Is pacifism at all logical?

[triumphguy]

Triumph
**
So if the men of Germany refused to join the Brownshirts, refused to pick up a rifle, refused to kill Jews, refused to spy on and turn in their neighbours etc., etc., etc. **

But that didn’t happen. The opposite happened. The question is, how effective is pacifism when the opposite happens, when the whole nation has signed on with an angry and lunatic dictator?

But… Germany was a mainly Catholic/Protestant church going country.

If they had First followed our Saviour this wouldn’t have happened.

If they had been the good guys, we wouldn’t have needed to be the tough guys.

 

[Charlemagne_II]

Triumph
**
If they had First followed our Saviour this wouldn’t have happened.
**
But since they did not follow him, what was the remedy? To submit with non-violent protests?

Most of those suspected of opposing Hitler quickly disappeared.

 

[nmgauss]

But… Germany was a mainly Catholic/Protestant church going country.

If they had First followed our Saviour this wouldn’t have happened.

If they had been the good guys, we wouldn’t have needed to be the tough guys.

When young men are starving and somebody comes along and offers them a uniform and support if they join up, they take it. The SA (Sturmabteilung) was exactly that kind of organization. It was the private army of the Nazis and was full of criminals and thugs.

In the period from about 1930 to 1932, the Great Depression was taking hold. Several political organizations were competing for power including the Communists and Nazis. There were so many parties that none could command a majority in the parliament (Reichstag). In 1931-32, multiple elections were held and no one party got a majority. After each failure, the Reichstag was dissolved, and another election scheduled. In frustration, violence erupted in the streets and the SA was in the forefront. They took it upon themselves to bust heads in political meetings of opposing parties. But the police were weak and could do very little stop it. Meanwhile the economy was getting worse and people were starving again.

Finally President Hindenburg, a very old man, negotiated with the leaders of the two largest parties, and Hitler was chosen Chancellor with a member of another party to be Vice Chancellor. Nobody expected loss of control of the government, but as soon as Hitler became Chancellor, he manufactured an emergency (the burning of the Reichstag building), and promptly enacted emergency measures provided for in the constitution. Meanwhile Hindenburg died in 1934. So Hitler proclaimed himself President and Chancellor. This gave him unprecedented powers, and he abolished the Communist Party and eventually broke up all parties except the Nazis. With his new powers he was able to gain support of the Wehrmacht (Army) as long as he could get rid of the SA. So he staged the Night of the Long Knives in which SA leaders and others who stood in his way were murdered. From that point on, nobody openly opposed the Nazis and lived to tell it.

 

[Charlemagne_II]

nmgauss

**From that point on, nobody openly opposed the Nazis and lived to tell it. **

That includes the 6 million Jews who dared not offer non-violent resistance.

 

[nmgauss]

nmgauss

**From that point on, nobody openly opposed the Nazis and lived to tell it. **

That includes the 6 million Jews who dared not offer non-violent resistance.

Pogroms against Jews were common in Eastern Europe during the latter part of the 19th and early 20th century, especially in areas where anti-Semitism was strong. Areas formerly under the suzerainty of the Russians were prime areas of extermination. As soon as the Nazis conquered Poland in the fall of 1939, Jewish populations started being herded into ghettos with extremely crowded and unsanitary conditions. Deportations of the inhabitants of the ghettos started in summer 1942, almost three years after Poland fell to the Nazis.

Most exterminated Jews were not German citizens. They were gathered up in Poland, Lithuania, Belorussia, Ukraine, Hungary, Romania, Slovakia, as well as Italy, France, and Yugoslavia. Since these were conquered territories, ordinary people had no rights and were at the mercy of the SS.

 

[triumphguy]

My point was that instead of wondering when we should take up arms and oppose evil doers, we should be more aware ourselves and say “No” to injustice as and when it happens.

If Catholics in Germany and Italy during WW2 had sat down and said “No” we will not do XYZ we Catholics now wouldn’t be discussing how to kill those Catholics then.