Not Quite Human, Part II

Many people today, if they are aware of the Holocaust at all, believe that it was purely a program initiated by Adolph Hitler and the Nazi leadership.  Last week, however, we saw that anti-Semitism had a history going back centuries, and although Jews in Germany had been granted equality and citizenship in the late 1800's, the late nineteenth century saw a change in attitudes towards them.  Only a few generations of teaching and preaching hatred against them was enough to turn the public opinion of nearly the entire country from one of acceptance to one of antipathy.

Jew were seen to be "sub-human," and although this would imply inferiority, they were seen as capable of great cunning and wickedness.  Newspapers and magazines began discussing how to solve the "Jewish problem", or "Judenfrage."  There was a widespread notion that the Jews needed to be eliminated from Germany.

By the early twentieth century, many felt they were the biggest threat to Germany.  They were felt to be responsible for the economic suffering of the German people due to financial manipulation.  Germany was in terrible condition following World War I, and it was easy to point to the Jews as the root source of all of the woes the country faced.  The schools and universities were full of anti-Semitism.

The Nazi Party became fully functional in 1920.  It was a nationalist organization, with elements of socialism.  In fact, its name was the "National Socialist German Workers Party" and that is where the name "Nazi" was derived.  They were opposed to capitalism, and felt that the Jews had manipulated the capitalist system to their benefit and the ruin of the country.  Adolph Hitler joined the party shortly after it was formed, and became a powerful public speaker. Both he and the party claimed the superiority of the Aryan blue-eyed, blond race, and emphasized the danger of the Jews to Germany.  Although Hitler was imprisoned for a short time in 1924 following a failed  government takeover, he and the party rose to power during the Great Depression of the 1930's, when economic conditions reached their nadir.  Hitler finally assumed the role of Chancellor in 1933.

The underlying anti-Semitism in Germany was now whipped into a roaring flame during the Nazi regime. The Jew was seen to be a force of evil, and children were taught that Jews were the source of all of the misfortunes in Germany and other countries.  In his landmark book, Hitler's Willing Executioners, Daniel Goldhagen describes the stages Jewish persecution would take, including severe legal restrictions, physical and verbal attacks, the transformation of Jews into "socially dead" beings, and obtaining a country-wide consensus on the need to eliminate the Jew from Germany.

 

Jewish students being humiliated in class.  The writing says, "The Jew is our greatest enemy.  Beware the Jew!" (from Isurvived.org.)

 

Those very things then began to unfold.  Jews were beaten and businesses vandalized.  There was a nationwide boycott of these Jewish businesses in 1933.  The Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service was passed, banning all Jews from holding civil service jobs.  Signs all over Germany were seen at villages, hotels, and restaurants, saying "Jews Not Wanted Here," and the like.  The physical attacks increased, and Jews were publicly mocked.  Men had their beards forcibly cut off.  These were not always the actions of German soldiers or Nazi government officials or Hitler's SS, but the acts of ordinary Germans who were taking their cue from the vitriol expressed by the government and media.  Over and over people were taught of the evil wickedness of the Jew and that their race was not human.  The Nuremberg Laws of 1935 stripped the Jews of their citizenship that had come with Jewish emancipation, and Jews were forbidden to marry Germans.  Finally, in 1938, the horrific Kristallnacht (Crystal Night) took place, and throughout Germany Jews were killed or beaten, their synagogues burnt, and the glass fronts of thousands of Jewish businesses were shattered.  Although organized largely by the army, many German citizens participated and most were accepting of this destruction.

 

"Jews are not wanted here" (from U.S. Holocaust museum)

 

 

Kristallnacht (from the Telegraph.co.uk)

 

All Jews that could manage to leave the country did so.  Their German neighbors treated them as outcasts or "lepers."  Yet, the leadership in Germany continued to preach about the "Jewish problem," and the need to eliminate Jews from the country.  Just how to do so was not readily apparent, although extermination was beginning to be discussed at the highest levels of government. By the beginning of World War II, in 1939, however, the children of German citizens themselves would point to how Germany could rid themselves of the Jewish plague.  These little ones, though "human", would guide the Germans in their elimination of the Jewish "sub-humans", all with the aid of modern medical science. We will look at this program next week, known by a simple letter and a number--"T4."