Saturday, November 13, 2010

"But she's a Jewess!"

I'm taking a European history (1900-1939) course. Recently, we've been focusing on Hitler's rise to power in Germany. I could go into extreme detail, but I won't. I will however, tell you a small story that to me shows that Hitler and his Anti-Semitic views, along with many who supported and were a part of the Nazi party, was nothing more than a desire to hate. It was a load of crap.


Marta Appel was a German Jewish woman living in Germany in the 1930s with her family when Hitler's dictatorship was slowly, but very strongly, influencing the German people. The Nazi party began integrating into education a new curriculum, a curriculum that would teach young German children about the Jewish race. But Jewish children were still required to attend school and would have to sit for hours and listen to the persecution of their people.

Appel's daughter was at school one day when an official from the Race Policy Office came to speak with the students about "high and low races." Below is an excerpt from her memoir:

"I asked the teacher if I could go home," my daughter was saying, but she told me she had orders not to dismiss anyone. You may imagine it was an awful talk. He said that there are two groups of races, a high group and a low one. The high and upper race that was destined to rule the world was the Teutonic, the German race, while one of the lowest races was the Jewish race. "And then, Mommy, he looked around and asked one of the girls to come to him." "First we did not know," my girl continued, "what he intended, and we were very afraid when he picked out Eva. then he began, and he was pointing at Eva, 'Look here, the small head of this girl, her long forehead, her very blue eyes, and blond hair,' and he was lifting one of her long blond braids. 'And look,' he said, 'at her tall and slender figure. These are the unequivocal marks of a pure and unmixed Teutonic race.' Mommy, you should have heard how at this moment all the girls burst into laughter. Even Eva could not help laughing. Then from all sides of the hall there was shouting, 'She is a Jewess!' You should have seen the officer's face! I guess he as lucky that the principal got up so quickly and with a sign to the pupils, stopped the laughing and shouting."

This story warms my heart a little bit, as it shows the Germans couldn't even distinguish themselves what the real difference between them and a Jew was. And yet, more than 6 million were murdered in a span of six years.

1 comment:

  1. Did you know that Hitler went as far as stealing children from East European countries? They couldn't get the German women to have babies fast enough to produce Aryans for their Master Race, so the SS created the Lebensborn (Fount of Life) to increase the number of Aryan children. They did this by kidnapping young blue-eyed, blonde Aryan looking children from the Eastern block countries. Raiding the homes in the middle of the night after they had been selected during the day and removing them from what ever life they had. Once they took them, they would try to brain wash them into thinking they were German and when they succeeded, they would place them in Nazi homes and raise them as their own. Many children fell to this life. Many never again to remember that they were Ukrainian, Polish, Czech and many more. There is a really good book called "Stolen Child" and it is the story of one of these children. This was a totally mad period of history and should never happen again. If we don't continue to talk about it, it will be forgotten and happen again. Please tell your children and make them realize that to hate any one race of people is not right and is wrong. Totally Wrong!.

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