From: dieter@informatik.rwth-aachen.de (Dieter Kreuer)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.german,soc.culture.jewish
Subject: Re: Germans and Jews
Followup-To: soc.culture.german,soc.culture.jewish
Date: 28 Jan 1993 08:26:33 GMT
Organization: i4
Distribution: world
NNTP-Posting-Host: frueh-koelsch.informatik.rwth-aachen.de

In article <1993Jan27.174108.19877@husc3.harvard.edu>,
abkevich@husc3.harvard.edu wrote:
> 
> In article <dieter-270193102700@frueh-koelsch.informatik.rwth-aachen.de>, dieter@informatik.rwth-aachen.de (Dieter Kreuer) writes:

> > [...] you see that cruelty existed on both sides. 
> 
> Of course it did. But what we began with that there was much more cruelty per
> soldier on the German side. BTW, comparison with Red Army is not you could be
> proud of. It was not that much difference between Stalin and Hitler.

Nobody is proud of that. I'm not proud of humanity as a whole, either.
  
> >> Ever read Remark?
> > 
> > No. What's the name of his book?
> 
> Well... He wrote in German, I read Russian translations and know I have to 
> translate titles in English! I bet it would be far from original, but you have
> to forgive me. "There are no changes on the Western front" (about WW1, but we 
> are talking about how cruelties are changing people, so it is not matter)

"Im Westen nichts Neues", rather famous book. Haven't read it, though.

> and
> "It is time to live and time to die" (about WW2). 

"Zeit zu leben, Zeit zu sterben", also heard about that.

> > In that, I agree. Didn't the Germans after the war admit their moral faults?
> 
> Government did. Under Allies occupation. I am not sure that average Germans
> admitted their moral faults.

Government was elected by those average Germans, and the allied occupation 
ended in '49 (not officially, this was only after the wall fell, but in 
practice, when the first chancellor and his government were elected; there
was no outside force necessary for Germany to take the moral consequences
of the war. 
How do you expect a specific person to admit his moral guilt? When I was
11,
I have taken part in an exchange program with France, which had been ar-
ranged to improve the relationship between Germany and France. Such pro-
grams are also planned for Poland.
 
> > True, but remember that the east makes up only 40 % of the German popula-
> > tion, and that most East Germans are not racist at all. There are just 
> > more racists relative to the population. This is because they haven't 
> > grown up with many foreigners.
> 
> I think that living with foreigners have nothing to do with racism, even though
> it sounds "strange". Poles lived with Jews for 800 years. There were 3.5
> millions of Jews in a country of 27 millions and antisemitism was *very* 
> strong. There are 3000 Jews now in Poland and antisemitism *is* very strong. 
> BTW, Hitler recieved 38% of votes in 1932. 40% is *VERY* much. Don't forget
> that extremists are always more politicaly active then average folks, who might
> easily be lazy to vote.

Uh, oh, this was a mistype; I meant to say 1/4, which is 25 %, not 40 %.
East German population is approx. 20 millions, West German is 60 millions.
And don't expect that those 20 million vote extremely more rightist than
the west does; actually, they have somewhat more socialist voters and
gradu-
ally more right extremist voters, but still about 5 % only. And as for
lazyness to vote: yes, Germans are rather lazy to vote sometimes, so that
only 80 % of the population take part in an election. What were the US
figures? 40 %? No, can't believe this...

> > So, facism is not just a German problem. If here, 60 % would vote for
> > right extremist parties ... what would the Jews say (and be right with it)?
> 
> You know when I sent my previous posting I just thoght: "Now they would use it
> against me". I won. You used it immediatly. Louisiana voters have their excuses
> too (as Germans in 1932) which are NOT sufficient from my point of view. Jews
> said a lot about that voting, don't feel discriminated. It was voting only in
> one state, when he tried to run for president it did give him anything except
> embarrassment. Well... What has it to do with Germany? Every country has its
> own problems.

Different problems, same people, same behaviour, so nothing is special
about
the Germans. That's what the whole thread is about. If we can agree in this
point, we can end the discussion here. Nobody says that the Germans behaved
sensible or tolerable, they behaved awkwardly. It's only that this hasn't
got to do with their Germanness, but with them being ordinary specimen of
the species "homo sapiens", as Louisianians, Californians, Russians...

> They didn't learn how costly are wars (a *lot* of Germans were killed in WW1).
> Why should I expect the to learn it from WW2?

A lot were killed, yes, but there was no bombing of civilian targets. In
WW1, 
the war was more limited to the frontlines, while during WW2, the town
where
I was born was destroyed 99 % (a town of 50,000 or so then; there were two 
things left: a museum and a statue of Bismarck; everything else looked like
a moon landscape). As I said, those two wars cannot be compared, and there-
fore, no conclusion about post-WW2-Germany can be drawn from post-WW1-Ger-
many.

What we have learned, for example, is to restrict to less political groups
than during the Weimar time. A party needs 5 % to take part in the "Bundes-
tag" (something like your house of representatives). To the contrary, in
Italy, the situation is like during the Weimar Republic, with coalitions
of 5 or so parties and a new government every half or full year. And they
have strong facists. Aren't you afraid of them more? Why not? Do you think
that Italian facism is less anti-semitic than German?

> > This is true for individuals, not for generations. [...] What also counts is 
> > what they are taught in school. 
> 
> Sure. Only for individuals. But I suspect that there are more such individuals 
> generation. BTW, I began not with your generation, but with generation of, lets
> say, your father. What did your father was taught in school? Did you ever
> looked through his textbooks?

They are long gone. He went to school starting in 1940, when he was 6.
The main part of his education was after the war. 
Following your logic, he must have strongly been influenced by the Nazis,
and therefore, through his influence, I should have racist ideas, too.
Do I? Tell my students (one from Turkey, one from Iran; our institute
has 20 foreign foreign students and masters of science, at the institute,
a total of 70 people work).

Regards,

-----------------------                  ---------------------------------
     Dieter Kreuer      ##     ======== / dieter@informatik.rwth-aachen.de
Lehrstuhl Informatik IV __   /// /#    /  dieter%informatik.rwth-
     RWTH Aachen        ##  /// # #   /             aachen.de@uunet.uu.net
     Ahornstr. 55       ## /// ##### /...!informatik.rwth-aachen.de!dieter
W-5100 Aachen, Germany  ====      # / PHONE:  +49 241 80 21413
Newsgroups: soc.culture.german