into Japanese conduct, check Wikipedia .
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That being said, I was speechless, a truly rare event, when I discovered Mr. Bond's comments, as follows (emphasis mine, misspellings his):
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What concerns me, and makes me comment in the way I do, is that the theory that is being presented--unwittingly by most--is the nation within a nation theory. This is a theory that was used by Hitler to irradicate [sic] millions of jews in Europe, including many of my ancestors. So when you start talking about how dangerous it is to have a sovereign nation in the midst of the Town, because they will be self serving and mistreat anyone who is not a part of their group, you begin to highlight for me a theory which has little merit--since they have already received sovereign status and that is not the fight in front of us.
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In response to the issue of Sovereign Immunity, Mr. Bond chose to suggest RACISM, yet again.

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Failing that, Mr. Bond instead raised the Holocaust as a sympathy issue.

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History is replete with despicable acts. In context, they are man being savage, but fail to mandate reparations.

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Europeans settlers may have committed offenses against long gone native peoples, but I fail to find medical experiments, labor camps, planned extermination or gas chambers that rise to the level of the Holocaust.

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Mr. Bond:

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This is about wealthy casino investors and not about the Holocaust.

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You have lowered the tone of the discussion to the gutter and you need

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to do better.

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The following are previous posts about racism: Middleboro Recall

2 comments:

  1. Excellent post.
    I may put dog heads on selectmen, or morph Tribal chiefs into Werewolves, but at least the issue at heart is always a casino.

    I grew up in Middleboro, not a particularly diverse place. But stories of the Holocaust were everywhere. I read many books on the subject until I realized I couldn't bear to look upon another word of this horror.

    And I remember thinking, as ayoung girl, that certianly there would never be another event like the Holocaust. That certainly, we as human beings have finally learned from History.

    But then, came Cambodia and Rhodesia and Iraq's chemical attacks on innocent men, women and children. Genocide.

    I can't imagine an analogy between those and the issue we are facing today in Middleboro.

    For anyone who has not already done so, there is a Holocaust memorial in Boston, right near Fanueil Hall and across from the Statehouse. To walk among the glass towers and wafting smoke, to see the numbers etched on the glass, is to gain a more meaningful perspective of the numbers presented in this blog post.

    Gladys

    ReplyDelete
  2. To use a reference to the Holocaust
    to advance an argument regarding the
    casino debate is insensitive at best,
    morally bankrupt at worst. It diminishes
    the persecution, suffering, and mass
    genocide of millions instigated by an evil
    madman. Hitler's 'final solution' for all
    those who didn't fit his Aryan model
    represents the ultimate in man's inhumanity
    to man. And it pains me deeply to see
    its effects diminished by an off-hand
    personal remark attempting to imply local
    racism.

    The atrocities and genocide of the Third
    Reich must never be forgotten. Nor should
    the memories of those who were castrated by fear
    then killed be abused. We must remember what
    happened to honor the memory of those who were
    sacriced and to insure it never happens again.

    Steven Spielberg documented in film the horrific
    stories of Holocaust survivors as part of his
    Shoah Project. Their stories are brutal and
    unnerving, but their voices must be heard.Also,
    anyone visiting the Holocaust Museum in Washington
    should request access to the archives to see the
    volumes of evidence forever indicting the Third
    Reich for its war crimes.

    Perhaps the most traumatizing experience at the
    Holocaust Museum is the small booth displaying
    photographs of corpses of mentally retarded
    children disfigured by Dr. Mengele.

    I can not sit silently and read a comparison
    of the Nazi Culture of Death with implied
    racism toward area citizens who disagree with
    a Casino. There is no comparison.

    ReplyDelete