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Arbeit my ass
Author: TriSec    Date: 05/05/2020 12:32:27

You know, the more I think about this, the more perturbed I become.


By now you've all seen it; over the weekend at a protest in Chicago, While I won't dignify her existence any longer, I will post a photo of the original.

https://onlinecal.ushmm.org/media/54ea7cb3-e160-4773-9787-f5a3b382eda0.jpg


This gate, one of the many entrances to the camp at Auschwitz-Birkenau, was among the last thing millions of Jewish people saw as they met their fate.

"Work Sets You Free".

Of course it has a history, and it's not all associated with Nazi Germany. The phrase has origins in the late 19th century.


The expression comes from the title of an 1873 novel by German philologist Lorenz Diefenbach, Arbeit macht frei: Erzählung von Lorenz Diefenbach, in which gamblers and fraudsters find the path to virtue through labour. The phrase was also used in French (le travail rend libre!) by Auguste Forel, a Swiss entomologist, neuroanatomist and psychiatrist, in his Fourmis de la Suisse (English: "Ants of Switzerland") (1920).

In 1922, the Deutsche Schulverein of Vienna, an ethnic nationalist "protective" organization of Germans within the Austrian empire, printed membership stamps with the phrase Arbeit macht frei. According to visitcracow.com: “In the 1930s, they (Nazis) promoted programs against unemployment through this sentence.”


In that at least, the Nazis were much like our own genocidal mass-murderer (Or maybe it's the other way around) in that everything they touched turned to shit. We all know the context in which the phrase was used during the Holocaust, but in researching it I ran across an example of black humour that the condemned in the camps would often recite:


Arbeit macht frei (Work makes you free)

durch Krematorium Nummer drei (Through Krematorium Number Three)


So. I cannot fathom any circumstance where normal people would want to quote a Nazi, much less put it on a protest sign. What makes it even worse is the fact that the target of this, Illinois Governor Jay Robert Pritzker (D-IL) is of Jewish heritage. I must say I admire his restraint; I would have been tempted to have the National Guard break it up, but that's just me.

Of course, the movement is spreading. All along, it's been targeted at Democratic governors that have taken a hardline during the crisis. Perhaps unique among all states, here in Massachusetts we have a Republican governor that's being just as hardline as a lot of the Democrats, and has even joined a multi-state coalition. (Charlie Baker).

So yesterday, the moron brigade reached the steps of the Massachusetts State Capitol. Nevermind that they were organized by the same group that gave us the "Straight Pride" parade last year. What's a little racism or white supremacy when the economy is at risk?


A large crowd of protesters gathered outside the Massachusetts State House on Monday afternoon calling on Gov. Charlie Baker to reopen the economy.

Dubbed the “Liberty Rally,” the event was planned to take place if Baker didn’t reopen nonessential businesses on May 1. Baker’s business order, along with his stay-at-home advisory, was initially set to be lifted on May 4 but was extended last week to May 18, as efforts to slow the spread of the coronavirus continue. The protest was promoted by Jeffrey Kuhner, a conservative radio host, and on the website for “Super Happy Fun America,” which organized the controversial “Straight Pride Parade” in Boston last year.

It was slated to begin at 2 p.m. “to demand that the Governor and his minions let the people get back to work,” according to its website.

When asked for comment, Baker’s office pointed to his response to a question about the protest Monday. In responding to the question, the governor noted that the decision to close businesses was based on science, and that his administration knew there would be economic, and other, consequences.

“We do believe and buy into the guidance that we’ve gotten from experts in the field that you need to see downward trends in a number of key indices associated with this virus for some period of time before you can actually reopen, and that’s the reason why we created the reopening task force, and it’s why we’ve spent so much time working with our colleagues in the health care community to develop a set of indices that we report on every single day,” he said. “And as I said in my remarks, you know, after a really long time of not seeing much positive traction at all with regard to those measures, in the course of the past few days, we’ve actually started to see some positive downward trends.”

As of Monday, Massachusetts had seen 69,087 COVID-19 cases and 4,090 deaths related to the disease.


I will at least tip my cap to them for having the courage to jam everyone together and not wear a mask (except that one guy in the photo). Unlike other places, I guess - they appear to have at least the courage of their convictions here.

https://c.o0bc.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/https___media.gettyimages.com_photos_protesters-rally-to-demand-an-end-to-the-state-wide-stay-at-home-and-picture-id1211759225_b1k6m1211759225s170x170hTu6o13efwnxuqbkBe1IfsGX-ThlM8qEzWWYsiqTvVrs-850x478$large.jpg


But as I noted yesterday - I'd gladly pay real money to see what their results are in two weeks.

Ah, but back to our Nazi friend. Even if it was an isolated incident, it made headlines around the world. The museum at Auschwitz certainly noticed, so I will let them speak for us all here.


"'Arbeit macht frei' was a false, cynical illusion the SS gave to prisoners of Auschwitz. Those words became one of the icons of human hatred. It's painful to see this symbol instrumentalized and used again to spread hate. It's a symptom of moral and intellectual degeneration."

 
 

4 comments (Latest Comment: 05/05/2020 17:01:47 by TriSec)
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Comment by wickedpam on 05/05/2020 12:54:40
Morning

Comment by Will in Chicago on 05/05/2020 13:51:26
Good morning, bloggers!!

TriSec, thanks for a sadly relevant yet very important blog.

We are hearing arguments that the weak and elderly should be allowed to die, echoing the Nazi policy of killing those deemed unfit. The Nazis began with those deemed mentally and physically disabled. Some of my fellow Americans want to start with other people's grandparents.

I am not sure where we go as a nation from here. We are more divided than any time in my lifetime.

Comment by Raine on 05/05/2020 14:53:46
Good Morning.

Great post today, Tri.

Comment by TriSec on 05/05/2020 17:01:47
BTW, happy annual "It's OK to like Mexicans" day.

We'll return to our regularly-scheduled institutional racism tomorrow.