(no subject)

[butterfly]

When I was younger, I spent nearly an entire year obsessed with the Shoah (commonly called the Holocaust). I read book after book about it, trying to figure out how a people could get so caught up in themselves as to cause such a horror and tragedy to come to pass. Because my interest in the situation was inspired by Anne Frank, I did focus on the Jewish part, which is almost certainly where I got my intense respect for Judaism in general and for Israel specifically. Even when I was a full-bore Christian, I believed that Judaism was still a path to heaven, that God would not forsake one promise in exchange for another.

Horrors of that sort happen so often. They happen whenever a people become convinced that they deserve to be treated better, that they are better. The German people were in a bad place -- they'd been smacked down by the first World War and believed that they deserved better. Hitler spoke directly to those beliefs, telling them that they were better, they were the best. Better than those Jews, those cripples, those queers, all those 'different' people who were tainting their society and their blood. He played on their fears and on their insecurity.

I was horrified and I kept reading, because I just couldn't understand. That level of hate, of the need to prove better, I outgrew that when I outgrew fighting with my brother. It's a childish way to live. It's horrifying to me to think that some people never get past that. The idea that I can be hated just because I'm different, just because I don't fit inside the nice, neat boxes that the so-called 'moral majority' would want me in, is something so outside what I believe that it's impossible for me to ever fully grasp it.

One of the tenets of hate in the religion that Bush aligns with is the "hate the sin, not the sinner". In a sense, I can understand this -- I hate the destruction that Bush has caused, I hate what he's doing to this country. I don't hate him. I don't particularly like him, but even in my darkest moments, I didn't hate him. Hate is such a violent and destruction emotion, so incredibly hard to control. It has such an enormous potential to do permanent damage, not just to body, but to soul. Hate isn't something that I can hang onto for more than a few moments, because hate never helps.

Hate can't build, it can only tear down. That's what this administration is proving. It's been true in the past, it will continue true in the future.

We're at a turning point. This is either another dark moment in history or the steps toward the end of the United States at the top of the heap. Possibly both. We've lost the respect of the rest of the nations. We're no longer a shining star, but instead a dark cloud on the horizon.

After World War II, Germany eventually rebuilt. Eventually, they healed, when the walls came down. Only time will tell with the United States.

We'll know in another fifty years or so whether or not this was the beginning of the end.

Comments

[suaine.livejournal.com]

It's a moment of transition (forgive my B5 geekiness). It's the end of something and the beginning of something bigger. Fourteen years ago the people in my country made change happen. We *did* it (though credit has to go to the Russians, who could have turned this into a battlefield and didn't).

But the scars are still there. It takes far longer than two generations to pay off the debt and we're still working things out. I'm hoping America sees the light much sooner.

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

Germany is a wonderful example of how something horrible like this doesn't have to be the end, that a country can recover, can... redeem itself from its mistakes, I suppose. It's a symbol of hope to me right now.

And maybe the scars are there because they need to be, because the scars are what the German people just how easy it can be to slip into the superior mindset. To put it frankly, you guys learned the lesson the hard way. We haven't, yet.

I really do hope that the United States sees the light relatively soon. I don't expect the next few years to be as comfortable as the last few, because I plan on being much more outspoken about my beliefs.

[fraulein.livejournal.com]

I like your post - because I too spent a lot of years studying the holocaust - appalled and fascinated by the country that could do this to over 6 million people. What sort of society could allow something like that to happen was one of the essay questions I had to answer in my senior seminar in college. I think you've hit excellent points in comparing our current situation and Germany 60 years ago.

The one thing that really bothers me though? Germany had a shinny, positive, happy America there to help her get back on her feet, provide an example for and to generally be it's nurse maid until it could stand on it's own - after we all but destroyed the country. I don't see any country in the world in that sort of position to help us - and that's scary. When we fall - and I'm sure we will, it will be a long, hard fall, with most feeling we got what we deserved. The helping hands will not be that evident. Our situation in some ways is heading more toward the time after WWI when the Germans felt they were never going to be done being punished by the other countries for the war they lead. Look what happened there? Hence, the concern.

[suaine.livejournal.com]

To put it frankly, you guys learned the lesson the hard way.

Don't I wish that was the truth. Recent election results, however, make me shiver. We now have more voters than ever who decide for either a socialist party or the right-wing nutjobs. This is scary, even though I personally would want the socialists in the government (in moderation with a liberal party that understands the economic needs of a free market)

*sighs* Nothing's ever perfect, but that's no reason for us to give up, right?

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

Sadly, no. We have constantly fight. It's exhausting, but so much more worth it than the results that show up when we've given up. And for that, I would point directly back at the US, where the Dems didn't realize in time in 2000 how powerful the Repub machine was.

It's a constant struggle, I think. Otherwise, people become complacent and don't rock the boat. So once the wrong person gets in charge of the boat, they go along.

Maybe the struggle is what makes us the questioning ones who search for a better way.

[butterfly.livejournal.com]

Thanks.

Yeah, America is going to end up with egg on its face in a major way and the other nations may not resist saying, "Told you so."

Then again, maybe that's what this country needs. To be humbled a bit.