Does the right intentionally leave out victims of the Nazis? (textbooks)

[Spacejet]

Last night I was watching a holocaust documentary. It mentioned that gypsies, communists, and GLBT people were also targeted by the Nazis to be sent to the camps.

It got me thinking... I can't remember ONE instance of textbooks in high school mentioning that the Nazis also focused on these groups.

I'm in Texas and just graduated last year. I wonder if the republicans in this state intentionally leave that out because they know their feelings are similar to the Nazis?

[Coastie for Truth]

1. I went to high school in Pennsylvania

... and those groups were all mentioned --- with special emphasis on the physically handicapped, mentally retarded, epileptics, and any Polish "intellectual" (academician, journalist, priest, physician, nurse, military officer, engineer, etc.).

Texas is just "different" - I worked in Corpus Christi, Houston, and Port Arthur -- it's "different."

[shraby]

2. None of the victims of the holocaust

were in our history books or government studies in high school when I was in school in the 1950s. Never heard a word about it until after I graduated and read books from the library.

[Cleita]

8. I went to high school in the fifties too and don't remember

those atrocities being mentioned until I got into college. In the sixties I started meeting victims who had survived that had immigrated here. This was how I learned about it.

[theresistance]

3. Whoa, interesting line of thought

but I'm too scared to say anything else, just an interesting line of thought...

[bloom]

4. It wouldn't surprise me

I've heard about Texans who manage to control textbook info (the right leaning people manage to control Texas textbooks - and being such a big state - it affects what other states get as well).

You can just imagine that the censors wouldn't want sympathy for gays, communists, etc. Look at the Sponge-Bob/tolerance controversy.

[Not_Giving_Up]

5. I'm in Texas, graduated high school in 1991

We had a married couple who had survived Auschwitz come and speak. They had returned years later, and gave a slide show of photos. I do remember that several kids were quite disrespectful, acting bored, making snide comments. They were quickly told to shut up and pay attention.

I have to admit that I didn't pay a whole lot of attention in the history classes taught by football coaches. My American History (coach) teacher refused to discuss Vietnam because he had been there, and didn't want to bring it all back. He assigned the reading in the textbook, but we weren't tested on it.

[ultraist]

12. Bet it wasn't noted in your text books though

Public school text books are propaganda, no doubt. One of the main functions of public schools is to indoctrinate the children.

[mitchum]

6. Just as they leave out the fact that the USSR was the prime mover...

in crushing the Nazi death machine. Stalingrad, not Normandy, was the decisive action in WWII

[bobbieinok]

7. students from Europe at college where I taught were constantly

surprised that US students did not know Nazis targeted homosexuals....of course, they were amazed about US students' unawareness about many things

[LuCifer]

9. I went to school here in FloriDUH and...

...I do not recall ANY mention of them in grade (private) school OR high (public) school! Lucky for me, my parents and sisters were in some ways BETTER TEACHERS! And I'm not knocking teachers, cuz as George Clinton said best: "NO MATTER WHAT YOU DO, TEACHERS WORK HARDER THAN YOU!"

Lu Cifer, let's hear it for HOME SCHOOLING!

[oneold1-4u]

10. Newsreel archives-

Have to exist somewhere, and just memory of the ones that showed the camps, the bodies that were mutilated, the living skeletons that were freed, is the mark of many monsters, of a nation that gave in to decadence of the worst kind! ARE WE THERE YET?

[diamond14]

11. "People with Disabilities" were KILLED first...much like what bush*

is doing....

"People with Disabilities" are the MOST VULNERABLE in any society and therefore, are the easiest to KILL....

hitler did that...first KILLED those with Disabilities, and NOBODY said anything.....so hitler continued....


bush* is already KILLING those with Disabilities....first, by eliminating medical assistance, and helping only the BIG drug companies...second, pushing them out of work, by eliminating Federal hiring goals for People with Disabilities AND failing to enforce the Americans with Disabilities Act....so there are NO MORE JOBS for People with Disabilities....third, bush* continues to force "People with Disabilities" out of Health Insurance Programs....

already in YOUR community, People with Diabetes have NO INSULIN to stay alive...these people are being KILLED right in YOUR community...right now, under bush* pogroms.....



just remember....if YOU are not speaking up for People with Disabilities, now....then, YOU will have nothing to say, when they come to KILL you and your family....

[KharmaTrain]

13. Growing Up Jewish In The 60s...

I knew Holocoust survivors and it was never far from the surface...especially with my parents. Yes, I was taught early on that Gypsies and Communists were included in the camps...Gays weren't mentioned, but I learned that when it began to come to light in the early 70's.

My grandmother came from a town outside Warsaw and emmigrated during the Czarist progroms...just as bad as the Nazis...but some of her family remained. The town pre-WWII had over 20,000 Jews. In 1967 we went to Europe and tried to track down some of the family names; hoping they had escaped, but came up empty. In 1974, my mother went to the town itself...in it only a dozen Jews remained.

I live with my grandmother's first-hand stories, plus my travels to Dachau and Vad Ha Shem (the Holocoust memorial in Jerusalem), but I still can't phathom the madness.

PBS is running an excellent series on Aschvitz...

[ultraist]

14. Yes, but we did not learn about the Holocaust in public school in 60-70s

I learned about it from my parents but mostly from a Jewish friend and her mother.

We had a Holocaust survivor neighbor who was unable to shower indoors. Her husband built her an outdoor shower with no ceiling. She was very traumatized.

Very interesting post, btw.