Each year we remember the terrible holocaust that Nazi Germany inflicted on millions of people. For many, the pain isn't confined to Holocaust Remembrance Day; they live it every moment through memories of their personal experience or that of their relatives and friends.
It is important to remember the Holocaust and the events and motivations that led to it so that never again will the world experience such atrocity.
However, while millions around the world pause to reflect on the horrors of that time, there are some who still deny that it happened or claim it did not happen on the scale reported. Holocaust Deniers are rightfully criticised and vilified for their complete disregard of facts.
Holocaust Remembrance Days reflects on the six million Jewish victims of the Nazi regime. They were the largest people group targeted by Hitler. Yet we should not forget that Hitler's hatred extended beyond Jews, resulting in almost triple that number, around 17 million, being victims of the Holocaust. To ignore the additional 11 million victims, is a form of Holocaust denial. We should not forget the fear and hate that caused an entire nation to commit genocide against people who were perceived as different to them, who were perceived as a threat to them, who were scapegoats used to justify racism, xenophobia, homophobia and bigotry in the name of patriotism and nationalism.
We must not forget the additional 11 million people who were murdered because of their politics, race, sexuality, gender and health. Why do Holocaust Remembrances focus on Jewish people? Because, in 1942, the Nazis implemented the Final Solution which specifically targeted Jews. In fact, the full title of this heinous crime was 'The Final Solution to the Jewish Question'. It deliberately targeted Jewish people and culminated in the death of two-thirds of the world's Jewish population.
From the early 1930s onwards, the Nazis had imprisoned anyone who did not conform to their ways. Although the Final Solution specifically targeted Jews, the detention camps also held socialists, Jehovah's Witnesses, gypsies, dissenters, LGBTIQ+ people, unionists, the sick and infirm. The Final Solution was not confined to Jews. These additional 11 million were also victims of Hitler and the Nazi regime.
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| Source: Holocaust Encyclopedia |
While the wholesale extermination of Jews and other groups began in 1942 with the implementation of the Final Solution, the evolution of this atrocity began almost 20 years earlier. Hitler published his memoir, Mein Kampf, in 1925; a rambling manifesto blaming Germany's defeat in World War I, its economic ills, its military emasculation and its loss of nationalism, on all manner of people, including Jews, socialists and unionists. Once Hitler took power in 1932, he brought the Holocaust to fruition by imprisoning the people groups he'd demonised in Mein Kampf; those he deemed inferior to his idea of racial supremacy encapsulated in his 'ideal Aryan'.
Some of the first people he began imprisoning were Communists. Shortly after taking power, Hitler was spreading propaganda about the danger of Communism, and bolstered this through a number of false flag events, most notably the Reichstag Fire, which Hitler used as an excuse to pass the Reichstag Fire Decree to remove civil liberties and give the government power to imprison anyone deemed a threat to the Reich. Communists were arrested within hours of the Reichstag fire, even though to this day, it is not clear how the fire started. The Reichstag Fire was also used by Hitler to pass the Enabling Act of 1933 (formally titled 'Law to remedy the distress of the people and the Reich'), which gave Hitler the power to pass legislation without going through the Reichstag, which was the lower house of government.
Hitler softened Germans with fear, hardened them with pride and strengthened them with religious conviction. He gave them a sense of unity, of belonging to something special and powerful. Hitler used Christian language to unify Christians behind his hate-speech. Whether Hitler was Christian or not is irrelevant; most Germans were Christian and they were the ones who committed the atrocities he decreed because according to Hitler, he was 'doing the work of the Lord'.
It is significant to remember the Holocaust in the context of then and now. Today we are seeing an emergence of far-right groups who drive a similar message of hateful bile towards leftists, unionists and environmentalists. While Jews are still part of the hate-speech of many, today's far-right are targeting Muslims as well, and have replaced gypsies with the poor, the unemployed, those requiring welfare.
Islam is under attack across the globe. There is increasing persecution of Muslims at the hands of Muslim and non-Muslim regimes, from brutal oppression in Syria, Egypt and Iran, to pogroms, ethnic cleansing, detention and persecution of 12 million Uigher Muslims in China, to Burma's genocide and ethnic cleansing of Rohingya Muslims, ethnic cleansing in Palestine by Israel through its settler programs, indefinite detention and use of illegal weapons such as Dense Inert Metal Explosives and white phosphorous, growing persecution in western nations, such as the United Kingdom, United States and Australia as hate-crimes increase amid bolder and more rancid invectives blaming Muslims for the west's economic ills, crime rates and reduction of civil liberties. Sound familiar?
A four-year study of the abuse suffered by people of all faiths in Australia and the UK, found that Muslims experience violent hate-crimes more than people of any other faith (Hanifie 2019).
The hateful, fear-driven hatred of Islamophobes who accuse Muslims of attempting world domination, of surreptitiously infiltrating western governments, is no different to the same accusations Hitler made of Jews. This is just one quote from Mein Kampf, yet it sounds so similar to the Islamophobic rhetoric of far-right politicians and preachers when they talk about Muslims, sharia law, failure to assimilate and Islam masquerading as a religion:
The Jewish state was never spatially limited in itself, but universally unlimited as to space, though restricted in the sense of embracing but one race. Consequently, this people has always formed a state within states. It is one of the most ingenious tricks that was ever devised, to make this state sail under the flag of 'religion', thus assuring it of the tolerance which the Aryan is always ready to accord a religious creed. For actually the Mosaic religion is nothing other than a doctrine for the preservation of the Jewish race. It therefore embraces almost all sociological, political, and economic fields of knowledge which can have any bearing on this function.(Mein Kampf, Volume 1, Chapter 4).
Hitler was a white supremacist who lamented the weakening of the white race because of breeding with what he considered to be inferior races. In Chapter 11 of Mein Kampf, Hitler stated, 'It shows with terrifying clarity that in every mingling of Aryan blood with that of lower peoples the result was the end of the cultured people'. How does this differ to people who are trying to retain the 'racial purity' of white people. Who can forget far-right politician, Pauline Hanson's stunt to declare 'It's ok to be white', which she proposed to the Australian Senate. The right-wing government of the day, beguiled by Hanson's persecution complex, voted in favour of the motion, only to later recant when they woke up to themselves and realised the origins of this supposedly innocuous saying lay in Hitler's white supremacist hate-speech. This hasn't stopped far-right politicians and groups from continuing to quote it and using it to justify attacks on non-white people, on migrants, on refugees, on Muslims ... essentially, the whole gamut of people groups who Hitler accused of being racially inferior. One of Australia's senators, Fraser Anning, formed his own party on a platform of racial and religious purity.
Why is racial purity so important to these people? What is wrong with being one race, the human race? No ethnicity is inferior to another. It isn't the end of the world if we see different ethnic groups inter-relating. No colour is superior to another. We should welcome unity and despise segregation and exclusion.
It should be noted that Fraser Anning, initially elected to the Katter Australia Party with all of 19 votes, called for a Final Solution to Australia's immigration 'problem'. Katter initially supported him on this, but as it was bleedingly obvious that Anning was referencing the Holocaust. Katter eventually sacked him from the party. Anning and others like him, have praised the white Australia policy to defend Australia's European Christian 'ethno-cultural identity' from becoming a minority.
This reflects the paranoia espoused by the white supremacist who committed the terrorist attacks in Christchurch, massacring 51 Muslims and injuring many others. This massacre was predicated in his largely incoherent manifesto called The Great Replacement which, just like Hitler, accuses other races and religions of insidiously plotting to replace white European Christians through inter-breeding with other races and religions.
Meanwhile, in Asia we see the westernisation of many of their cultures as globalisation expands into those countries, turning them into outposts of the United States. The westernisation of Asia is proceeding at a far greater rate, than the supposed Asianisation of the west espoused by extremists like Pauline Hanson and Fraser Anning.
White supremacy is driven by fear and ignorance. To support the idea that one ethnic group is superior to another, is to either support atrocious eugenics and genocide ... or to be completely ignorant of the ultimate outcome of white supremacy. White supremacist or racist beliefs are not rooted in objective logic. They are group-think for people easily manipulated by threats and fears, regardless of how outrageous. Umberto Eco nailed it when he stated that 'nothing gives the fearful man more courage than another man's fear'. Fear has been used by fascists for years to control the people. James Bovard summed this up when he said, 'As long as enough people can be frightened, then all people can be ruled. That is how it works in a democratic system and mass fear becomes the ticket to destroy rights across the board'.
White supremacists make scapegoats of others of different ethnicity or religion, with scant regard for scientific or historical facts. They fail to consider self-reflection or the role that their own actions have played on the events that they are complaining about. For example, if they are upset about affirmative action or claiming reverse racism, they often ignore the horrendous treatment meted out to people of colour by white people for centuries. Equal rights for others, doesn't mean fewer rights for someone else. Yet, many on the far-right, many conservatives, fear that their rights will be eroded if someone else is granted the same rights. This fear is then manifested in hate for those they've oppressed for centuries.
'Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that. Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that'. - Martin Luther King
Why is racial purity so important to these people? What is wrong with being one race, the human race? No ethnicity is inferior to another. It isn't the end of the world if we see different ethnic groups inter-relating. No colour is superior to another. We should welcome unity and despise segregation and exclusion.
It should be noted that Fraser Anning, initially elected to the Katter Australia Party with all of 19 votes, called for a Final Solution to Australia's immigration 'problem'. Katter initially supported him on this, but as it was bleedingly obvious that Anning was referencing the Holocaust. Katter eventually sacked him from the party. Anning and others like him, have praised the white Australia policy to defend Australia's European Christian 'ethno-cultural identity' from becoming a minority.
This reflects the paranoia espoused by the white supremacist who committed the terrorist attacks in Christchurch, massacring 51 Muslims and injuring many others. This massacre was predicated in his largely incoherent manifesto called The Great Replacement which, just like Hitler, accuses other races and religions of insidiously plotting to replace white European Christians through inter-breeding with other races and religions.
Meanwhile, in Asia we see the westernisation of many of their cultures as globalisation expands into those countries, turning them into outposts of the United States. The westernisation of Asia is proceeding at a far greater rate, than the supposed Asianisation of the west espoused by extremists like Pauline Hanson and Fraser Anning.
White supremacy is driven by fear and ignorance. To support the idea that one ethnic group is superior to another, is to either support atrocious eugenics and genocide ... or to be completely ignorant of the ultimate outcome of white supremacy. White supremacist or racist beliefs are not rooted in objective logic. They are group-think for people easily manipulated by threats and fears, regardless of how outrageous. Umberto Eco nailed it when he stated that 'nothing gives the fearful man more courage than another man's fear'. Fear has been used by fascists for years to control the people. James Bovard summed this up when he said, 'As long as enough people can be frightened, then all people can be ruled. That is how it works in a democratic system and mass fear becomes the ticket to destroy rights across the board'.
White supremacists make scapegoats of others of different ethnicity or religion, with scant regard for scientific or historical facts. They fail to consider self-reflection or the role that their own actions have played on the events that they are complaining about. For example, if they are upset about affirmative action or claiming reverse racism, they often ignore the horrendous treatment meted out to people of colour by white people for centuries. Equal rights for others, doesn't mean fewer rights for someone else. Yet, many on the far-right, many conservatives, fear that their rights will be eroded if someone else is granted the same rights. This fear is then manifested in hate for those they've oppressed for centuries.
'Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that. Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that'. - Martin Luther King
White supremacists believe in a mythical idea of ethnicity; that there are monocultures. Since the beginning of time, cultures and ethnicities have been mingling. Former Australian Prime Minister Paul Keating addressed this in a speech in which he indicated that the rise of Pauline Hanson and One Nation had let a 'very ugly, resentful xenophobic cat out of the bag'. Keating went on to state:
'The great tragedy of the shamelessly regressive politics of Pauline Hanson is not so much that it is rooted in ignorance, prejudice and fear, though it is; not so much that it projects the ugly face of racism, though it does; not so much that it is dangerously divisive and deeply hurtful to many of her fellow Australians, though it is; not even that it will cripple our efforts to enmesh ourselves in a region wherein lie the jobs and prosperity of future generations of young Australians, though it will—the great tragedy is that it perpetrates a myth, a fantasy, a lie.
The myth of the monoculture. The lie that we can retreat to it'.
White supremacists, just like Hitler, appeal to nationalism. That it is somehow patriotic to claim one culture is superior to another, to defend this mythical 'monoculture'.
Give up this ridiculous idea of one ethnic group being superior to another. H.G. Wells summed it up with, 'our true nationality is mankind'.
Beware the politician who promotes nationalism at the expense of others.
Hitler blamed Germany's loss in World War One on communists and pacificists. He saw the Treaty of Versailles as a betrayal of Germany by its government. Following WW1, the League of Nations was formed to prevent a repeat of WW1. Hitler viewed it as an organisation that was opposed to Germany. Hitler used nationalism to provoke animosity against the League of Nations (or League of Oppressed Nations as he called it), while scapegoating those he blamed for Germany's ills, namely communists, pacifists and Jews. In channelling the right-wing politicians and preachers of today, Hitler blamed the pre-war press for injecting pacificism into Germany at a time when the world was gearing for war. He called the worst poison that can be imagined. He blamed the League of Nations for teaching the people a 'miserable morality' to make the people 'modern'. All of this to make Germany 'ripe for the slave's yoke of international capital and its masters, the Jews' (Hitler 1925, p. 221). How is this different to our current preachers of hate who bemoan 'post-modernism' and its control by leftists, in the same way that Hitler bemoaned modernism and its control by Marxists. Today's far-right detests the United Nations and attacks the 'lefist' media ... while promoting fake news through its own right-wing media channels that have scant regard for fact and which encourage the right-wing's persecution complex. In Britain this has played out through Brexit, in which many Britons blamed Britain's economic ills on migrants, refugees and the European Union.
The father of modern fascism, Benito Mussolini, opposed socialism and democracy, stating that 'Fascism denies, in democracy, the absurd conventional untruth of political equality dressed out in the garb of collective irresponsibility, and the myth of "happiness" and indefinite progress'.
The popularity of Mussolini, Hitler and other despots was firmly rooted in their 'us versus them' rhetoric. Hitler popularised the persecution complex wrapped in nationalistic fervour and the gullible people gave Hitler popularity and established his power.
Think it can't happen again? In Australia, conservatives justify the continuing indefinite detention of innocent people who came to Australia seeking asylum from persecution and war. While conservative Christians gloated over the election of Scott Morrison because he worships at a Pentecostal church, at least 11 asylum seekers on Manus Island and Nauru, attempted suicide because of the complete despair at any hope of compassionate treatment by the Morrison government and its 'Christian' values. Thousands of refugees on bridging visas in Australia fear deportation to the countries they escaped. Where is the compassion from the Christians, the conservatives who voted for Morrison? Few stood up against this treatment, because the refugees were not European Christians, but predominately Muslims from Africa, the Middle East or South Asia. A United Nations report identified systemic abuse and torture in Australia's detention centres. This should be a concern, considering the shift in Australia's politics to the far-right, where politicians are elected on platforms of white supremacy, anti-Islam, racism, anti-migration and scare campaigns based on an invented persecution complex that causes conservatives to believe they are being oppressed by minorities, political correctness, LGBTIQ+ people, environmentalism, socialism and pacifism.
And of course, these far-right types bemoan 'cultural relativism' as a threat to morals, families and truth. Iranian political activist, Shirin Ebadi, observed, 'the idea of cultural relativism is nothing but an excuse to violate human rights'.
In the introduction to his book 'Nein!: Standing up to Hitler 1935-44', Paddy Ashdown observed the similarities between Nazi Germany and the political trends of today: '... you may be struck, as I was ... by the similarities between what happened in the build-up to World War II and the age in which we now live. Then as now, nationalism and protectionism were on the rise and democracies were seen to have failed, people hungered for the government of strong men; those who suffered most from the pain of economic collapse felt alienated and turned towards simplistic solutions and strident voices … ‘fake news’ built around the convincing untruth carried more weight in the public discourse than rational arguments and provable facts'.
Remember the Holocaust.
Remember the 6 million Jewish victims and the 11 million others who didn't comply with the Nazi criteria for Aryan perfection.
Remember the fear, exclusionism, lies and hatred that manipulated an entire nation to commit one of the gravest atrocities the modern world has seen. Recognise that it is happening again and challenge it before it is too late.
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