Night - How evil can humans be

[beakdoctor]

Recently read a book about the sobibor revolt. Afterwards decided to read Night, a book that's literally been on my shelf for 40 years collecting dust.

Can't believe how evil humans can be. I know fanatics, extremists, isolated incidents,  Isis, etc all evil but  I've never read about the Holocaust before. Just never interested me. Evil on the grandest scale imaginable. Really haunting.

[dan18]

Recently read a book about the sobibor revolt. Afterwards decided to read Night, a book that's literally been on my shelf for 40 years collecting dust.

Can't believe how evil humans can be. I know fanatics, extremists, isolated incidents,  Isis, etc all evil but  I've never read about the Holocaust before. Just never interested me. Evil on the grandest scale imaginable. Really haunting.

A bear lion tiger  we call them animals and we humans but really we are much worse then them they do what they were born to do  they don't know any better.we on the other hand have a choice seems we always choose the latter.

[Powerlift66]

Adolph was on to something.

[dan18]

Adolph was on to something.

He was an angry little twink smart yes but a scorn little man who put his hate on the jews he used them as scapegoats
Conspiracy against the Germans. When Germany lost World War I, Hitler blamed the Jews and the communists
living in Germany and felt that they were part of a huge conspiracy against the German military. He believed that had it not been for their interference, Britain and the allies would have lost the war


 Hitler targeted the Jewish people to fulfill his two main goals of racial purity for the Aryans, or pure Germans, and the need for territory in which that race could expand.







 

[Powerlift66]

[beakdoctor]

Can anyone tell me why HISTORICALLY Jews have been despised? I mean it started long before Hitler but I'm just not that informed on the topic.

[loco]

Can anyone tell me why HISTORICALLY Jews have been despised? I mean it started long before Hitler but I'm just not that informed on the topic.

Many reasons:  "God's chosen people", wouldn't kneel before pagan gods or kings, wouldn't assimilate into the culture of their conquerors, envied because of their education and financial success, strong and undivided communities, etc.

Hecateus of Abdera is quoted by Flavius Josephus as having written about the time of Alexander the Great that the Jews "have often been treated injuriously by the kings and governors of Persia, yet can they not be dissuaded from acting what they think best; but that when they are stripped on this account, and have torments inflicted upon them, and they are brought to the most terrible kinds of death, they meet them after an extraordinary manner, beyond all other people, and will not renounce the religion of their forefathers"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_antisemitism#Early_animosity_towards_Jews

[robcguns]

Love that

[loco]

Love that

Actually, Hitler lamented on why did the religion of Germany have to be a weak Christian religion, and said “the Mohamadian” religion would be better.  

[sync pulse]

Can anyone tell me why HISTORICALLY Jews have been despised? I mean it started long before Hitler but I'm just not that informed on the topic.

Most trades were closed to Jews....except:

• Banking and Finance
• Science and Medicine

All high profit jobs...and with each generation building up the next...So Jews "Had all the money..."


My Mom's parents were from Austria...She was anti-Semitic...

[IroNat]

Can anyone tell me why HISTORICALLY Jews have been despised? I mean it started long before Hitler but I'm just not that informed on the topic.

Because they demanded Pontius Pilate kill Jesus.

"In the New Testament Pontius Pilate first appears during the time of the Passover Feast in Jerusalem and is confronted with the person of Jesus, who is accused of treason and blasphemy by the Jewish authorities, and Pilate must act as Jesus' judge. The Gospel recounts the trial in detail. Although Pilate is convinced of Jesus' innocence, he is forced to order Jesus to be crucified. By washing his hands and declaring he is innocent of the blood of Jesus, he tries to evade any responsibility."

https://www.bible-history.com/pontius_pilate/

[Humble Narcissist]

Can anyone tell me why HISTORICALLY Jews have been despised? I mean it started long before Hitler but I'm just not that informed on the topic.

Traditionally it was believed they were parasites who destroyed their host slowly and then moved on to another host.

[Agnostic007]

Recently read a book about the sobibor revolt. Afterwards decided to read Night, a book that's literally been on my shelf for 40 years collecting dust.

Can't believe how evil humans can be. I know fanatics, extremists, isolated incidents,  Isis, etc all evil but  I've never read about the Holocaust before. Just never interested me. Evil on the grandest scale imaginable. Really haunting.

That and a couple other books like Flags of our Fathers will really destroy your hope in humanity. What humans are capable of doing to other humans in the name of ______ (fill in the blank) is disheartening

[Stephano]

Traditionally it was believed they were parasites who destroyed their host slowly and then moved on to another host.

Religious minorities are almost always despised. The Cathars were hunted to extinction, as were the Pythagoreans long before them.  The Thirty Years' War was Europe's most brutal, and ended in a detente only because both sides were exhausted. To this day, the contemporary middle east is full of Islamic sects that hate each other. And of course Muslims hate outsiders even more -- look at how the Chinese merchant minority was treated in Malaysia and Indonesia; the world's most recent progroms were in the latter: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/May_1998_riots_of_Indonesia   

Under the circumstances, what the Jews have gone through is not particularly remarkable. Religious and ethnic conflict is the rule, not the exception. The only remarkable thing is that the Jews have managed to survive for so long -- and that persecution has made them stronger, more ethnocentric.

[Humble Narcissist]

Religious minorities are almost always despised. The Cathars were hunted to extinction, as were the Pythagoreans long before them.  The Thirty Years' War was Europe's most brutal, and ended in a detente only because both sides were exhausted. To this day, the contemporary middle east is full of Islamic sects that hate each other. And of course Muslims hate outsiders even more -- look at how the Chinese merchant minority was treated in Malaysia and Indonesia; the world's most recent progroms were in the latter: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/May_1998_riots_of_Indonesia   

Under the circumstances, what the Jews have gone through is not particularly remarkable. Religious and ethnic conflict is the rule, not the exception. The only remarkable thing is that the Jews have managed to survive for so long -- and that persecution has made them stronger, more ethnocentric.

That is because they appear weak and non confrontational.

[Stephano]

That is because they appear weak and non confrontational.

In some cases, yes.  This is definitely true of European Jews.  But it isn't a complete explanation -- in Yemen, for instance, Jews didn't submit to their Islamic hosts, and were at times in open conflict with them.  And instead of working in usury, Yemenite Jews were mostly employed as smiths, shepherds, and mercenary soldiers.

What's surprising is not that Jews suffered more persecution than other ethnic or religious minorities -- it could easily be argued that they suffered less persecution.  What's surprising is that they have survived as a ethnic/religious minority when many other similar groups throughout history have been eliminated.  Or, in some cases, have been totally assimilated, e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cagot.
 

[loco]

Then Haman said to King Xerxes, “There is a certain people dispersed among the peoples in all the provinces of your kingdom who keep themselves separate. Their customs are different from those of all other people, and they do not obey the king’s laws; it is not in the king’s best interest to tolerate them. If it pleases the king, let a decree be issued to destroy them

Dispatches were sent by couriers to all the king’s provinces with the order to destroy, kill and annihilate all the Jews—young and old, women and children—on a single day, the thirteenth day of the twelfth month, the month of Adar, and to plunder their goods. Esther 3:8,13 (486–465 BC)

[beakdoctor]

Some great information in this thread. Thanks for the different view points.

[illuminati]

Some great information in this thread. Thanks for the different view points.

Yes - very interesting points
I’ve learnt a few things

[JustPlaneJane]

Can anyone tell me why HISTORICALLY Jews have been despised? I mean it started long before Hitler but I'm just not that informed on the topic.

Because the original Hebrews were black.

[Mr Anabolic]

Most trades were closed to Jews....except:

• Banking and Finance
• Science and Medicine

All high profit jobs...and with each generation building up the next...So Jews "Had all the money..."


My Mom's parents were from Austria...She was anti-Semitic...

Just like Asians and dot-heads are doing today?