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Neville Chamberlain had similar thoughts about Germany. Perhaps when dictators start doing things like rounding up undesirables into camps and pushing ideologi

Neville Chamberlain had similar thoughts about Germany. Perhaps when dictators start doing things like rounding up undesirables into camps and pushing ideological uniformity at the point of a gun the reasonable response is to condemn the behavior? It doesn't matter who's wearing the jackboots, it's despicable to appease, condone, or enable the ones stepping on the throats of human beings.

tombh 5y ago
In Zygmunt Bauman's Modernity and the Holocaust[1] it is argued that the Holocaust was not merely a tragic aberration of the ideals of modern Western civilisation but rather a logical realisation of it. Hitler himself, in both Mein Kampf, and Zweites Buch, wrote of how he was inspired by British concentration camps in South Africa. Maybe I haven't studied history enough, but I simply do not understand how dismissing the terrors of WW2 as merely a German problem is not also appeasing, condoning and enabling the terrors of the British. The Holocaust lies at the feet of Europeans, not merely the Nazis. The problem isn't about who did what, the problem is the idea that horrors can only possibly happen outside the borders of the nation to which I belong.
- ganzuul 5y ago
  > The Holocaust lies at the feet of Europeans, not merely the Nazis. Why stop abstraction there? You should continue on with all humans, then all life... that would be logical; this isn't.
  - tombh 5y ago
    I'm British. I was specifically taught the gruesome details of the Holocaust in school. But I only learnt about the horrors of British colonialism much later in life, and through my own efforts. British genocides are conspicuous by their absence from both our education system and our political discourse.
    - ganzuul 5y ago
      I don't think this makes it truly an European issue... In general history as it is taught is almost a total loss for how biased it is, meaning that since we dropped the ball on writing it down we are doomed to repeat it until we do. So far we have only been playing at historical account, because the truth undermines national borders. But this is a global issue.

tombh 5y ago

In Zygmunt Bauman's Modernity and the Holocaust[1] it is argued that the Holocaust was not merely a tragic aberration of the ideals of modern Western civilisation but rather a logical realisation of it. Hitler himself, in both Mein Kampf, and Zweites Buch, wrote of how he was inspired by British concentration camps in South Africa. Maybe I haven't studied history enough, but I simply do not understand how dismissing the terrors of WW2 as merely a German problem is not also appeasing, condoning and enabling the terrors of the British. The Holocaust lies at the feet of Europeans, not merely the Nazis. The problem isn't about who did what, the problem is the idea that horrors can only possibly happen outside the borders of the nation to which I belong.

ganzuul 5y ago
> The Holocaust lies at the feet of Europeans, not merely the Nazis. Why stop abstraction there? You should continue on with all humans, then all life... that would be logical; this isn't.
- tombh 5y ago
  I'm British. I was specifically taught the gruesome details of the Holocaust in school. But I only learnt about the horrors of British colonialism much later in life, and through my own efforts. British genocides are conspicuous by their absence from both our education system and our political discourse.
  - ganzuul 5y ago
    I don't think this makes it truly an European issue... In general history as it is taught is almost a total loss for how biased it is, meaning that since we dropped the ball on writing it down we are doomed to repeat it until we do. So far we have only been playing at historical account, because the truth undermines national borders. But this is a global issue.