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Edited on Thu Mar-25-10 01:48 PM by Cyrano
So some “respected authority” has declared that using the word “Nazi,” in comparison to today's politics, is a BIG No-No.
He has said that when the term “Nazi” enters a conversation, the conversation is over.
And to this “respected authority”, I reply that, on some occasions, we avoid using the term “Nazi” at our own peril. It has an emotional impact that is spot on, and it is needed now more than ever to confront the reality of what America is currently facing. And it is accurate.
The Nazis had forerunners called Brown Shirts who spent their time bullying and beating up political dissidents, gays, Gypsies, Jews, the disabled, those who disagreed with them, and anyone else they felt like beating up at any given moment.
So for just a moment, try to imagine that there is little difference between the Brown Shirts of that era, and our homegrown tea baggers, our homegrown militias, and so many other Americans who spend far too much time on Fox, Limbaugh, et al, immersing themselves in the hatred being sold to them. Because, in truth, there is no difference.
(Too bad that the tea baggers and their ilk, don’t know that Hitler murdered all the Brown Shirts the instant he had a functional Gestapo and SS. The Brown Shirts were useful tools to him at the beginning, but became a danger to him because they knew how to organize.)
The past few months in America are not all that different from the German Brown Shirt era. The thugs have been unleashed by their Republican/corporate masters. Death threats to congress people are just dandy, breaking windows with bricks is A-Okay. Too bad the thugs committing these crimes never read a history book.
I’m saddened by the fact that far too many Americans can’t/won’t/don’t make the connection between Uganda, The Sudan, Rwanda, The USSR gulags, the Nazi concentration camps, and so many other places and incidents of inhumanity and genocide that have occurred in the past century.
And the absolute definition of ignorance is Americans who mouth the words: “It can’t happen here.” To them, I have but three words: Abu Ghraib. Guantanamo. (And those are the only ones we currently know about.)
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