Markings for prisoners in concentration camps

This is a prisoner marker that was used in concentration camps.

Note the categories horizontally and vertically.

The question is how does one get to this stage where a mass of humanity can do this to another mass of humanity?

It does not happen in a day or in a year. It starts with ridicule – the other side is stupid, and the other side are socialists.

Then it graduates to hate – or reflected hate – the other side hates the country, and the other side is the cause of all that is ill with the country.

Then it descends to inhumanity – the other side are not human, the other side are Untermenschen – the other side hence has no rights the other side are second class citizens.

Then the other side goes to jail, the other side goes to concentration camps, and the other side does not deserve to exist.

The depths that individuals and societies can plumb to are not easy to comprehend.

It is easy to dismiss as it is never going to happen in ‘our country.’

History is replete with repeated examples of that descent into inhumanity.

Eternal Vigilance.

Source:

Header Images courtesy of United States Holocaust Memorial Museum