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There
was a very revealing story that made it in the news recently,
but did not get the attention one would expect. A DNA test
was performed on 39 living relatives of Adolph Hitler.
And the results were stunning: The Haplogroup E1b1b1 chromosome was found in the samples, which
is rare in Western Europe, and is usually found among the
Berbers of North Africa, and Ashkenazi and Sephardic Jews.
So, if we put two and two together, we may conclude that
the ultimate “Aryan” leader of the Third Reich was himself
of Jewish heritage, if not a person of color.
So, the most loathsome figure of the twentieth century—
responsible for the Holocaust, the genocide of 6 million
Jews, as well as millions of others, including Roma, homosexuals,
political prisoners and people with disabilities--was himself
conceivably a Jew. The madness and brutality of this man
was daunting, as was his apparently high degree of self-loathing.
And yet there is much we can learn from the Fuhrer’s legacy
of death and destruction. Indeed, we must learn if we are
to avoid revisiting the tragic mistakes of the past. People
say “never again” because the idea is to ensure that such
inhumanity does not repeat, lest we conclude in our smugness
that “it could never happen here.”
And yet genocide, and the ritual scapegoating that society
perpetrates against a defenseless minority, has happened
in the six and a half decades since Hitler’s demise—and
more than once.
As for Adolph Hitler, warped, delusional and paranoid as
he was, he had a lot of help. Criminally insane as he was
to conceptualize a final solution and then carry it out
to the utmost, he had in Germany a nation of willing executioners
that was more than willing to oblige. After all, it was
a country suffering from hyperinflation and economic deprivation,
with a predisposition for virulent anti-Semitism and an
unhealthy respect for authority. And what do you do when
an entire nation, or most of it, is literally insane? As
I remember my Harvard professor, Holocaust survivor Erich
Goldhagen, saying over twenty years ago, it was as if the
entire German society was under a spell, or some type of
fog that was lifted when the regime was brought to an end.
The Third Reich, we must remember, was democratically elected
at first. Hitler had a mandate, perverted as it was. People
needed a boogeyman to blame for all of their problems, and
the fascist narrative was made to order. Nazis wanted to
restore Germany’s honor, return to some nonexistent glorious
past, the good ol’ days I suppose. And they would deal
with those segments of the population they believed were
the root cause of their social ills.
It began with mob violence, the lynch mob if you will, with
acts of physical assaults, vandalism, desecration of property,
and the burning of “un-German” books. Racist propaganda with offensive media images helped to soften up the populace
and normalize society’s hatred towards the scapegoats.
The next step was to codify and fully legitimize the hatred—that
is, utilize the legal system to marginalize Jews from every
facet of society, remove them from civic life, and neutralize
them. Jews and so-called Aryans were forbidden by law to marry. Jews could not own property, attend school or hold professions,
and were stripped of their citizenship, their voting rights and their personhood. And they were deported, ghettoized and thrown into concentration
camps.
But could it happen again?
People of good will who observe today’s America cannot help
but react with concern, if not alarm. The U.S. economy
is a basket case, or at least will soon become one if President
Obama does not channel his inner FDR and bring on the second
New Deal many are waiting for. In any case, Americans are
in pain, with massive unemployment, poverty and homelessness on the rise, and 40 million people on food stamps. Many folks out there are looking for someone to blame.
The Patriot movement, including militias, neo-Nazis, Minutemen,
Oath Keepers and other armed hate groups are proliferating
and boosting their membership, united in a hatred of Latino
immigrants, people of color and President Obama. And political
extremism has entered the mainstream. The Republican Party—
almost completely purged of moderate voices— and the corporate-sponsored
Tea Parties are comparing notes, if they aren’t one in the
same. This, as the GOP hopes to score major political points
via an updated Southern Strategy of hating Muslims, mosques,
Mexicans and marriage equality.
 Meanwhile,
as two billionaire brothers bankroll this nascent fascist movement to suit their narrow business
interests, another rich guy serves as its propagandist, inflaming racial, ethnic and religious tensions
on the airwaves, and setting up groups and individuals to
be the victims of hate crimes. There is a cable network
that articulates the frustration of low-income, low-information
whites who are angry that this neighborhood called America
is changing, browning up to be more exact, and that is the
Fox News Channel. Fox News and Glenn Beck—that opportunistic
and delusional little jester of “restoring honor” fame—
would make Goebbels proud.
And I use the term fascism, indeed creeping fascism, to
describe what is happening because no other words will suffice.
Now is the time that we refrain from dancing around the
problems here in America. Burning the Holy Qur’an, bombing
and burning mosques, banning houses of worship on private
property, widespread denial of the president’s citizenship,
efforts to nullify the Fourteenth Amendment, states scrambling
to enact punitive, unjust laws to target Latinos—these are
the ingredients of which fascism is made.
The crises outlined above are far too complex to be resolved
in this commentary. However, it must be said that these
forces of right-wing extremism are able to exploit the desperation
of hard economic times and seize the moment. Reforming
America’s dysfunctional casino-shell game economic system
in fundamental ways, making people whole, and restoring
a sense of equity and justice are the things we need. Tweaking
at the edges will not do. President Obama, are you listening?
BlackCommentator.com Executive
Editor, David A. Love, JD is a journalist and human rights
advocate based in Philadelphia, and a contributor to The Huffington Post, theGrio, The Progressive
Media Project, McClatchy-Tribune News Service, In These Times and Philadelphia Independent Media Center. He also blogs atdavidalove.com, NewsOne, Daily
Kos, and Open Salon. Click here to contact Mr. Love. |
Sep 2, 2010 - Issue 391
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