But Then It Was Too Late

[sintax]

But Then It Was Too Late

"What no one seemed to notice," said a colleague of mine, a philologist, "was the ever widening gap, after1933,between the government and the people. Just think how very wide this gap was to begin with, here in Germany. And it became always wider. You know it doesn't make people close to their government to be told that this is a people's government, a true democracy, or to be enrolled in civilian defense, or even to vote.  All this has little, really nothing to do with knowing one is governing.

What happened here was the gradual habituation of the people, little by little, to being governed by surprise; to receiving decisions deliberated in secret; to believing that the situation was so complicated that the government had to act on information which the people could not understand, or so dangerous that, even if he people could understand it, it could not be released because of national security.  And their sense of identification with Hitler, their trust in him, made it easier to widen this gap and reassured those who would otherwise have worried about it.

"This separation of government from people, this widening of the gap, took place so gradually and so insensibly, each step disguised (perhaps not even intentionally) as a temporary emergency measure or associated with true patriotic allegiance or with real social purposes. And all the crises and reforms (real reforms, too) so occupied the people that they did not see the slow motion underneath, of the whole process of government growing remoter and remoter.

<snip>

"To live in this process is absolutely not to be able to notice it - please try to believe me - unless one has a much greater degree of political awareness, acuity, than most of us had ever had occasion to develop.  Each step was so small, so inconsequential, so well explained or, on occasion, "regretted," that, unless one were detached from the whole process from the beginning, unless one understood what the whole thing was in principle, what all these "little measures" that no "patriotic German" could resent must some day lead to, one no more saw it developing from day to day than a farmer in his field sees the corn growing.  One day it is over his head.

http://www.thirdreich.net/Thought_They_Were_Free_nn4.html

[Horse with no Name]

1. Terrifying, isn't it?

The first time I read it it made my blood run cold.

[sintax]

2. Same Here

The seeming normalcy of it all. When you see this trend in present day USA you can feel as if you are walking amidst zombies and no matter how loudly you scream very few can even hear as it is perhaps a different wavelength that their earspace is on.

[kiki]

3. The banality of evil n/t

[wli]

4. surprise!

... look, it's Guantanamo! surprise!
... look, it's Pier 57! surprise!
... look, it's Jose Padilla! surprise!
... look, it's Abu Ghraib! surprise!

The things our government is doing to the rest of the world abroad will soon be done to us at home.

[oldlady]

5. see it coming or not...

one day the corn is certainly over the farmer's head. corn's up. what are we going to do about it?
peace

[OneBlueSky]

6. never forget the direct connections between the Bush family, . . .

the Third Reich, and the eugenics movement . . . they are not irrelevant . . .

[Media_Lies_Daily]

7. Yep...that's the NeoCons game-plan.

[dbt]

8. Spit-shined, hobnailed, jackbooted KICK.

[sintax]

9. They Thought They Were Free

to go shopping at Wal-Mart
to view the pigskin Coliseum thrill games
to choose 37 varieties of the same sugared cereal

[sintax]

10. Is it too late?

Are we watching and waiting while the beast approaches?

[Paula Sims]

11. What will happen when this is "over"?

Based on the rise and fall of all empires, this WILL end, as all regimes do. Will those who finally stop drinking the Kool Aid say they didn't know? That they were just following orders? How fashionable will having a "W" bumper sticker be?

Unfortunately, it will be too late for some.