Blog: My Turn

Getting terms and history correct are important for democracies. We throw around labels too loosely to silence the opposition rather than engage in conversation. There is a lot at stake when fascist violence destroys institutions, individuals, human rights and dignity and leads to catastrophic ends.  What exactly is fascism and is the United Stated drifting towards it? 

What is fascism?    It is not an ideology, but a reactionary political behavior – encouraging violent rejection of the status quo by embracing an authoritarian leader. Support comes from below as the fascist leader capitalizes on discontent and promotes “masculine” and exclusive populist nationalism over universal values. Note, the key is to reduce complexity to easy "labels". Fascism began with Mussolini and was twisted into Nazism by Hitler. Nazism focused on master races and “inferior”, dangerous peoples. Racism (often White Replacement “Theory”) is used to show that democratic ideals of freedom, inclusion, diversity, and equality are a threat. Nazis oppose any initiatives or institutions that are racially, ethnically, or religiously diverse. Policies for racial purity and unity are promoted while those defined as not part of the “nation” are removed. Identifying and targeting “enemies” is a unifying cause and Nazis imprisons and/or murder opposition and minority group leaders, critics, artists, comedians... 

Labels can be helpful or dangerous. They can identify something but also reduce something, not engage in its complexities, and dismiss or accept it. To have thoughtful discussion, not just condemnation or a sense of powerlessness, let's explore the poison of fascism.

Fascism 101 “bullet” points 

Fascism:

• Is centered on cult of a perceived redemptive, “infallible” leader. Rampant cronyism and corruption are built in. Loyalty to the leader becomes paramount for advancement, payoffs, and safety. Loyalty often becomes more important than competence. Once that narrow path is chosen it is difficult to leave it. 
• Strengthens the power of the state by subordinating the interests of individuals. Rejection/villainization of democracy, democratic institutions, and norms.
• Derives political power by questioning reality, endorsing myth and rage, promoting lies; controlling of mass media, distorting belief in “truth”, promoting an alternate reality fixated on national decline and the blaming and rejection of liberal democracy.
• Is rooted in “action” and instinct over thought or reflection. Not focused on articulating doctrine, programs, ideas, or ideology (although the Nazis clearly do).
• Is fixated/obsessed with perceived national decline, humiliation, victimhood, national security, crime and punishment. It fosters a sense of the “nation” under attack.
• Capitalizes on feelings about master races, their perceived “unjust” lot and rightful dominance over “inferior” peoples. Racism (often White Replacement “Theory”) is used to show that democratic ideals of freedom, inclusion, diversity, and equality are a threat. Opposes any initiatives or institutions that are racially, ethnically, or religiously diverse.
• Pursues policies for racial purity and unity while removing those defined as not part of the nation. Identifying and targeting “enemies” or scapegoats as a unifying cause. Imprisons and/or murders opposition and minority group leaders, critics, artists, comedians... It is an anti-liberal, (anti-Communist) movement.
• Focuses on the supremacy of the military and the embrace of paramilitarism in an uneasy, but effective collaboration with traditional elites.
• Arm people and encourage, justify, and glorify violence as “redemptive”. Often seek to expand territory through armed conflict. Often this comes from necessity as fascist policies tend to restrict markets and they are pressured to take what they need from other countries.
• Disdains human rights and embraces rampant sexism.
• Intertwines religion and government.
• Protects corporate power and suppresses labor power.
• Conducts fraudulent elections, undermines democratic norms, and creates of a one-party state.
• Rejects international systems and institutions.

Appeal? Why does this become permissible?    Some people do not like democratic restrictions and responsibilities and enjoy seeking personal gain at the expense of others. Some are racist, enjoy the appeal of violence, and/or like the permission structure. But for the majority of followers, seeking explanations in a confusing world, accepting that “bad” things “just happen” to them because of who they are makes no sense. Trauma (traditional lifestyles are uprooted or threatened by technological changes, wealth inequity, unequal access to goods and services, and/or changing social mores) allows the embrace of the irrational. It would be a mistake to reduce its followers to racists. Followers are often reclaiming a sense of self-worth and dignity by venting against a world in which they feel unfairly judged and victimized. Contempt for truth and reason (reinforced by mass/social media) reflects the despair of the follower who is frightened, feels disempowered, and may be socially and spiritually adrift and cynical. Political rallies reinforce a sense of belonging, are fueled by confirmation bias, and encourages violence, rejection of and dominance over the so-called “other”. We need to reject those promoting violence and reflect with empathy, not labels, about those who are drawn to fascism (or any extremism including Communism). Justice, law and order, democratic principles and dignity are paramount. As historian John Meacham puts it, "The opposite of fear is hope." 

My Turn   Just because someone acts like a fascist does not make them a Nazi - yet. Fascism is destabilizing because it undermines democratic law, checks and balances, and human dignity. There are certainly echoes of fascism in the United States. Each bullet point requires reflection - both for what echoes and what is different. Having said that, we are not yet a fascist state. Unlike Hitler, but more like Mussolini, our leader has no guiding ideology other than personal power, greed, and corruption.  Some checks remain and Americans are slowly beginning to wake up. Elections continue. Fundamentally, despite ignorance of history and the defunding of education Americans, with all our human flaws, gravitate towards decency and freedom. 

It is not surprising that a leader who spouts antisemitism, fascism, white supremacy, and conspiracy theories has recruited Nazis, racists, antidemocratic, corrupt, anti-immigrant isolationists and less than competent acolytes.  It’s not surprising that he readily utilizes the tools of fascists – including war, violence, and the glorification of violence.  That does not make him a fascist – more of a pathetic wannabe “strongman” who uses whatever he can, including fascism, for his own ends. 

A good number of his supporters do not fit into the categories listed. They are seeking dignity and often just want to be left alone. The glue - either from fear, greed, perceptions of hope, or reliance on presidential; pardons - is the leader. It is not sustainable. The president is old and his schtick is getting old too. Nothing stays the same. Nothing is inevitable. We cannot despair. Will enough destruction and corruption pull his supporters away in time for the mid-terms? I hold out hope. Dignity and freedom are things Americans instinctively understand – no matter how long it takes to realize. It really is up to us whether we accelerate towards self-destructive fascism or reclaim our democratic experiment. The mid terms in November will go a long way in determining that. It is a new year. If we can hold on to our idealism through the cold of winter, continue to fight against tyranny, we can honor those who did so during the American Revolution at Trenton, Princeton, and Valley Forge. 

However, given Steven Miller's articulation of President Trump's policies this evening, we may be running out of time. He painted a social-Darwinistic world where might equals right, where ideals and virtue do not matter, where humanity is held in contempt, and that because we have power we can use it. It is a worldview shared by Putin and Hitler. What has kept us prosperous with relatively stable international markets and law and away from global warfare have been the structures created after World War II. The Trump administration is in the process of openly throwing all that away. It is a disturbing future if we are the country undermining sovereignty, democracy (tomorrow is January 6), reject treaties, allies, restraint, judgement, and the rule of law. We are at the threshold and there is no more wishing it away. We turn instead to our ideals. Like Ukraine, we fight because it is right to do so. To quote Thomas Paine from the American Revolution: "A body of men holding themselves accountable to nobody ought not to be trusted by anybody."   "Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom, must, like men, undergo the fatigues of supporting it." 

Ken Burns   I am grateful for Ken Burns. His film on the American Revolution reminds us of our struggle to aspire to something better than being subjects - to seek human dignity rooted in democratic freedom. He shows how we must continually ask questions of ourselves and not avoid the complexities and contradictions. In a November interview with Nicholle Wallace he said the great American question is, “Where do you want to live, in Bedford Falls or Pottersville?” It's a question about dignity and responsibility. Do we accept an amoral universe where the powerful dictate our choices or do we live with a common purpose, bound together in a complex social contract rooted in decency and hope? I am a hopeful person not an optimist. My former students might remember the metaphorical optimist Pangloss (the windbag) from Candide. An optimist ignores negative realities, chooses only to see the good, and passively expects things to work out for the best. A person with hope sees the evil, the despair, the pain and suffering but insists that we must and can do better. "The American Revolution" and "It's A Wonderful Life" challenge us to hope. 

Season of Lights   This week, on the first night of Hanukkah (Festival of Lamps/Lights) Jews were attacked and murdered on Sydney's Bondi Beach. Ahmed al Ahmed, a Muslim whose refugee parents had just arrived from Syria, wrestled one of the guns away from the younger attacker and was shot twice himself. In the darkness we try to hold on to the light, to hope, and release ourselves from religious hate and bigotry that leads to destruction. We seek to resist despair and darkness. 

During this holiday season where our towns and homes are brightened and made more beautiful by various lights, we embrace each other with love and hope. We bring light into the world by rejecting hate, antisemitism, and despair. When Jews or any group is targeted we recognize that all our freedoms are being attacked. We must be the voices that provide hope and leadership by embracing, with confidence, democratic values that dignify life. We know that we are all vulnerable and in need of support and help. Leading by example is crucial.

Bedford Falls    In Frank Capra’s “It’s a Wonderful Life” we are introduced to Bedford Falls (shout out to upstate New York where my son went to college). People face (as individuals or as immigrants), every day struggles, setbacks, loneliness, helplessness, frustrations, and joys. At first, George Bailey (Jimmy Stewart) feels increasingly trapped, his dreams smothered, as the demands and responsibilities of life keep asking more of him. The joy and “wonderfulness” emerge when George comes to realize that his life and self-worth is tied to the common purpose of others – family, colleagues, spouse, and those who depend on him. This was true not only in the movie but in his own life. 

Jimmy Stewart   This was Stewart’s first film after serving in World War II. He had flown twenty combat missions and in 1944, over the German city of Gotha, lost members of his crew. A hole had been blown under his pilot’s chair, and he got his plane home through at least twenty degrees below zero temperatures. He had fought the Nazis but felt responsible for the men he lost. He had come home with a mixture of survivor’s guilt and post traumatic stress. His service and sacrifice was noble but came at a cost. Could he, should he, reclaim his acting life? Donna Reed would help him reclaim his sense of self on and off camera. 

As Bailey's world collapses - and he feels as if he has failed himself, his family, and those who rely on him, he falls into despair that echoed his own life. The most powerful moment of the film was caught in one take. As his world crumbles and he feels that he has failed everyone and himself, Stewart unravels. The utter despair Stewart portrays is real and transcends film and life. He is rediscovering his acting by tapping into his own deeply personal experience of the war. As George breaks down, so too does Stewart. He is facing the idea that he is worth more dead than alive. It was an outcome of his post traumatic stress and decency. The character and the actor became one and thereby enriched both. Throughout it, Stewart was thinking of all those who might feel this way. It was his burden of leadership. Donna Reed knew that he did not need rescuing, but support.  She was his steady rock during the filming. He was not alone.

Pottersville   The loneliness and despair that is Potterville is produced by the desires and power of one man who seeks power by destroying social bonds that bring meaning and joy to life. We can see that Potter’s greed for power, wealth, and materialism make him a lonely man. As he "wins" we lose. I think we are all sensing the growing possibility of a future Pottersville, a place of hate and fear, coldness, destroyed lives, and exploitation make us subjects. It is a place where no one has self-worth and people are isolated from each other’s. It is a window into a world where democratic values are undermined by tyranny. As Americans, we get that. Interestingly, the FBI at the time didn't. It warned that the film was spewing Hollywood "Communism" by attacking capitalism. OK, so much for dealing with complexity. And that's the point, the cautionary tale. The immediate and narrow ideological goal of the FBI was to fight Communism which has proven to be a poisonous and destructive ideology. It would take a few more years to realize that we weren't just fighting communism but fighting for democracy. The focus of the movie is not on Mr. Potter despite the FBI's twisted logic to defend him. Instead, it is a story of hope focused on the rediscovered strength and resiliency of Bailey. 

And that is why we cannot despair. Like Stewart and Reed we must rely on each other to rediscover our worth. Ken Burns stated it clearly, “I want to live in Bedford Falls. I don’t want to live in Pottersville.” Pottersville is a lonely, dark place. We must take care of each other in all of our complex, contradictory humanness. We cannot target each other as enemies nor tolerate those who tell us to do so. We must find ways of living together, or as Ben Franklin said as The Declaration of Independence was signed, "We must, indeed, all hang together, or most assuredly we shall all hang separately." 

My Turn   “It's a Wonderful Life” is a story of light in the darkness. Each time I watch Stewart break down as George Bailey I tear up. (Let's not even talk about the ending!) I am reminded of all those who sacrificed so much, fighting the Nazis or the enemies of freedom, and hope I do not betray them.  I then find the courage to say that I will not. I see his, mine, our vulnerability and know that the Potters of the world cannot win by attacking and exploiting it. To hope, we must recognize our mutual vulnerability, help and not label, and resist tyranny. 

Stewart’s real encounter with darkness gives us the way forward, the way to embrace the light of the season. And so, to quote Elie Wiesel, we have the duty "to reject despair". We do that with honesty, courage, and mutual dependence. “It’s a Wonderful Life” because of those around us. 

The Christian story of the Nativity is all about vulnerability - of refugees seeking shelter. We light a candle when we refuse to accept the brutality of Bondi Beach or the vileness our government when they separate and deport people (including veterans) or accumulate wealth and power at the expense of others. Evilness comes from those who try to snuff out the light within us or around us. They lose if we rely on each other and accept the difficult proposition that we must face despair to overcome it. We must bring the gift of ourself to the manger and to those seeking warmth and dignity. 

Self-inflicted Damage: Eugenics and White Replacement    I just made my annual presentation at a NH high school about eugenics in the U.S. and "racial hygiene" Nazi Germany. As always, their questions and reactions were inspiring and complex. They energize me and give me hope. It’s always fun, and disturbing, to begin by raising the question, “How did an elitist, antidemocratic, race-based, white supremacist, antisemitic ideology become popular and shape the norms and laws of the U.S. in the 1920s and 1930s?” Admittedly, I’m pretty satisfied with how I got that into one sentence. More to the point, what happens if hate goes unchecked? What ethical questions are raised when we discover that American eugenics had a direct impact on Nazi “race hygiene” which escalated to mass murder? Why are eugenics language and ideas reemerging to justify hate of immigrants? or the "genetic superiority" of those certain individuals or groups? Why is antisemitism part of it? I’m not so smugly satisfied anymore. 

Hate Tells Us Nothing About the Target Group    I’m always asked to talk about antisemitism, hate, and bigotry and why certain groups are targeted. I always begin by saying that we will learn nothing about a targeted group when talking about hate. Instead, we will learn about the variety of intersecting and individual motives, fears, and needs of the believer. Blaming the victim is an easy way to justify hate that is destructive and importantly self-destructing. Confederate states committed treason and caused the blood-letting of the Civil War for two reasons: rejecting the election of 1860 and preserving the institution of slavery.  Each succeeding state spelled that out clearly. The end result? Devastation. It is no coincidence that Berlin in 1945 resembled Richmond, Virginia of 1865. Hate is empowering but destroys us. 

Eugenics    Eugenics was the movement to improve society by fixing its genes, a sort of animal husbandry for humans. Who should reproduce? Who was valuable? Who was a threat? Who gets to decide? Eugenics emerged out of rapid social changes brought about by the Industrial and French Revolutions which would continue through the 19^th century. Rapid urbanization brought poverty, disease, exploitation, crime, despair, but also great fortunes for some. Were there enough resources for all? Do we have a responsibility towards those less fortunate? Were traditional power bases and important people safe? A lot of wealthy well educated white guys didn’t think so. 

Origins    With Darwin’s Origins of the Species people began to think of how the rules of nature applied to human life. More to the point, how did this new scientific thinking give a framework to justify maintaining privilege? British thinkers created the idea of “positive eugenics” (that the right sort of people (white, healthy, likely educated and financially sound) should reproduce and “negative eugenics” (that less “valuable” people: workers, the poor, infirmed, weak) should be eliminated. Adopting the idea of “survival of the fittest” gave a convenient “natural” argument (no longer tied to traditional moral constraints) that resources should be diverted from the “worthless” to the “valuable”. This coincided with the social safety net shifting from being the responsibility of traditional care givers (churches, philanthropy...) to the state.  As leaders wrestled with budgets and the ways to solve problems in society, eugenics offered the idea that undesirable traits and behaviors were inherited and genetic. It was not necessarily about choice or even environment. Although debunked now (especially the focus in America that a single gene determines certain behaviors) powerful people came to see their role as containing bad behavior, mitigating it, and if necessary, eliminating its genetic origin through sterilization or just letting "nature" take its course by letting the poor die. 

German Empire    In Southwest Africa (Namibia today) colonial German troops suppressed the Herero and Namaqua peoples at the turn of the 20^th century. Dripping in nationalism (Germany was unified through three wars ending in 1871) and racism, Germans set out to prove why their race was superior. German scientists conducted medical experiments in concentration camps and there was even a killing camp, Shark Island. Intermarriage between natives and Germans was forbidden. If this sounds familiar, Hermann Göring’s father was the governor of SW Africa and some of the post World War I leaders of paramilitaries were veterans of the colonial slaughter. Nazis later dressed up in their brown colonial uniforms in part to relive the imaged good old days and to to affirm their shaky sense of self by projecting racial superiority. 

The U.S.    While Britain and Germany had their eugenic thinkers it remained a relatively small clique of elites. The U.S. showed how these ideas could become mainstream. There were a variety of groups (often with nothing in common) that accepted eugenic language, some with zeal and others out of convenience. Former Confederates, for example, could keep building the “Lost Cause” myth and gain power by playing the race card; antisemitism was always a bedrock, as was anti-immigrant sentiment. Henry Goddard even categorized people's worth by using IQ tests he borrowed from France to create tiers of "moral defectives." "Idiots" were people with a "mental age" of 2 or less. "Imbeciles" were those of a mental age of 3-7. The most dangerous (because they could function and pass themselves off as valuable) were "Morons" with a mental age of 8-12.     

Anti-Immigrant Hate    There’s much to discuss, but I will focus here on post-Civil War America’s embrace of hate of the immigrant. The Statue of Liberty and its lamp of hope went up in New York harbor in 1886. Immigrants had been coming in (mostly from Europe) to seek opportunity and help replenish and rebuild America. However, by 1879, the U.S. barred Chinese and Asians from citizenship and in 1882 passed the Chinese Exclusion Act. Targeting Chinese workers who built the transcontinental railway allowed former Confederates to find allies with racists in California. As Jews began to arrive in the 1880s (escaping the pogroms) Boston brahmans created the Immigration Restriction League. Senator Lodge talked about the usefulness of racism and the League (finding allies in the KKK and elsewhere) saw a threat to the nation’s “race and blood” from foreigners they saw as “breeds” or “species” not individuals seeking safety. "Build a wall" comes from this period. When President Trump uses 'moron" to bully reporters and talks this week about Somalis as “filthy, dirty, disgusting, ridden with crime” he is echoing the language of the 1880s. Steven Miller adds to the diarrhea of hate that frames people as inferior species, "You are not just importing individuals. You are importing societies…” "What do we think is going to happen?” 

Hate Education and Immigrants?    Racists often attack education – a main vehicle for democratic dignity and progress. Eugenicists embraced antidemocratic ideas and embraced hate through “scientific” justifications. Of course, they ignored facts that got in the way. A 1917 U.S. Army IQ test administered to many immigrants joining the ranks was designed and twisted to reinforce racial prejudice. Indeed, the “data” collected would be the basis of one of the most important Nazi eugenics books. What they ignored was that blacks who had migrated north and had access to philanthropically funded schools performed much better than poor whites from Mississippi, Arkansas, Kentucky who did not have access to education. Maybe this wasn’t about genes and species after all! American eugenicists wondered why they “have no place to drive the Jews to” and remembered in the good old days, “they burned the witches but it seems to be against the mores to burn any considerable part of our population.” They also argued that “The laws of nature require the obliteration of the unfit, and human life is valuable only when it is of use to the community or race.” Hitler was impressed and praised American “Nordic pride in its politics” (referencing immigration restriction laws). The KKK with its slogan “America First” and other anti-immigrant allies in Boston and elsewhere passed the race-based 1924 Quota Immigration Law. 

My Turn    “What is going to happen to us?” By the late 1930s America (due in large part to the levelling effect of the Great Depression) began to sour on eugenics. Were social position and prosperity really indicators of genetic superiority? Eugenics was more about prejudice than science. Funds dried up while researchers discovered that there were no scientific justifications for sterilizing the “feeble-minded”. As we started to let go the Nazis grabbed it. By 1945 they had killed millions and destroyed themselves fighting their war of “race and space”. 

The U.S., and its Allies won World War II. Our strength was our diversity that offered new solutions and commitment to the cause of building a more just Republic. As was true since the American Revolution, Christian, Jew, Muslim, indigenous men and women fought. Over 500,000 Hispanics served valiantly. The Tuskegee Airmen and the 761^st “Black Panthers” continued valuable black service. Indigenous peoples were code talkers and Japanese Americans (despite or because of their families being locked up in U.S. concentration camps) produced the most highly decorated combat unit in U.S. history, the 442^nd Nisei. My good fortune was to work with “Ritchie Boys” mostly ex-pat Jewish German refugees whose service provided about 67% of the battlefield intelligence that helped us beat the Germans in Europe. 

Those who vilify immigrants and refugees for personal political gain, grown from fear and hate, betray and weaken us. It is in our self-interest to foster freedom and diversity. It is purposefully self-destructive (although perhaps self-enriching) to extinguish the lamp beside the “golden door” of American freedom. 

Once while traveling in Israel my driver passed a blackened, dying forest. I thought maybe a missile had fallen. Oh no, he reassured me. We were stupid. Over there we planted one type of tree. A disease came and they died. Look over there. He pointed to a thriving forest full of a variety of trees. We got smarter. Now when a disease comes, only a few die, and the forest is strong enough to thrive. It is the perfect metaphor.    

The Nuremberg Trials: Selective Judgement    The film Nuremberg has made viewers question and reflect on how a democracy descended into fascism. What sorts of personalities and decision-making shape the violence? Simultaneously we are confronted with potential war crimes by our own Department of Defense with indiscriminatory attacks on boats in the Caribbean and the follow-up killing of the survivors. The media has tried to bring our attention to military ethics and codes of conduct that are under assault by using the cases of Nazi U-852 commander Heinz-Wilhelm Eck who was executed for the war crime of gunning down survivors of a freighter n 1944; U.S. Lieutenant William Calley’s conviction of murder for the Mi Lai massacre of 1968, and the crimes committed by U.S. soldiers at Abu Ghraib prison in 2003. “I was only following orders” is not a defense. Law and ethics are the guardrails of functioning democracies. 

Murder is a crime, but is mass murder different?    Raphael Lemkin was a student at the University of Lwów Law School in post-World War I Poland. He was disturbed by the Armenian genocide that was in the news in 1921 because one traumatized survivor, Soghomon Tehlirian, was on trial for assassinating Talaat Pasha, the former Grand Vizier of the Ottoman Empire. Why was he on trial while Pasha, who was convicted in absentia and sentenced to death in the Turkish courts-martial of 1919–20 lived freely in Berlin under an assumed name? Tehlirian was acquitted on grounds of temporary insanity after a brief two-day trial. In 1926 Symon Petliura, alleged overseer of a Ukrainian pogrom in 1918, was killed in Paris by traumatized survivor Shalom Schwarzbard. Like Tehlirian, he was acquitted on the grounds of temporary insanity. Why were individuals forced to take the law into their own hands? Because at the time there were few international laws to punish mass atrocity. States could do what they wished to do to anyone within their borders. Why? 

State Sovereignty    The 1648 Treaty of Westphalia ended the Christian internecine devastation of the Thirty Years’ War. The treaty established the concept of state sovereignty, that the state has supreme, exclusive authority over its territory and domestic affairs. This would create an international system of states meant to maintain order through a balance of power and through avoiding religious wars. This was one of the guiding concepts in both our Declaration of Independence and Constitution. The First Amendment, adding the idea of individual rights of citizens, created the foundation principle of freedom of speech to prevent laws “respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”  

Can States Legally Commit Atrocities?    When Lemkin asked his professor Juliusz Makarewicz about his dilemma about Tehlirian and Tallat Pasha he responded, “Consider the case of the farmer who owns a flock of chickens… He kills them and this is his business. If you interfere, you are trespassing.” Makarewicz was a Polish nationalist who resented the 1919 Minorities Treaty of the Treaty of Versailles that singled out Poland for its attack on minorities, especially Jews, after the First World War. He was arguing that states had the right to protect themselves (or their perception of national identity) when, as he saw it, it was being threatened. He was arguing state sovereignty. 

Nuremberg Trials In 1945    Justice Jackson opened the trial of top Nazis by stating, “The wrongs which we seek to condemn and punish have been so calculated, so malignant, and so devastating, that civilization cannot tolerate their being ignored, because it cannot survive their being repeated.” But what crime would Nazis be tried for? It was decided to charge them with war crimes and crimes against humanity. 

War Crimes (based on the Lieber Code of the Union Army in 1863 and Hague Conventions of 1899 and 1907) are defined as acts between sovereign states in war/armed conflict violating the laws or   customs of war (murder, killing civilians, child soldiers, destruction without military necessity…) 

Crimes Against Humanity (1945 Nuremberg and UN Charter) are defined as “Murder, extermination,   enslavement, deprivation, or any other inhuman act committed against an entire civilian population   before or during the war, or persecution for political, racial, or religious reasons.” In other words,   crimes directed against any civilian or an identifiable part of a civilian population in war or peacetime.   The trials would judge individual actions committed outside of Germany that violated other nations’   sovereignty. Were no crimes committed in Germany from 1933-1939? 

Genocide    Since 1933 Lemkin had tried to give a name to intentional mass murder. By 1944 he had combine the Greek “geno” (race/tribe) with the Latin “cide” (murder). The 1948 U.N. Convention for the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (ratified in 1951) promised to “prevent and punish” genocide.  The new legal concept was meant to be preventative: to identify escalating processes of targeting groups (even within sovereign states), to identify and project intent, and to stop it before the killing began. We will discuss this later. 

My Turn    We are about to judge if our Department of Defense has committed war crimes or just straight out murder because we “cannot tolerate their being ignored.”  Justice Jackson continued his introductory remarks by observing, “That four great nations, flushed with victory and stung with injury stay the hand of vengeance and voluntarily submit their captive enemies to the judgment of the law is one of the most significant tributes that Power has ever paid to reason.” We are being challenged to stand up for our ideals and the rights of citizens against unchecked power. It is truly patriotic to ask difficult questions of those in power and of ourselves. We remember that our government speaks for us, We the People. Legal standards, restraint, responsibility for and dignity to others, not their exploitation or destruction, is the work of democracy.

Hyperbole?   In January 2016 Presidential candidate Donald Trump stated, “I Could ... Shoot Somebody, And I Wouldn't Lose Any Voters”. According to the Washington Post this week, Secretary of Defense Hegseth ordered the military to “kill everyone” who had survived an attack on an alleged drug smuggling boat. This, after firing many top JAG lawyers and after announcing to top U.S. military leaders forcibly assembled at Quantico in September 2025 that the U.S. would no longer be bound by the military rules of engagement. Are we about to cross the line into being a lawless nation running at the whim of its leaders? Are we to discard the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution and let violence overcome legal constraint? Hyperbole you say? It is astonishing that this is the actual opening of a blog in the U.S. in 2025. We are entering the next phase to test the strength of Madisonian checks and balances democracy. I believe we will pass this test. It is important to point out, however, that Germans did not in the 1930s.

Hitler Given Power    Hitler is given power legally In 1923 while in prison for treason (trying to overthrow the government with a coup) Hitler wrote his whiny, self-pitying, hate rant Mein Kampf (My Struggle) that not only invented a false political biography but shifted his political calculations. Rather than seize power he would get it by working within the system, by getting the Nazi Party to win elections. Then he would be able to destroy the state from within. Hitler went from defeat in November 1932 to being named chancellor by a willing coalition of conservatives in a few weeks in the beginning of 1933. President Hindenburg, convinced by backroom plotting by self-serving elites, had given Hitler power legally. It did not take him long to overcome the checks and balances of the Weimar Republic and establish his destructive dictatorship. 

Ending Democracy From Within    Hitler’s first discussion with his cabinet on January 30 was about how to create an Enabling Law to circumvent the Reichstag and let Hitler rule by decree. Conservatives were fine with that. A few days later (February 2) the cabinet adopted an emergency decree for “the protection of the German people” giving police enormous power. Two days later the cabinet adopted an emergency decree to arrest striking workers. They were moving quickly, and conservatives were pleased that they had secured the power to destroy the Left – especially the Communists. Soon it became clear that Hitler had no intention of playing by their rules. Frick, the new Nazi Minister of the Interior, replaced SPD (Social Democrat) leaders with Nazis, mandated prayer in schools, and gave the University of Jena a chair in racial sciences. 

The Reichstag Fire Decree    Hitler’s consolidation of power began in earnest on February 27, 1933. It was one week before the March 5 federal elections. Tension had been building and the SA brownshirts were anxious to fight their opponents, the Communists. And then, the Reichstag was set on fire. Hitler learned of the fire and was driven to the site. Like any good narcissistic leader, he was enraged and took the fire as a personal attack. Hermann Göring, suspiciously on scene (speculation remains that he ordered a paramilitary unit to set the fire), rushed over and convinced Hitler to let him team up with SA to destroy the Left. Hitler responded in fury: “Now there’s no mercy…every communist functionary will be shot where he’s found. The Communist members of the Reichstag must be hanged this very night!” It was a call for political vengeance, but the police hesitated. 

Law and Order    On February 28, Hitler decided to act within the constitution. He blamed the Communists for the fire and urged a ready and willing Hindenburg to use Article 48 to suspend civil liberties. The “Decree for the Protection of Volk and State.” The “Reichstag Fire Decree” enabled Hitler to suspend the constitution and curtail personal freedoms: freedom of opinion; freedom of press; and the freedom to organize and assemble. It dramatically increased state and police intervention in private life: censoring mail, listening to phones, searches without warrant. President Hindenburg approved a new legal category “protective custody” (Schutzhaft) for political dissenters. All criticism of the government was outlawed, and political ‘gossip’ was now seen as dangerous. Hitler was using legislative loopholes to destroy democracy from within. Hitler utilized the police to arrest political opponents. 4,000 political opponents were arrested that night. Within months, the police arrested more than 20,000 people in Prussia; 40,000 political opponents fled to neighboring countries; and within weeks, 25,000 were arrested and tortured in emerging “wild” concentration camps (80,000 total by end of the year). The disunified Left realized this was no longer politics, but annihilation. Special courts were introduced to speed up the process and avoid entanglements and delays. 

Destroying the Legislature    On March 23, Hitler moved to pass an enabling act, the “Law to Remove the Distress of the German People and the State” (a nice, cynical touch) that would transfer legislative authority from the parliament to the Reich Chancellery. To pass, it required a two-thirds majority and 66% of deputies to be present. But many ministers had been intimidated and were not present (including at least 26 SPD hiding for their lives). How to overcome this?  Göring, as President of the Reichstag, simply created a new procedure deeming any absent members as “present” to ensure the “constitutionality” of the vote. The Nazis were still 31 votes short. Now what?  The Nazis lobbied the remaining obstacle, the German Center Party (Catholic). Hitler promised them that he would only use his new powers in emergencies and promised the Catholic Church that they could operate without any interference. Hitler enjoyed lying to those willing to believe him. Thinking they had secured a win, the Catholic Centre Party gave the Nazis the required votes and the enabling act was passed with 441 deputies voting in favor with 94 nay votes. The Reichstag had voted itself out of power. The Enabling Act would be renewed three times in the coming years and was the pseudo-legal foundation for Hitler’s actions. 

Enter, the Courts    The courts, not for the first or last time, shaped and helped Hitler to consolidate his power.  Justice Franz Schlegelberger, State Secretary in Ministry of Justice, played a key role. He had been an opponent of the Reichstag Fire Decree arguing that it was unconstitutional to retroactively impose the death penalty for arson on the unstable Dutch tourist the Nazis had arrested for the crime. The judge was not so concerned with the decree as much as he was concerned that it was retroactive, and thus, in his mind, illegal. This is one of the main reasons the Nazis learned to work within the system. Schlegelberger had trained during the Kaiser Reich and was attracted to the idea of an authoritarian legal order that could maintain social order. He gravitated towards Hitler and believed that individualism undermined the state’s ability to keep order. He would not challenge decisive actions by Hitler if they followed legal forms. Thus, in ruling about the legality of the Enabling Act, he embraced the pseudo-legality of the manipulation of the vote (at least they had gone through a process) and ruled that with the elimination of parliamentary oversight of legislation, the government could now act “with boldness, quickness [and] richness.” 

“Working Towards the Führer”    It was the cooperation from the public that made Nazi control possible. There were relatively few police per capita, and people quickly learned that all they needed to do was to obey the law, try to stay out of trouble, and promote their own interests. Werner Willikens, a bureaucrat in the Prussian Agricultural Ministry, summed it up best by saying, “…it is the duty of every single person to attempt, in the spirit of the leader, to works towards him… which would lead to enjoying “the finest reward” of “suddenly attaining the legal confirmation of his work.” 

The “Night of the Long Knives”    In June 1934 Hitler ordered (and was present) at the slaughter of the leaders of his paramilitary, the Brownshirts, and some of his political opponents. It was outright murder, but Hitler claimed he hadj to do this to defend the nation (from the very group he had utilized?) Hitler had decided to side with the powerful elites (Army, businessmen, bankers…) over his own thugs in order to advance his power. Is Murder Illegal? Even President Hindenburg was impressed by Hitler’s decisiveness. It was clear that no opposition to Hitler would be tolerated. On July 3, the Reich Cabinet issued a law, legalizing the murders after the fact, as an emergency action taken to save the nation. Hitler addressed the Reichstag on July 13, 1934, explaining that, as the supreme ruler of Germany, he had exercised his power against individuals who threatened the existence of the German nation. He was claiming to have acted in self-defense of the nation. Justice Schlegelberger, having already approved the Enabling Act, now accepted the idea of retroactive sanctioning of the killings as it “was absolutely justifiable, because revolt meant a state of emergency.” He had already ruled that Hitler could act with boldness. Murder was now seen as an acceptable act of the state to protect the nation. 

My Turn    There are echoes here about how people who despise democratic checks and balances work hard to get unchecked power. As one who believes in democracy, it is self-evident that individual power must be checked. We are not 1930s Germany. Yes, there are echoes, but also something different, bipartisan push back. An investigation into what Secretary Hegseth is up to (in our name) is a good start. Military veterans speaking up against following illegal orders show a clear difference between our system and Germany in the 1930s. We need to keep supporting those who point out the obvious – that unchecked power and greed is self-destructive and destructive. As we turn back to the 250^th anniversary of our founding and the extraordinary ideas produced by imperfect people, it is important to embrace the significance of those ideals: 

The Declaration of Independence: We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed…laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. 

Our Constitution: We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity… Our freedom, liberty, safety, and happiness are rooted in recognition of the dignity of each individual. As humans we face challenges, contradictions, motives, and rationalization that  sometimes betray this. 

As we look back, we can be patriots who overcome our own failings by accepting the challenge to live with law and order, not law by order.

Beware   On a fall day in New England a friend and survivor of the Bosnian genocide turned to me and said, "Always beware of paramilitaries. That's where it starts." As I thought about how true that was across the genocides that I was studying, I thought I should add "state sanctioned". Mass atrocity crimes are facilitated by paramilitary organizations that receive the "green light" from those in power. Paramilitaries operate outside the law and avoid oversight or constraint. It is more likely to occur in places where democracy is weak or there is a state legitimacy crisis.

A History of Extra-Legal Paramilitaries   There is a long and twisted history of armed paramilitary vigilantes in the U.S. from the KKK to, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center, an estimated 169 private groups operating today. These groups exist outside state-sanctioned militias (ie: National Guard) and are often associated with anti-government and often extremist views. They find legitimacy in part by tapping into traditional symbols of contested history such as the Confederate battle flag. 

2^nd Amendment    I am a New Englander. I actually look forward to Patriot's Day every April that remembers the battles of Lexington and Concord fought by minutemen militias against British tyranny. Throughout the American Revolution colonial militias were a key supplemental force for the Continental Army. At the nation's founding they had been crucial for each colony's defense. When the Second Amendment was codified, it recognized "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed". The amendment was crucial for new states to give up some of their autonomy to agree to join and form the United States. The agreement allowed states and their governors to oversee and maintain their defense force while joining a federal state. As in any good democracy the meaning of the amendment continues to be debated. When it became part of the Constitution, smooth bore muskets were prevalent, but not the more expensive rifle. In the lasty twenty or so years the Supreme Court has increasingly ruled that individual gun ownership, with little regulation, is appropriate. Training to be a soldier in the 1980s but not taking my commission, I believe that weapons of war designed to inflict mass destruction belong in the hands of the professional national armed services. Guns continue to proliferate in our society in staggering ways that could never have been anticipated by the Founders. We continue to debate the social cost we are willing to spend. 

Compare and Contrast   As guns become more part of our daily lives one argument that doesn't hold true is the often repeated political (and marketing slogan) that the first thing the Nazis did was to take away the peoples' arms. In a false comparison, the inference is to Patriot's Day, but has little relevance to what happened in Germany. The truth is a bit more muddled and unnerving.   

The Germany Army, Paramilitaries, and Nazis    President Hindenburg named Hitler as German Chancellor in 1933 after listening to the advice of a group of anti-democratic conservate politicians who convinced him to give Hitler a chance. Since being imprisoned for treason after the failed comical Munich Putsch, Hitler wrote his fictional biography and political self-pitying rant Mein Kampf (My Struggle) in which he outlined a new political strategy. He would get power by working within the system not by trying to overthrow it. It almost didn't work, until the Great Depression, para-militarized pressure, and political back door maneuverings helped. That is where the guns come in. 

Kurt von Schleicher was a Major General in the Reichswehr (German Army after World War I). He was scheming to modernize the army by cutting social spending. He feared, with an army of only 100,000 men, that Germans would lose their identities (manliness) if they did not have mandatory military training. He was also scheming for power. In 1930, thinking that Hitler's paramilitary SA (“Brownshirts”) could fill the void, he befriended Ernst Röhm, the SA chief of staff. Schleicher gave the SA access to army depots and arsenals. The two agreed that in a crisis (war or a Communist coup) the SA would come under command of the Reichswehr. Like everyone else, Schleicher mistakenly underestimated the threat of Hitler and the Nazis and thought he could use them for his own ambitions. 

The SA were interested in antisemitism, violence, cruelty, and ending democracy. With guns now plentiful they could terrorize Hitler's opponents. It was a constant problem for Hitler. He loved the violence and intimidation tactics of the SA but was frequently put on the defensive when other leaders of society (especially the police, courts, and the Army) pushed back. In a moment of political clarity, then Chancellor Brüning was working against Schleicher and convinced Hindenburg to ban the SA and SS. To no one's surprise, street violence dropped dramatically and confidence in government stabilized briefly. It is difficult for violence and democracy to coexist. 

And then, Schleicher secretly met with Hitler on May 8, 1932. If Hitler supported him, Schleicher would convince Hindenburg to dismiss Brüning, create a new government, and lift the ban on the SA and SS (Blackshirts).  And so, Schleicher convinced Hindenburg to ask for Brüning’s resignation. A puppet of Schleicher was named chancellor and the ban on the SA and SS was lifted. Hitler would now often rally the SA to flood the streets as he tried to ramp up the pressure. His goal was to make violence the norm so that he could convince people that only he could stop it, only he could bring back "law and order". 

Warnings    Leaders in the German Weimar Republic actively worked with unregulated right-wing paramilitaries and the Army gave them weapons. There had been a long tradition of armed paramilitarism in Germany from the time of Napoleon's occupation in the 19^th century through the post World War I era in the early 20^th century. These military and paramilitary formations were often used to suppress revolt and keep a government (whether left or right) in power. Symbols and badges were interchangeable, such as the Death's Head symbol of the Prussian Hussars becoming the symbol of Hitler's SS. Little of this reflects the American experience whose militias were formed to protect, not destroy, communities. 

My Turn   Once when I was presenting at a U.S. military base during the Days of Remembrance of the Holocaust, a soldier asked, with obvious concern, "What is the difference between a patriot and a nationalist?" A patriot is someone who examines their country's history without fear with the goal of improving its ideals. A nationalist is someone who wants to rewrite history, exclude those who they believe do not belong, and accept violence as a means to an end. 

I'll sight only two of many obvious warning signs to the growing influence and sanctioning of extra-legal paramilitaries in the U.S.: Amongst the January 6, 2021, rioters and attackers of the Capitol were paramilitaries like the Proud Boys, Oath Keepers, Three Percenters and more, who all received presidential pardons. ICE is claiming the role of law enforcement, blurring the lines between their behavior and the police. They act outside the normal restraints and rules while well-regulated militias (professional armed services) are being coopted into the mission. Viewing pictures of German police on the parameters of SA public acts of brutality do strike a frightening, echoing chord from 1933. As a well-armed, government sanctioned and financed paramilitary, ICE has been setting up extra legal camps and disappearing people. I won't go further for now. 

Paramilitaries have skirted the law in the past and inflicted harm on U.S. citizens. President Grant established the Department of Justice to fight the KKK and succeeded, at first. It is a fine line between defense and vigilante behavior. 

When comparing ourselves to Nazi Germany it is important to point out that our system and experiences are different. Significantly, this applies to our professional armed forces. Unlike Germany, whose officers swore an oath of loyalty to the person of the Presidency, our leaders swear an oath to the Constitution. The military is designed, and its values are ingrained, to protect us from enemies foreign or domestic, and follow duly elected public officials. It is crucial to push back against those who wish to blur these lines or change the role from defense to oppression. It is alarming how much our political leadership is working to undermine and shift the mission of our armed forces. It is a troubling warning sign if militia symbols, or symbols from anti-democratic history become acceptable. 

I was alarmed this week when the U.S. Coast Guard lowered the threat level of hate symbols like the Nazi swastika, the so-called Confederate flag, and the noose. And then, I was encouraged when Admiral Lunday asserted the next day that these symbols of hate, treason, and antidemocracy would continue to be banned in the service. We are a democracy continually wrestling with its ideals and leadership matters. We need to be constantly reminded of what our democratic ideals are, support those who bravely clarify when the line is blurring. We must realize that we too are leaders standing in defense of a more just Republic not one that justifies violence for the sake of power.

Believe in the Republic   Up front, I believe in the unfulfilled dream of our democratic exercise. The promise of individual dignity, however, is a work in progress. There’s a sense of despair as we watch anti-democratic leaders, autocrats, oligarchs, and greed- fueled people commandeer the Republic. We must overcome them. If we misread their intent or qualify it, we know the potential outcomes. Mostly, we must realize that the words we use and the world we see and hope for - are not the ones they see or hear. What is strange to us is perfectly normal for them. We need to stop adjusting, rationalizing, and accommodating and instead, make them. As we identify the toxic threat, we can redirect our future. As we continue to show our courage – simply not giving in – the people exploiting us will lose. 

As Ken Burns’ film about the American Revolution is about to air it is important to remember our Declaration of Independence from the monarchs and now oligarchs: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” There is nothing self-evident about this. It is up to us to make it so. 

Be Silly and Focused   I’ve written before about how silliness and joy are powerful weapons against the tyrant and autocrat who cannot understand them. Even so, funny people are grounded. At the end of The Great Dictator, Charlie Chaplin, literally replacing “Hitler” speaks:  “We all want to help one another. Human beings are like that. We want to live by each other’s happiness, not by each other’s misery…Our knowledge has made us cynical. Our cleverness, hard and unkind. We think too much and feel too little. More than machinery we need humanity. More than cleverness we need kindness and gentleness. Without these qualities, life will be violent and all will be lost…Do not despair. The misery that is now upon us is but the passing of greed – the bitterness of men who fear the way of human progress. The hate of men will pass, and dictators die, and the power they took from the people will return to the people…” 

It Happens   I’ve just described Mussolini, Hitler, Franco, Stalin, Putin, Orban, and should I go on? Each one of these men are insecure and full of fear and perhaps even self-loathing, The end result is pain and suffering. 

Wanna be a lonely, pathetic “strongman”?   Shout out to Ruth Ben-Ghiat’s excellent book, Strongmen: Mussolini to the Present. If you wish to submit your job application for pathetic “strongman” here’s a guide: Because you need constant adoration, you must require constant statements of loyalty from those around you who are using you for their own gain. Make sure you’re good at threatening people and have the capacity for violence. That shouldn’t be hard as you don’t like people anyway. You’ve likely committed a crime or two so make sure you seek office to gain legal protection. Don’t forget to hate, blame, and manipulate women (or girls) and humiliate the men around you while you’re at it. It’s good for your resume if you are a sexual predator. That will reinforce your definition of powerful manliness, and be a strong motive to get elected to avoid prosecution. Don’t listen or work with others because everyone else is stupid and weak. You’re not getting the job unless you have experience in mass communication so buy a few media outlets or at least get on them. They like things that are angry and shocking so be sure to build up your “manliness” by attacking the weak and vulnerable who are just trying to live their lives in peace and joy. Attacking LGBTQ+ is easiest. Bluster a lot as you plunder. Don’t forget to manipulate populist nationalism to let people know who does and does not belong. It’s better to tell people who doesn’t belong or have the right to exist. That might be trickier in America with the whole Statue of Liberty thing, so be sure to divide people by “race”, religion, ethnicity, or anything else you can come up with. People may not like it so be sure to forbid protests, comedians, our newspeople who criticize you. Oh, good trick, label everyone else “terrorists” or “enemies” of freedom. As you undermine law, order, and decency, it’s fun to use paramilitaries to act outside the law. It's just easier and the best part is that you can say you’re “for” “law and order”. It’s important you don’t laugh to yourself too much about this. Big rallies gives you the adulation you need and gives people something to do when there’s not much on TV these days anyway. Oh yes, don’t forget to pal up with other dictators who are slaughtering or imprisoning their people. People will be confused by that, but what do you care. You have money and they don’t. Create as much chaos, pain, confusion, and economic distress as possible because that’ll distract them. Oh, almost forgot because it’s hard for you to believe this, but it works. Be sure, as you victimize other people, that you constantly tell others that you are the victim. That’s a good one! Who said you didn’t have a sense of humor? 

The “Strongman” as Crazy Uncle   I am still guided by President Roosevelt’s, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself” from 1933. He was offering the antidote to fascism. Hope over self-destruction. We have to be able to separate the leader from his followers. I’m not talking about those who have collaborated for self-gain and have hurt so many – that will be a matter of politics and law. But we must recognize that we humans are vulnerable. When people are traumatized or afraid they can embrace the irrational. As they attempt to get some control over their lives in moments when what they “knew” or expected from life are disappearing, we must respond with compassion not condemnation. They have embraced the “strongman” perhaps because he feeds their biases, frustration, and anger. For many, their most important “currency” isn’t financial but social. Family and friends are what makes life worth living. The “strongman” knows this and is playing the role of the crazy uncle. Sure he’s nuts, but he’s one of us and someday he might help us. If you try to use your logic and reason on them to tell them that they’re wrong, good luck! This is about their pride, sense of belonging, and sense of self-worth. 

My Turn   Shout out to the Portland frog! We must keep calm and not take the bait. We’re strong enough to respect ourselves and our democratic hopes. People who try to project power as “strongmen” are pathetic, but dangerous. How long do we accept their buffoonery before we say that we matter? Using non-violent demonstrations and laughing at the strong man is a good start. We must continue to limit access to guns and turn the temperature down. Arming paramilitaries and increasing violence is the tool of choice for dictators. Despite what the rumor mill says, Hitler did not take away the guns. Instead, his SA “brownshirt” thugs got their weapons from the German Army depots in a plot to create violence so that a dictator could justify a crackdown. We’ll talk about the Second Amendment later. For now, it’s good to remember that it focused on the 18^th century concept and federated nation-building idea of “well-regulated militias”. We must investigate white supremacists in the military and police and declare white supremacist movements as terrorist organizations. Demand transparency and oversight. Protect any groups or people that are targeted. Follow the money. We must say enough, there is a better way. We must value and protect the media, comedians and the teachers. When it seemed that we were powerless, a nationwide protest to save Jimmy Kimmel (whether you like him or not) showed that this is up to us. We must educate ourselves about the merits of civic behavior and encourage workplace training. We do this not by focusing on the “strongmen” and giving him air to fill his balloon, but by highlighting the everyday, extraordinary person who stands up for their neighbor and themselves. We have plenty of examples to find.

10 November 2025 

Kristallnacht Remembrance   The Nazi-organized November pogrom (violent attacks on Jewish communities with the aid or indifference of the government) took place on November 9-10. 1938. It was a threshold moment for Hitler and the Nazis who had been given power in 1933 and had destroyed checks to his power, destroyed the Weimar constitution, assumed control of the military and police, and changed German society. This evening marked a radicalizing shift in policy and actions towards Jews. Synagogues, businesses, and homes were violated and destroyed, and tens of thousands of German Jews were arrested or murdered. There were willing collaborators across society and fire and police departments stood by, generally refused to help German Jews, and hosed down adjacent buildings as synagogues and Torah scrolls burned. A new level had been reached, and anti-Jewish policy was increasingly radicalized as World War II approached. For years I helped to direct an annual Kristallnacht Remembrance in partnership with Keene NH’s Colonial Theatre to remember the violence and remind our community that mass atrocity crimes are a process not an event. By paying attention to that process, we have the power to intervene, to stop the acceleration. It was a public event that included the Jewish community, mayor, fire and police chiefs, survivors, witnesses, community organizations like MoCo Arts, school groups, interfaith community, and other community members and officials. City institutions chose to use the remembrance as an opportunity to repeat their mission of service and protection to all – in the light of a time when that was not true. Remembrance allowed us to come together, for each other, and use memory to teach responsibility and awareness. It fortified us and sustained us for many years and created a community alert to antisemitism, hate, and targeting. We are a resilient people when we take care of each other. 

Hate in the 1930s   Of the many friends Hitler had in the United States in the 1930s, I would like to focus on Fritz Kuhn and Fr. Charles Coughlin. Kuhn was a German World War I veteran who immigrated and became a US citizen in 1934. Germany had the second highest immigration quota due to the 1924 Immigration Act that gave preference to white Europeans. The act, being heralded today by some in the administration, was written and passed by members of the KKK and others who jumped on the Anti-immigrant bandwagon. The KKK’s slogan and soon to be allied movement, was “America First!”  Kuhn was a fascist, pro-Hitler, isolationist, and antisemite. He created the German American Bund on the hopes of being Hitler’s man in the U.S. and recruited mostly immigrants who were anti-Communist to his movement. At first, the Nazis offered funding but became increasingly concerned that Kuhn’s antics might draw too much attention at a time when Germany was content to let America be isolationist and ignorant. Fr. Charles Coughlin was a Catholic priest born in Canada who became a U.S. citizen. He was an antisemitic, anti-Communist, pro-Nazi, outraged radio host whose audience was the largest in American history (29 million listeners out of 130 million Americans).   His newspaper, Social Justice, had a circulation of 200,000 in 1940. He had his own paramilitary, the Christian Front militia (“Fr. Coughlin’s Brownshirts”) organized like a terrorist cell. In Boston, they showed Nazi military propaganda films. Like the Oath Keepers today, they recruit from military and police for weapons and credibility. His followers were poor and working class Irish and Germans from Northeast and Midwest. His National Union for Social Justice was a political movement focused on replacing capitalist democracy. He published the fraudulent, Russian-invented antisemitic conspiracy fantasy, The Protocols of the Elders of Zion; Nazi propaganda; Goebbels’ speeches; and praised was praised by Der Stürmer. He verbally attacked refugees as communists and Jews and ranted about the “left-wing” “liberal” media. He worked closely with the German-American Bund. His rallies were replete with American flags and crowds riled up by hatred. 

The America Frist Committee   The AFC brought together isolationists, failed Bundists, Coughlin supporters, far-right extremists, antisemites, religious bigots, the disenfranchised, and the greedy. Many respectable business leaders and politicians gave it legitimacy. They opposed the New Deal and President FDR and feared that war would undermine their European investments and markets. In September 1940 America First became an official nonprofit. They called for “Anglo-Saxon purity” and launched an antisemitic magazine, The Cross and the Flag.  

Resisting   Leaders must constantly remind us to push back against hate, anger, and fearmongering that are toxic to democracy and dignity. President FDR responded to threats and problems with caution, patience, timing, and education. He was clear about believing in democratic norms and helped to reshape American attitudes in ways that would lead to the civil rights movement. Leadership matters. But we can be leaders too. We must reject political violence, anti-democratic forces, and accept our responsibility to build a “more perfect union”. We must have confidence and courage. 

Resisting the Bund   In 1937, Kuhn’s German American Bund tried to establish a Hitler Youth-type training camp in Southbury, CT. Kuhn stated: “The principles of the Bund and the KKK are the same”. How did the people of Southbury respond? How did they meet the challenge? Rev. M. Edgar N. Lindsay was one of two pastors who used the Sunday before Thanksgiving to preach about the Nazi “menace”. The Southbury churches rallied behind their neighbors and demonstrated peacefully, and through zoning regulations, prevented a Bund camp from being built. Southbury is about 25 miles from Yale University where the America First Committee (AFC) began. 

The German American Bund Loses   In 1938 Nazi Germany cut off funding for Kuhn’s Bund and forbade membership for German citizens. Hitler was intent on keeping the U.S. isolationist. In 1939, Kuhn pulled off his greatest event, a rally in New York City’s Madison Square Garden. 22,000 attended as Nazi drums pounded and uniformed Nazis marched and gave speeches. The film of the rally is often used today as a frightening warning. However, what most people forget is that 100,000 protested outside the arena. Mayor LaGuardia was outraged by Kuhn and ordered an investigation into Bund financial records. They discover that the $14,000 raised at MSG rally had been embezzled by Kuhn and he was arrested and convicted. Other Bund leaders were jailed for various offenses and membership dwindled. After December 1941, the Bund was outlawed by the U.S. Fritz Kuhn was imprisoned for larceny and forgery from 1939 to 1943. In 1943, he was reinterned as an enemy agent. In 1945, he was deported and imprisoned in post-war Germany before dying in 1951. 

Father Coughlin Loses   Fr. Charles Coughlin ranted and justified the Nazi November 9-10 pogrom (Kristallnacht): on air by claiming they had it coming to them because Christians were being persecuted. The owner of the WMCA station that hosted Coughlin’s broadcasts immediately ended them. The Nazi German press decried his censoring as the silencing of free speech by "Jewish organizations camouflaged as American.” In 1942 the U.S. government suspended the free mailing privilege of “Social Justice” and the Archbishop of Detroit forced Coughlin to close his newspaper and forbade its distribution by mail. Coughlin vanished from the public arena, working as a parish pastor until retiring in 1966. He died in obscurity in 1979. 

My Turn   Kuhn and Coughlin were defeated because Americans took responsibility for each other and trusted in their confidence in democratic norms. We must resist the temptation to respond to hate with hate. We respond with confidence, humor, discipline, peaceful protests, and the ballot box. We find strength by recalling the destructive events that took place in the past, the people affected by them or targeted today, and we stand together. At the Cohen Center’s annual Kristallnacht Remembrances, the participants recommitted themselves to being members of a community that stands against hatred and violence. Together they would say: 

We remember that night as a moral obligation to the victims and the survivors as well as for ourselves, for the sake of our children, and for our community. We recognize our responsibility to care for others in our midst who might be overlooked, targeted, or victimized in their circumstances. We remember so that                individuals may refuse to become perpetrators, “bystanders” or   collaborators. We remember in the hope that present and future   generations take responsibility for building a world free of   antisemitism, bigotry, intolerance, and hate. Therefore, we     remember Kristallnacht to remind ourselves to care for one another, to build peace, and be a community in which compassion, respect and justice thrive.

On this Veteran's Day, let us also remember the sacrifice of our veterans who risked all to defend the idea of liberty, freedom, and dignity. 

3 November 2025 

Compare and Contrast:  “Godwin's Law” states: "As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches one." It is all too easy and too common to throw around “Hitler”, “fascist”, “Nazi”, or “Communist” name-calling in what passes itself off as political discourse. That is recklessness shaped by laziness, anger, fear, and ignorance. Reducing devastatingly powerful names and terms into slurs may feel satisfying or allow us to vent, but it is counterproductive and damaging. As an example: After the Trump/Hegseth meeting with our top military commanders (some of whom courageously retired afterward rather than be manipulated into authoritarianism) an online post reduced the significance and got it wrong: “German generals were summoned to Berlin…They were told that their previous oaths to the Weimar Republic were void, and that they had to swear a new oath to the Fuhrer. Most did, in order to keep their jobs. Sound familiar?” Well, no. The significant difference and dangerous misunderstanding in this post is that the German military never swore an oath to the Weimar Constitution, but to the President of the Republic. When President Hindenburg died, Hitler merged the roles of President and Chancellor, and the military were obligated to swear loyalty to him. Although the outrage about the unprecedented meeting of our military leaders was genuine, reducing it with incorrect comparisons cannot help us find solutions and recognize our particular challenges and opportunities. 

We Should Care About Our Own History   The United States has a wonderfully complex history. We grow stronger by honestly and responsibly asking questions of it. Why was fascism (and then Nazism) appealing to many Americans in the 1930s? What connections were there to our founding? Our Civil War? The KKK? Anti-immigrant sentiment? The immigrant experience? Eugenics and Jim Crow? We should be less concerned about wondering if we are acting like Germans in the 1930s and recognize instead the dark forces we have had to repeatedly beat back during our own history. There are definite connections to behaviors, justifications, political shenanigans, personalities, and corporate maneuvering towards fascism. Fritz Kuhn’s German American Bund espousing Nazism was in many ways an import, but how did he and Father Coughlin attract an audience? The questions we need to ask must reflect more home grown, not German, realities.   

Fascists and Nazis   Fascism is not an ideology, but a reactionary political behavior – encouraging violent rejection of the status quo. Nazism is a form of fascism, but in addition to being focused on strongman leadership, ultra-nationalism and war, they were uniquely driven by antidemocratic and race-based ideologies of purity of blood and antisemitism. We may be troubled by authoritarianism in our Republic and echoes of fascism today. We must identify and label fascist and Nazi-leaning actions and beliefs. But we must also recognize the differences between then and now, our own history of opposing them, and focus on the opportunities. 

Origins and Misconceptions    In 1933, newly elected President Franklin Roosevelt was accused of wanting to become a “socialist dictator” with his New Deal approach to the Great Depression. From then on, the corporate-motivated slur of “socialist” misunderstood or less likely conveniently ignored that the Nazis were not socialists. Context is everything. Nazi was shorthand for “National Socialist German Workers' Party.” Taking just a second, something is wrong. Nationalists were in favor of a strong state, militaristic leaders and authoritarian rule while socialists were concerned with the worker, democracy, and think internationally. How do we reconcile this? The Nazis were the first modern German political party attempting to break through the old way of doing politics in Germany. They were seeking to blur the lines and appeal to a broader constituency. If terms were used loosely enough, people could hear what they wanted to hear and dismiss and deny things that did not represent them. 

Weimar Republic

At that time, Germany was divided politically, socially, religiously, regionally, and economically – and the parties represented those identities. Catholics voted for the Catholic Center Party; Farmers voted in the German Farmers’ Party;  Conservatives and monarchists voted with the German Peoples’ Party (DVP), or if more right wing, The German National People's Party (DNVP); and if you were working class, you perhaps would vote for the Socialist Workers’ Party of Germany (SAPD) or, if more left-leaning, the Communist Party (KPD); while advocates of democracy voted for the Social Democratic Party (SPD). While the conservative parties represented the old Germany and the leftist parties expressed Marxist beliefs in different ways, it was difficult to form coalitions. This was especially true of the left where there were clear distinctions and hostile divisions between socialists and communists. 

Socialists and Communists

The SPD sought a democratic path to socialism and separated itself from any affiliation with the Soviet Union while he KPD argued for a violent revolution working with Stalin. Germans could distinguish between them. For the Nazis, their goal was to appear socialist in order to deepen the wedge and perhaps attract followers as they reached out beyond identity lines in the name of “unity”. It was cynical manipulation by a party that was fascist. They did attract some socialists, but the majority of those remained with the Social Democrats. If we fall into the trap of “Nazis were socialists” then we ignorantly accept the Nazi manipulation, the contradictions, and their blurring of reality. If we accept the reductionist narrative that the “left” are “communists” we are ignoring reality once again. 

In the post-World War I 1930s, with Germany facing unrest and fear, Communism was indeed perceived as a threat (Ukraine famine, soviet purges, an ideology of violent expansion and overthrowing the elites…) Stalin was funding much of it and Communist loyalties were to him and the ideology. Today, there is no organized and threatening Communist Party (especially in the U.S.). Putin’s funding of a campaign of disinformation, antidemocratic, social division and violence does echo those times. However, it is a different threat, and we must perceive it as so. Those who invoke the specter of Communism are tapping into German fears of the 1930s, but also our fears that carried through the Cold War and created blacklists. It is a convenient red herring, disinterested in truth, but fueled by and banking on fear and ignorance for personal gain and power.

My Turn   We can use history as a tool to compare and contrast, An image taken by Franz Konrad of the SS during the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising of 1943, the “Warsaw Ghetto Boy”, is a photo taken at a murder scene. For the perpetrator, that was not an issue. Indeed, the perpetrators posed for their friend behind the camera for pictures that would be submitted in the report on the operation. They wanted to be seen because they saw themselves as powerful and right. An obvious comparison would be of an American lynching. After all, the KKK was one of the groups behind the writing and passing of the 1924 Quota immigration system and would later side with American Nazis and antisemites in the 1930s. In 1930, a lynching took place of two black American teenagers in Marion, Indiana. It was one of the few lynchings outside the deep South, so it was a boon for white supremacists and racists to argue that this is a common American practice. Lawrence Beitler, unlike Konrad, was a reluctant photographer of over 15,000 white men, women and children who showed up. Like the Warsaw Ghetto killers, there was glee in be photographed as it reinforced their sense of white power. Like the Nazis (that would come after them) they would self-identify as white Christian nationalists - many of whom believed in the mythical white replacement conspiracy theory that still drives racist manipulation and destruction today. In both cases mentioned here, murder was not just possible, it was permissible. However, we must go beyond simple comparisons and look for contrasts. Why were the Nazis in the photo later convicted and executed for war crimes when the Americans in their picture were not? Does it change the questions we if we recognize that the Nazis and their collaborators were acting during wartime while the American lynching mobs were not? Does that matter? What allowed for public lynching? That is a deeply American question. And yet, despite the difficulties and contradictions, we cobbled and forged together a nation rooted in a premise that things can improve. We resisted and bested fascism, Nazism, and Communism in the 1930s. We decided that faith in the Republic and its demands were more powerful than fear. Leadership, the rule of (not by) law, and individual citizens standing up for each other made the difference. It was not perfect nor without controversy, but it emerged from a nation aspiring to build a more perfect union, not a self-destructive authoritarian state.

27 October 2025  

The Pursuit of Happiness Over Politicization of Everyday Life   Over seven million people gathered across the nation to express their right to be left alone. This generation may not remember a time when every decision (what car to drive, what sticker to use, what opinion to express, how to talk with friends and family…) was not measured by politics. The sheer invasiveness of politics in private lives and in our public spaces warns us that we are navigating how life will look in a totalitarian state. That is not the promise and hope of the American Revolution nor why our imperfect Republic was established. We were created in the pursuit of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, not, as the Declaration of Independence proposed, freedom from the autocrats and religious ideologies that divided and destroyed Europe for personally perceived gain. 

A Process Not An Event    Mass atrocity crimes take a long time to develop. Institutions have to be weakened, perpetrators need to be recruited, collaborators and away-lookers need to be cultivated. We see past viciousness and atrocities as something that would never happen here…until they begin to. Our senses, reactions, priorities, and energies are dulled, and we enter a new reality. Can we perceive that things have shifted and continue to shift or are we too busy accommodating? The powerful, choosing power, wealth, division, and exploitation are keenly aware of the momentum they are creating. Their interests are not ours and they know it. 

Warning Signs    Experts in my field have enough longitudinal evidence of how societies find themselves in increased risk of atrocity. My former colleague Dr. James Waller has identified a number of those areas of concern such as governance and economics.  Democratic governance decreases the risk of atrocity as people’s needs are heard and political stability and future expectations of stability frame discussions and policies. However, when a minority elite has power and uses an exclusionary ideology to secure that power, a country’s risk increases. Do those in power try to include a vast majority or do they isolate, manipulate ever-present divisions, and villainize those in the opposition?  Is violence and militarism promoted as virtue? Are state structures secure and trusted or weak and corrupt? Are there checks and balances in place? Economic health can also reveal risk factors. Are there levels of economic discrimination? Is there a growing wealth gap with unequal access to goods and services? Are there gender inequalities? Are education and free speech under assault? Is a country isolated or connected to other nations. The more interconnectedness, the more international laws apply.    

The Founding of the United States    The Declaration of Independence in 1776 and the American Revolution was, in great part, a response to and a rejection of religious violence in Europe. “He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages…” That “barbarous age” being referred to was the Thirty Years’ War (1618-1648) which had seen Europe devastate itself in wars of Christian sectarianism. The Treaty of Westphalia that ended that conflict stopped religious massacres and creating the guiding principle that state sovereignty would replace religious hare and identity by establishing a balance of powers, limiting mercenaries, and creating laws to protect states. This was the guiding principle in the establishment of the United States. The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution in 1791 read: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press…” 

Crossing the Threshold    Triggers that allow a society to cross the threshold into mass violence are varied. They can come out of anywhere: natural disaster, assassinations, and/or elections when the minority elite feel threatened. No one can predict when that might happen. However, if those in power promote conspiracy theories, increasingly use and justify violence, ignore or rewrite history and claim to be defending or resurrecting a better, mythical past, then we need to pay attention. 

Questions to Ask    Are we really at risk of mass atrocity and authoritarianism? We need to ask some simple questions: Is there a defined target group and direct, public incitement to commit violence? Are the patterns consistent with extensive, group-selective violence, intent on destruction of groups under the would-be perpetrator’s control? Are significant segments of a target group subject to violence? Have genocidaires articulated a logic of annihilation (classifying the target groups and identifying “them” as an existential threat)? Is the violence organized, deliberate, and systemic? Is violence sanctioned by those in power. Is the violence spread out to target a geographic area? Is there a capacity to inflict large scale violence? 

My Turn    I am a patriot of our Republic. I am alert to the warning signs that currently exist in our country. I know also that nothing is inevitable – no matter how probable it might seem. I know that if we give into fear and powerlessness, we lose our greatest asset: the internalized belief in and dignity of our democratic experience. We will never agree on everything, and it is that acknowledgement that keeps us free. We do not seek to convert as much as to protect. The “No Kings” demonstrators demonstrated joy, happiness, silliness, discipline, non-violence, and reminded us of how life used to be and can be again. Make no mistake. Once those in power embark on an anti-democratic agenda seeking personal wealth, power, violence, and lawlessness disguised as virtue, we are all at risk. The very momentum they create radicalize individuals, institutions, and societies. However, by tapping into our history of dissent and the social contract that has bound us together in this experiment, separating church and state and allowing for private freedom, we can find the strength to resist. Nothing is inevitable unless we despair and isolate ourselves. Too many have sacrificed to allow for a kleptocracy to insult us. We must embrace our diversity as a strength, or silliness and sense of humor as a weapon, and our dignity and self-worth to be our foundation.

20 October 2025   

The Frightening Past   The past can be a painful place to visit or dwell in. It can be more comfortable to avoid it, be ignorant of it, rewrite it, or reshape it to reinforce whatever we need it to - or worse, make it fit an ideology. Today political justifications and villainization of the other thrive on reductionist and often wrong (yet attractively simplistic) narratives. Fascist, Nazi, and Communist histories are reduced and weaponized. Teachers, charged with helping students to thoughtfully investigate the past in order to build a better future, are threatened. History is deemed “divisive” if it raises questions of the past that might undermine a narrative that feeds one groups’ identity, power, and ideology. Much of this is based on identity needs and fear that is easily manipulated. That is why the work that we did at the Cohen Center for the past twenty-four years were guided by the insightful charge of its founder, Dr. Charles Hildebrandt, “to remember…and to teach.” Memory needed to be examined, confronted, questioned, and reflected upon. To help each other, we needed to face difficult history. To resist manipulation, we needed to make sure that we confronted history and the constructions of memory with informed, courageous, and responsible questions. 

The Son of a Perpetrator  Martin Rumscheidt came into my life because of Hank Knight and Franklin Littell’s Scholars’ Conference on the Churches and the Holocaust. Martin exemplified the courage that many of our contemporaries lack. Rather than shun history, Martin had to confront his own, very personal history. Martin grew up in a privileged Nazi home in Leuna in central Germany where his interpretation of history and his own identity was shaped by Nazi frameworks. Years after the war and after his father’s death he discovered that his father, an IG Farben executive, had been a perpetrator. His father’s wartime diary revealed his trips to Auschwitz. His own playmates had been the children of officers in Auschwitz III. His brother had been killed fighting for Germany and he and his mother barely escaped a strafing of their town by American aircraft. How could his father, even his country, be wrong? He had accepted his father’s explanations that those facing judgement in postwar trials, the family friends, were victims of “victors’ justice”. And yet, the narratives he was brought up did not ring true after the war. He fell in love with a young woman only to be astonished that she was a Jew. The stereotypes and fears evaporated, and questions were raised when his loving family, always friendly, forbid her entering their home. The more questions he asked his father, the more their relationship was in peril. Martin continued to love his imperfect father, but questioned “how much of him is in me?” 

Shame not Guilt   Martin had no guilt for what had happened, but he felt responsible for the shame of his father’s actions. He was a humble penitent, able to make that distinction between guilt and shame. He began to recognize the deep-seated Jew hate he had been taught and described himself as an “antisemite in remission”. He wondered if he had any right to or even should try to rectify the past. Survivors told him, while holding his hands, that he must speak. He accepted the responsibility for a difficult past, worked with survivors, became a theologian questioning Christian antisemitism, and was a beloved speaker at our summer institutes helping teachers as their guide and companion. 

The German Brings the Jew Back to Auschwitz   Martin did not reject facing difficult things. Asked by the Jewish daughter of a survivor (if memory serves), he accompanied her in a trip to the Auschwitz-Birkenau site. Upon arrival, she hesitated, Martin held her hand and assured her that they would do this together. As the day grew darker, they found themselves separated in the ruins of the camp, each facing their own encounters with the past. Martin was in the part of the camp that his father had visited. He was unable to move. This time, she was the one to find him, to hold his hand, to help him find his way out. He would remember that day as the day “the German brought the Jew to Auschwitz and the Jew brought the German out.” I often think about this painful, yet deeply humane moment. His framing continues to puncture my safe space, that part of me that wants to face things alone, perhaps to keep it inside and not to burden others. And yet, we cannot do this alone. We all need companions along the road. We also need to get out of ourselves and our own deeply felt concerns and worries by listening to, and walking with, an other. If we can think about the face of the other as well as our own, we both become safer, more free. As a Christian theologian, Martin would talk about how the ability to mourn for others allowed for his own resurrection. 

Legacy of Courage   It has taken time, but Germans now continue this courageous confrontation with the past. Katharina Matro, a third generation German and high school teacher in Bethesda, Maryland talks of how, when being educated in Germany, she was exposed to her country’s history without mercy. Instead of guilt or despair, she discovered that she became a more informed citizen, a more critical thinker, more aware of social injustice, and a patriot who, as the German president stated, loves [her] country with a broken heart. She argues that this makes her a better democratic citizen as the past shapes her responsibility to people today. 

Franklin Littell.                  

My Turn    Few countries try to face their own difficult history and that includes the United States. That can change. If Martin and Katharina can face the responsibility towards a Nazi past and come out stronger, then who are we to be afraid? Confident, courageous, and responsible people and societies are not afraid of the past. Healthy democracies, building a better world for all its citizens, rely and thrive on it. We can mourn what was done in our name. We can recognize human imperfections, worry less about guilt and more about responsibility, and let ourselves escape the trap of “victimization”, fear-induced narratives that restrict our freedom, confidence, and hope. We will not be weaker by raising important questions of the past. Rather, we will gain the strength and confidence to hold each other’s hands while finding a way out of darkness and despair.

13 October 2025  

Welcome!

An opening insight into your blogger... I like to write to try to define and figure out questions that are on my mind. This was true even in college when my patient, understanding, and supportive roommate (and life-long friend) would tolerate the hammering of my old (new then) Smith-Corona typewriter in our small room at Norwich University. When I began my professional career as a Holocaust and genocide educator, my questions were formed by my then Catholic identity.  My first two directors and the people I met along the way (whom I will write about in this blog) during my tenure as the Coordinator of Educational Outreach for the Cohen Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies encouraged me and expanded my thoughts, walked with me, and opened new paths. I engaged in interfaith dialogue, attended the Scholars’ Conference on the Churches and the Holocaust, served on the NH Diocesan Interfaith and Ecumenical Commission, engaged in interfaith dialogue and midrash, studied in Israel and proceeded to write down a history of Christian anti-Judaism and antisemitism (found on my website). I was on a journey of self-discovery and accountability as I tried to quantify and clarify. It was an important step in looking outward by looking inward. I identified problematic and destructive ideas, tropes, and constructs within my tradition and tried to take responsibility for them. The more I wrote and tried to detail, the less effective I felt. I had become more aware and self-aware, but it was not changing the viewpoints of others. I realized it was not about just getting it right but realizing that others were not on the same path. Giving them facts did not change their perceptions, or more importantly, their needs. 

Better Questions?   The repeated query of “Why the Jews” was an honest question, but the wrong one. More revealing was the question that they did not want an answer to, “How is this antisemitic”? The implication is that there is something about “them” that we need to figure out and not “us”. And yet (thank you Professor Wiesel) hatred does not begin with the target group, but from the needs of those who would target. Often justified as self-defense or self-preservation, people can always justify hate in moral terms. Violence is not only possible, it becomes permissible and even necessary. What if the questions were about us and not them? What if we realized that accepting hate, limits our freedom as well? 

Limits of Labels:   To approach complexity, we use labels and definitions to reduce complex information into smaller, more examinable chunks. As a tool, they are good starting points for inquiry. Used differently, they can reduce things to simple conclusions that need to be defended. By their very nature, definitions reduce complexity and we rely on our implicit (and explicit) biases to fill in the rest. We assign additional meaning and adjectives based on our own experiences or prejudices. unconscious assumptions, associations, attitudes, and stereotypes. Implicit bias desensitizes, simplifies, and reduces identity – the actual process and building blocks for atrocity.

Therefore, we must use definitions and labels (perpetrators, bystanders, victims…) as starting points. That is why I hesitate to try to define antisemitism. It is difficult to narrow down because the motives, needs, and perceptions of those who accept it are complex and varied.  To me, the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) working definition on antisemitism, attempts to do this. https://holocaustremembrance.com/resources/eu-handbook-ihra-working-definition-antisemitism 

The "working definition" recognizes that the goal of any definition is to begin exploration and understanding and, in this case, help people to identify potential ideas, code words, symbols and actions that might be antisemitic and destructive. “Is this antisemitic?” is more helpful than labeling someone an antisemite. 

Empathy Towards Anger:   Survivors have taught me that anger is the first step towards healing m- if we do not let it consume us. When one expresses fear of, hate for, disgust with an other “group” my response is now shaped by empathy. What has happened, is happening, or do you perceive is happening to you that you need to look for “answers” that dehumanize and target rather than reflect? I prefer to listen and engage in conversation than condemn and reduce. This is what I learned in the sacred space of my classroom. Education (self-awareness) is needed when someone says something out of naivete or ignorance. Education can empower us by helping us to become aware of hate and to take responsibility for others in our Republic. However, if someone has expressed antisemitism as a provocation, it is difficult to educate. Instead, it is important to deprive them of oxygen. If there is a threat, it requires a legal response. 

I remember a school where a student posted a Hitler-inspired image on his social media and the school, rightly concerned for those who felt targeted, asked me to talk to the staff and students. In a moment of responsibility and realization, the student apologized just before I was to speak. I explained that everyone does stupid things and that although his actions were hurtful, he took responsibility and therefore should not be labeled as a Nazi or an antisemite. It did not mean that his actions were not hurtful and harmful. My questions to them were, Why did you repost it? Who felt targeted? Is it easier to condemn one person than to take responsibility for what comes next? 

My Turn    It is my turn to offer questions. How does the query, “Why the Jews”? expose and reinforce the biased assumption that where there are Jews, there must be antisemitism. There are numerous examples throughout history of neighbors living and working together regardless of their religious or cultural identities. Even in 1920s mandate Palestine, Jewish settlers and Palestinian neighbors tended to get along and work together. How did that change? becomes an important contemporary question. Is antisemitism the norm or a destructive aberration? What are the motives of those who accept it? Why would someone want you to believe that? Why do people hate and what is in it for the hater? These are better questions to ponder. Antisemitism may always exist, but it is not always the norm. 

Contextually, it is important to note that when one hate rises (and Jew hate has proven timeless and flexible), they all do. Note how fear of (start naming “groups”) begins to rise when Jew hate rises. Jew hate is a proven and effective construct that undermines human dignity and freedom from a variety of historical motives and contexts and is especially potentially lethal when linked to a conspiracy lie. Often, this follows a traumatic event which pushes people to rely on biases in an urgent attempt to explain the irrational. Once people, nationally or locally, embrace Jew hate and are rewarded (with temporary power, deflection from crises or relieving of psychological and identity needs) the need to focus on an “other” and expand the list of targets is difficult to resist. 

Hate is a reactionary, self-reinforcing, destructive, and self-destructive force. Antisemitism is toxic for democracies, justice, and human freedom. Those who push you to reduce complexity, offer targets and justifications, promote conspiracy theories, and make hate permissible will gain short term power and limit your options. Raising better questions reduces fear, engages those who are frightened, and helps us to build a more just democracy.