Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2007 November 23

= November 23 =

Pronunciation help
How is Edgar Degas' name pronounced? --John (talk) 01:57, 23 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Presumably you've checked his article, which gives the IPA symbols. If they mean little or nothing to you, the surname is sort-of like "duh-gah", although many people seem to assume the e has an acute accent and say it like "day-gah".  --  JackofOz (talk) 02:24, 23 November 2007 (UTC)


 * I read another source which suggested the terminal 's' was pronounced. I wondered if it was a sourced pronunciation, or if the book was in error. --John (talk) 05:43, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
 * JackofOz is correct, although "duh" (the neutral sound you get when you let it all slack in your mouth) is the most common pronunciation, a minority of people use the "deh" or "day" (without the ï inflection at the end). I'm talking here about the original French pronunciation of the name, I don't know what the most widespread English one is. I have neverd heard it pronounced with an "s" at the end. Keria (talk) 12:36, 23 November 2007 (UTC)


 * 1834 Hilaire-Germain-Edgar De Gas is born on July 19, 1834, at 8 rue Saint-Georges in Paris. His father, Auguste, a banker, was French, and his mother, Célestine, an American from New Orleans. The family name "Degas" had been changed to "De Gas" by some family members in Naples and France in order to sound more aristocratic; the preposition indicated a name derived from land holdings. Degas went back to using the original spelling sometime after 1870, and that is how we spell his name today. Which indicates that there is no justification at all for "Day-gah" as a pronunciation, although it is the common usage in the UK. SaundersW (talk) 20:25, 23 November 2007 (UTC)


 * No connection with gaydar, btw. Although, I note that he never married. Hmmm..... -- JackofOz (talk) 20:50, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

Wizard of OZ - The Red Brick Road
I've looked and can't find anything on this, so I've left questions elsewhere on some discussion pages nad I'll ask here too: Where does the red brick road go? My 5 year old daughter asked me this while we were watching the movie. While it obviously exists as the alternate pathway to the yellow brick road in munchkin land, I've never given it much more thought. It seems people have opinions, and in the absence of ant clear answer, I'd like to hear those, thanks. Mattopaedia (talk) 02:26, 23 November 2007 (UTC)


 * To Quadling Country, the home of Glinda the Good! Clio the Muse (talk) 02:33, 23 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Like it! Good tie in with the red theme! Mattopaedia (talk) 04:13, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
 * There are maps in Land of Oz. --—  Gadget850 (Ed)  talk  -  02:48, 23 November 2007 (UTC)


 * the maps only show the YBR, not the RBR. Mattopaedia (talk) 04:13, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

This big FAQ list says here that there's no definitive answer as to where the Red Brick Road goes. Perhaps it only appeared in the movie and not the original books. This page of the FAQ list shows some maps of Oz, which do not name any roads. --Anonymous, 01:59 UTC, November 24, 2007.

Is there a patron saint of noses?
If so, who? Whom? Thanks Adambrowne666 (talk) 04:54, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
 * I could not discover a patron saint of noses specifically, but there is a patron saint of perfumers, and if he's not looking out for noses, I don't know who is. It's Nicholas of Myra, better known as Saint Nicholas--yes, Santa Claus. His status as patron saint of of perfumers is not mentioned in the WP article, but this fact can be confirmed at numerous other reliable sites, such as the St. Nicholas Center.-- Shelf Skewed  Talk  05:45, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

great, thanks - actually, it suits my purposes if there is no saint of noses, so I'm doubly grateful. Adambrowne666 (talk) 10:06, 23 November 2007 (UTC)


 * "Who" was the correct pronoun, btw. --  JackofOz (talk) 12:40, 23 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Saint Blaise appears to be the patron saint of otorhinolaryngology --—  Gadget850 (Ed)  talk  -  13:31, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Good lord - I used to live down the road from St Blazey and I never knew that! DuncanHill (talk) 13:37, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

That's fantastic, Gadget! Adambrowne666 (talk) 20:50, 23 November 2007 (UTC)


 * You are welcome, from myself and Google. --—  Gadget850 (Ed)  talk  -  03:27, 24 November 2007 (UTC)

How many ninjas?
How many ninjas are there in the world {Wookiemaster (talk) 13:44, 23 November 2007 (UTC)}


 * The first rule of ninjas is that ninjas do not take part in census. This is one of the many things that separate them from pirates, who participate in the census, though they lie. --24.147.86.187 (talk) 16:29, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Unlike light wielding Jedis who love the attention. Keria (talk) 19:18, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Jedi is the singular and the plural; I can only assume this is because they move in shoals or flocks where jedi are to numerous to count. Skittle (talk) 00:46, 26 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Few if any, if you define ninja by role and not by training. They served an interesting historical function in and around feudal era Japan, but warfare's much more about pushing buttons these days than throwing shuriken.  Undoubtedly, some of the traditions and techniques have remained and filtered down to modern practitioners, so there are going to be people with various aspects of ninja training, and may even engage in a rare act of assassination or espionage, but I don't think you're going to find clans of them living in the rural grasslands or anything.  Of course, that's just what they want you to think... :)  ◄   Zahakiel   ►  16:35, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
 * The best trick the ninja ever pulled off was making the world think he didn't exist. (Cf. pirates, who advertise their presence with their smell.) --24.147.86.187 (talk) 17:45, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

I'm sorry. I need to rephrase my question. "Is there more than one ninja in the world?" is what I wanted to say. The reason why I say this is because my friend told me that their is only one ninja in the entire world. He said that he saw it in a documentary. Thank you for your time. {Wookiemaster (talk) 20:16, 23 November 2007 (UTC)}


 * This seems to be the story about the world's last and only ninja, if you want to check how reliable it seems. SaundersW (talk) 21:41, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

My friend debated that ninjitzu is illegal in every country in the world exept hong kong. He claimed that he is one hundred percent sure. Is this fact true? {Wookiemaster (talk) 02:28, 24 November 2007 (UTC)}


 * None. He maybe wants to call himself a ninja, but actually he is just teaching ninja practice. True ninjas extincted a long time ago. Please be realistic. Oda Mari (talk) 15:20, 24 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Your friend is not providing actual facts. He may be "sure" of it, but it's an absurd contention that "ninjitsu is illegal" in any country.  ◄   Zahakiel   ►  16:50, 24 November 2007 (UTC)

Tnks
How does one say thank you in Swedish, Thank you. Jenquiem(Polish) Danke(Ger) Dankie(Afrikaans) Mersi(French) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 12.191.136.2 (talk) 16:44, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Tack

Tack alot. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 12.191.136.2 (talk) 17:17, 23 November 2007 (UTC)


 * To the anon: "Tack så mycket!" SaundersW (talk) 18:56, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
 * French is "Merci" with a "c". Keria (talk) 19:10, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
 * And Polish is "dziękuję". &mdash; Kpalion(talk) 13:43, 24 November 2007 (UTC)

marriage and life
why is having more than one wife prohibited by law (I assume it) while a person can have sex with any number of women? (all in US law). Is it legal if I have 2 or more women with me for years by giving them money but without marrying them? Do those women have to pay tax on that? Is it legal to marry two or more women if all women give permission to all? If law says a man cannot marry many women even if all agree, why is it like that? What is the problem there? Is it because rich may have many wives and leave nothing for the poor? Or is it due reasons like tax and social security? Or is it both reasons? Will any island get more investment and get rich if its rules say you can marry any number of people? Is there any way of contract possible by law where a women signs to spent a limited number of years with a man for some amount? Is it legal if a man signs a contract with five women for those five women to spend five years with him all six living together? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 59.92.114.221 (talk) 17:34, 23 November 2007 (UTC)


 * We aren't allowed to answer questions here about what's legal, but you will want to read the pages on polygamy and polygyny. --Anonymous, 02:02 UTC, November 24, 2007.


 * What jurisdiction? —Nricardo (talk) 16:17, 24 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Have you read about polygamous communities in the North American West? Polygamy results in a tremendous shortage of wives. There's such a demand for wives that girls are forced into marriages at very young ages, while young men are expelled from communities for the smallest of infractions. Sure, polygamy may seem OK when one person does it, but when it becomes part of the culture, bad things happen. -- Mwalcoff (talk) 03:39, 25 November 2007 (UTC)

Lester Smith 1924 Olympics Swimmer - Can anyone find any other information about Lester Smith?
I searched wiki for the 1924 Olympic Swimming, and found a web page that gave the medal winners for the 4×200 m freestyle relay (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swimming_at_the_1924_Summer_Olympics) Lester Smith was on that team. I am trying to learn more about him. The link with his name does not lead anywhere, really. I tried typing in Lester Smith (swimmer) as suggested by Wiki but that did not get me anywhere. I have tried a few other search engines and pharases but cannot find anything. Thanks for any help you can offer. 1924oly (talk) 18:31, 23 November 2007 (UTC)


 * My google-fu seems to be weak today, all I can find is him listed as being a medal winner (which we already know) and that his home club in the US was the 'Olympic Club' (from usaswimming.org 1924 Olympic Swimming Team). 86.21.74.40 (talk) 21:08, 23 November 2007 (UTC)


 * I haven't been able to find much more, except that his club was the San Francisco Olympic Club. Marco polo (talk) 21:59, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

Lucius Junius Brutus
Who was the father and mother of Lucius Junius Brutus and exactly how is he related to Lucius Tarquinius Superbus? Is there any relationship between Lucretia's mother and Lucius Junius Brutus? Or blood relationship between Tarquinius Collatinus and Lucius Junius Brutus? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 172.171.177.68 (talk) 21:39, 23 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Lucius Junius Brutus is reported as the son of Marcus Junius (sometimes called Marcus Junius Brutus) and of Tarquinia, the second daughter of Lucius Tarquinius Priscus. Tarquinia was the sister of Lucius Tarquinius Superbus and of another Tarquinia who was the queen of Servius Tullius. Tarquinius Collatinus was the son of Egerius, himself the son of Aruns, who was Lucius Tarquinius Priscus's brother. So Lucius Junius Brutus was the nephew of Lucius Tarquinius Superbus, while Egerius and Tarquinia were first cousins and their sons (Lucius Junius Brutus and Tarquinius Collatinus) were second cousins. Xn4  23:35, 24 November 2007 (UTC)

Current specific issues related to the Anti-federalist vs. Federalist debates
Are there currently any specific issues and people that can be seen as a continuation of the Anti-Federalist vs. Federalist today? Thanks in advance! 24.4.206.117 (talk) 22:20, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

The Holocaust, some important questions

 * 1) My first question concerns pogroms. I don't understand why people would willingly participate in pogroms such as Kristallnacht and the Jedwabne pogrom. Why would people deliberately attack a community, you can't have a grudge on an entire community of people. What's the psychology of it?
 * 2) Secondly, I don't understand how the Holocaust was allowed to evolve from anti-Jewish legislation into mass-murder. Why didn't the German authorities just establish one huge ghetto in the conquered territories, Poland for instance. Surely there were alternatives to the "Jewish Question" to mass-murder?
 * 3) Were people just heartless? People just seemed to look on. Why? For every member of the Gestapo,SS etc. there were probably about 20 members of the public who could overwhelm them. Why did the members of the Einsatzgruppen agree to murder people, surely they had some choice, they were the ones with the guns, after all.
 * 4) Lastly, why were the victims so passive during the Holocaust. Surely, when they were all on the Umschtaglplatz, they could have all worked together to overpower the guards. Why did they allow themselves to be herded into cattle trucks and gas chambers. I don't nderstand this, Jewish resistance may have existed, but it isn't anywhere near as prominent as you'd expect it to be.

I'm not looking for definite answers to these questions because I don't think that they exist. I'm just wondering what people's thoughts are on these matters. --Hadseys (talk • contribs) 22:35, 23 November 2007 (UTC)


 * A partial answer for your questions can be found at crowd psychology. There are plenty of interesting links at the end of that article.


 * The Stanford prison experiment and the Milgram experiment will give you more insights into why things like this happen. A modern case of the same mechanism is what happened at Abu Ghraib torture and prisoner abuse case.


 * Not many jews knew that they would be murdered. Actually they were expecting to be just deported. Evidence was the fact that they took some of their possessions with them. The existence of killing fields didn't become a matter of fact until after the war, although the allies had some evidence that something terrible was going on. Mr.K. (talk) 23:02, 23 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Well i know that, but when they were shoved into cattles trucks that, according to Wladislaw Szpilman's novel The Pianist, smelled like chlorine, surely they must have realised that something was wrong. Perhaps even before that, the German's would want a strong labour force from the ghetto, but allowed a lot of the ghetto's inhabitants to die. Perhaps the poor people didn't want to admit that they were doomed, whichever way you looked at it --Hadseys (talk • contribs) 02:47, 24 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Furthermore, we have the advantage of hindsight (ergo also bias). Jews could not imagine what would come next. However, don't forget that many Jewish people have emigrated before the war. Some of them didn't have the necessary means to emigrate. Other emigrated, but to 'wrong' countries like France or Holland.  Of course, many people - Jews and non-Jews - didn't perceive the menace of the nazi regime. Hitler was even declared Time's man of the year 1938 (Stalin was man of the year 1940). Mr.K. (talk) 04:20, 24 November 2007 (UTC)
 * Ruhollah Khomeini was TIME's Man of 1979. The criterion is influence, not goodness.  —Tamfang (talk) 05:50, 24 November 2007 (UTC)


 * (edit conflict) Concerning your first three questions, I agree with you that genocidal intentions and actions are incomprehensible, yet genocide has happened several times through history.  The section of our article titled Stages of genocide and efforts to prevent it explains that genocide occurs only when the intended victims are first dehumanized (depicted as detestable, nonhuman parasites or the like) and when the killing is directed by a totalitarian state or other powerful social institution.  All of these preconditions existed with Nazi anti-semitism.  So, for questions 1 and 2, Nazis didn't just have a grudge toward a community of people.  They were convinced that Jews were not really human and that they were so horrible that they needed to be exterminated.  Keeping Jews alive in a ghetto would not have been an appealing alternative to these people.  As for your third question, individuals' motivations varied.  Some were heartless, self-centered, and/or careerist.  Others were too scared to speak up, much less act.  Others enjoyed a sadistic (and cowardly) feeling of power in ending the lives of virtually helpless victims.  As for your fourth question, victims were typically quite defenseless and rounded up at gunpoint.  Many of the victims did not know that they were being taken to their deaths and hoped to save themselves by obeying orders.  Typically, they had endured weeks or months of severe suffering in ghettos or detention camps and had come to despair of escaping their plight.  Also, groups of victims being rounded up included large groups of strangers (though perhaps made up of many small family groups).  These groups of unknown strangers typically never would have had the opportunity to organize resistance.  In this context, isolated acts of resistance would likely have been fatal.  Marco polo (talk) 23:12, 23 November 2007 (UTC)


 * Suppose a new member of the S.S. has been ordered to abuse the concentration camp prisoners. Will he follow the order?  If he does not, he will suffer severe punishment and perhaps even execution.  A rational person would follow commands in such a situation, and eventually people do lose their conscience after committing atrocities every day.


 * As for why the Holocaust victims didn't resist, they were unarmed and had no interest in a plan that will end in further punishment if it fails. There were some mass escapes but almost all of them were failures, with all but a few detainees being recaptured.  --Bowlhover (talk) 16:28, 24 November 2007 (UTC)
 * It's also the case that the Nazis practiced community punishment as well—if one prisoner escaped/resisted, then not only would they be punished, but others uninvolved would be punished. Such a scheme is a great way to cow large groups of people into inaction, especially if they are told that through work they will gain their freedom. --24.147.86.187 (talk) 16:40, 24 November 2007 (UTC)


 * The Nazis did have a number of different ideas floated for the Final Solution to the "Jewish problem" at times, including one scheme to ship them all to Madagascar after they defeated the British. However, they didn't defeat the British, and the plan fell through. The article on the subject discusses what is known about the evolution of the idea that they should kill the Jews rather than just ship them off to a different part of the world. --24.147.86.187 (talk) 16:40, 24 November 2007 (UTC)

Hi, Hadseys. An interesting set of questions in which I think I can detect your understandable sense of bewilderment. To begin with I should make it clear there are no easy answers here. Scapegoating, the feeling that someone, somehow, has to be held responsible for life's misfortunes, has a long and tragic history in human affairs. Scapegoats are selected, if that is the right word, because they stand apart; because they are obvious and because they are vulnerable. That is chiefly why Jewish people have, time and again throughout history, been forced to take on this part; not the only victims, but the most obvious. Anyway, if I cannot provide you with full answers, perhaps I can suggest one or two clues which may help aid your understanding.

1. Minorities are always vulnerable, and can, and do, come under attack at any point, though usually in times of unusual historical stress. Consider here what happened to some Muslim communities during the Bosnian War, massacred by those with whom they had lived in peace for decades. People may take part in massacres and pogroms for all sorts of reasons: because they are resentful, because they are vicious, or because they are simply greedy. You also have to remember that there is always a 'herd mentality' at work, a process by which ordinary people are pulled along into murderous actions that they would not in normal circumstances contemplate; anything from individual lynchings to community pogroms. Here I would suggest that you may care to study crowd psychology, in particular Gustave le Bon's seminal The Crowd: A Study of the Popular Mind. The author argues that the irrational crowd acquires its own justification and dynamic, suspending concepts of individual morality. I should also stress that pogroms often have their own unique causes, which are not strictly comparable. The two you have identified are really quite different, both in nature and in conception. Kristallnacht was an act of state, or the agencies of the state, whereas Jedwabne follows a more traditional pattern, reflecting local resentments and hatreds.

2.  On your second question, the specific timing and nature of the Holocaust-the point when discrimination and persecution turned into outright murder-I've posted below-slightly adapted-a previous answer I have given to this question.


 * I have some additional information and argument that might be of interest to you, all of which I have based upon Laurence Rees' monograph, Auschwitz: the Nazis and the Final Solution., in the edition published by BBC Books in 2005


 * By the spring of 1940 it was becoming increasingly clear that the policy of of using the General Government as a 'racial dustbin' was causing huge logistical problems. In May 1940 Himmler addressed the issue in a wide-ranging memorandum, in which he rejects 'the Bolshevik method of physically exterminating a people as fundamentally un-German.' (Lees, p.45)  He goes on to say that I hope to see the term 'Jews' completely eliminated through the possibility of large-scale emigration of all Jews to Africa or to some other colony.  When Himmler discussed this proposal with Hitler he was told that it was gut und richtig (good and correct).  But, as you indicate, the tenacity of England effectively put an end to all such notions by the autumn and winter of that same year.  The problem in the General Government remained, and got steadily worse with the arrival of additional deportees.


 * Moving further down the line to the summer of 1941, when mass killings were already underway in Russia, we have Göring's memo to Heydrich of 31 July, asking for a blueprint for 'the execution of the intended Final Solution of the Jewish question.' However, as Lees says (p.84), the discovery of a document in the Moscow Special Archive casts some doubt on the particular significance of Göring's memorandum.  This contains a note from Heydrich, dated March 26 1941, in which he says With respect to the Jewish question I reported briefly to the Reich Marshal and submitted to him my new blueprint, which he authorized with one modification concerning Rosenberg's jurisdication, and then ordered for resubmission.  This document has to be taken in the context of the coming invasion of the Soviet Union-which was expected to collapse in a few weeks-and the continuing deadlock with the British in the west.  In other words, the new destination for the Jews of Europe was no longer Africa, but parts of conquered Russia, including areas expected to be under the jurisdiction of Alfred Rosenberg.  It seems clear that the 31 July document should be read against the background of forced migration, rather than mass murder as such, though in practical terms the end result would have been just the same, as most of the deportees are likely to have frozen to death in the east with the onset of the Russian winter.  However, it was the specific actions of the Einsatzgruppen-particularly in the shooting of women and children-that raised yet another set of problems, and a further quest for solutions.  The decisive moment here, it might very well be argued, came in August 1941, when Himmler visited Minsk, and saw the work of the killing squads at first hand.


 * The Minsk killings, and the complaints, amongst others, of Lieutenant-General von dem Bach-Zelewski, that the sheer personal horror involved was having a severe psychological impact on the men in the Kommandos, pushed Himmler along the path of a less 'bloody' solution to the whole issue. He already had before him one possible 'clinical' way out: mass-killing had already been tried and tested in the euthanasia programme, with poison gas being used to kill as many as ten thousand people in mental hospitals in Wartegau and West Prussia between October 1939 and October 1940.  The need for new killing techniques-soon to be explored in places like Auschwitz-,the continuing build up of Jewish deportees in the ghettos of Poland, and the unexpected stubbornness of Soviet resistance, demanded that the whole issue be re-examined from top to bottom.  Amongst others, Josef Goebbles, the Propaganda Minister, was lobbying Hitler for more radical solutions, urging the expulsion eastwards of all the Jews of Berlin to already grossly overcrowded ghettos, like that at Lodz.  The way out of this deadlock was the authorisation of the first mass gassings at Chelmno, close to Lodz, in late 1941.


 * Given Hitler's method of working, and his dislike of committing himself to paper, we will never know for certain when outright murder took the place of deportation as the favoured solution to the Jewish question. If I were pushed to choose a specific time-frame, on the basis of the evidence as it presents itself, it would be October 1941.  By then the decision had been taken to send all of the Reich's Jews to the east, even though the war with Russia showed no sign of ending.  In November, in a conversation with the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Hitler said that he wanted all Jews, even those not under German control, 'to be destroyed.' (Lees, p. 110) Here, in essence, is the agenda of the Wannsee Conference, where the populations detailed for elimination included those living in areas not even under German control, including England.  The following month the gas vans of Chelmno began their work.


 * Against this whole drift of events and policy, the Wannsee Conference has been allowed to carry far too much weight. The decision on mass extermination, it seems highly likely, was conveyed by verbal insruction alone by Hitler to Himmler sometime in October.  Wannsee was merely a forum for ensuring maximum bureaucratic complicity.  Those who attended, with the exception of Heydrich (and even he was not yet in the uppermost ranks of the party leadership) were by and large men of the second-division, like Martin Luther from the Foreign Ministry, representing Ribbentrop; senior bureaucratic funtionaries, in other words, implementers of policy, rather than formulators.  Clio the Muse 10:14, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

3. Are people heartless? Yes, sadly some are. Most people, though, are neither very good nor very bad; they are simply people. In normal circumstances they will speak out against wrong; but in abnormal circumstances they will retreat from the public arena, into a tortoise-like attitude of self-preservation. You have to understand that Nazism as a system fed on fear and intimidation. It requires a unique kind of courage to stand up to this, the kind of courage shown by people like the wonderful Sophie Scholl; the kind of courage that most ordinary people simply do not have. They may be saddened; they may even be disgusted; but in the end, to preserve themselves, they simply turn away. The Nazi state, moreover, was not simply the few agencies you have identified. It was based on a mass movement that had achieved a strength beyond all others during the days of the Weimar Republic. People did try to resist its ascent; and from 1930 to 1933 Germany was in a state of semi-civil war, with huge street battles between the Nazis and their opponents, Communists and Socialists in the main. But after Hitler became Chancellor the Nazis could not only call on their own supporters but all of the agencies of the state, from the police, to the judiciary to the army. But their biggest ally of all was fear; for concentration camps were always ready to receive new inmates.

4. This is the most difficult question of all, for what you are dealing with here is the fallacy of hope, the belief that there were indeed things too terrible to be contemplated, things beyond the imagination. There are several excellent accounts by people who were caught up in the whole nightmare, and I am thinking in particular of Anus Mundi by Wieslaw Kielar; If This is a Man by Primo Levi; and Night by Elie Wiesel. The thing is you, we all do, have perfect knowledge; they did not. You know, we all know, the outcome; they did not. For, quite simply, it was beyond the imagination. Hope is the last to escape from Pandora's Box after all the evils, and is sometimes taken as the only blessing. It is, rather, the ultimate curse, the one that makes tolerable that which is intolerable. I'm sure you must have seem Schindler's List? You will remember, then, the way in which people comforted themselves, whenever there was a further deteroration in their circumstances, with the encouraging words 'The worst is over now'. It was not. You may also remember when a group of women are talking and one tells the others what she has heard of the gas chambers, a story which is rejected as too awful, too irrational to believe? As I say, it was simply beyond the power of imagination to contemplate such a thing. There is an even more dreadful, and true, illustration of this, narrated, I think, by Kielar. A group of people have just arrived at Auschwitz. A truck passes filled with dead bodies, arms hanging over the side. As it passes the arms wave, 'as if in a grim farewell'. The crowd screams; but no sooner has the truck passed than it is put out of mind, excorcised from the consciousness as if it was all an illusion. Collaboration in death was aided by hope, aided by the belief that there were limits to the terrible. There were not, and there are not.

I hope this helps. Clio the Muse (talk) 01:04, 25 November 2007 (UTC)


 * This is truly one of the great questions of our time. If you want to understand how genocide can happen with the collaboration or at least wide disinterest of the general population, go to Central Europe and ask people about the Gypsies, or, as they call themselves, the Romani people. I've met plenty of otherwise liberal people, who wouldn't mind if their daughter married someone from the Congo, talk about Gypsies in the most horrifying way. They say things like "The Gypsies are all a bunch of cheats," or even "The Gypsies should all be shot." The problem is that when you have a disfavored group, they are spoken of as a group rather than as individuals. If you pressure them, a Slovak or Pole will admit that yes, there are individual Gypsies who own businesses or are studying in universities or whatever. But as a whole, they'll say, the Gypsies are a bunch of cheats. And what's worst is that when a group is disfavored, it's de rigeur socially to join in the hate -- just like seventh-graders will go out of their way to show their hatred of the unpopular kid. -- Mwalcoff (talk) 03:36, 25 November 2007 (UTC)


 * It's possible that you could gain some insight into these questions from the Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil, or the book of excerpts from it Eichmann and the Holocaust published in the Penguin Books Great Ideas series. I gather it is controversial (but then, what isn't?), but it might help. Skittle (talk) 00:32, 26 November 2007 (UTC)