I want to remind you that the Holocaust did not start with slavery, death camps, and genocide.
_ It began with painting yellow stars and Anti-Semitic slogans on shop windows.
_ Men with swastika armbands and quasi-military uniforms showed up to chant and threaten shoppers who went into the stores.
_ People got used to it.
_ Some folks ignored the Nazis and went into the shops. They got beaten up in the street. Anybody who “looked” Jewish could get curbstomped.
_ People got used to it.
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_Then they smashed all the shop windows. From graffiti to outright vandalism on top of street violence.
_ People got used to it.
_ The police could have stopped it, but they chose not to.
_ Burning Jewish houses of worship came next.
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_ At this point, the Nazi government stopped pretending it wasn’t involved and encouraging the street thugs.
_ They started passing laws that made it all Oh-kaaay.
_ It was all legal now, so more people got used to it than ever before.
_ By then, the people who couldn’t get used to it but could afford to travel and could get a foreign visa had fled the country.
_ Then your neighbors started disappearing in the wee hours of the morning.
_ People who couldn’t get used to that and spoke up tended to evaporate around 4:00 am.
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_ Three kinds of people were left:
_ Nazis who liked it this way,
_ Those who didn’t like it, but were afraid to speak up,
_ Those who just got used to it.
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_ There were about 2500 clergymen who were prisoners at Dachau, mostly for speaking up.
_ A few clergy continued with Anti-Nazi work on the sly.
_ A lot of clergy actively supported the Nazis from their pulpits.
_ Many thousands of clergy and the millions in their congregations just got used to it.
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_ Graffiti, vandalism, street violence,
_ The government winks.
_ It has already started here.
_ We should all be at least a little afraid. It keeps us on our toes.
_ Fascists and Nazis don’t scare me nearly as much as people who just get used to it.