Discrimination is come together with human’s society, some
discriminated against somebody to access something, while some just to distinguish
his individual from others. In the era of Nazism, eugenics was used as a tool
of racial discrimination which harmed millions people around the word at a
later time.
According to “How
the Nazis undermined eugenics” (2013), Because Nazi regime’s eugenics programme
had persecuted and killed large numbers of people during 1933 – 1945, it were
condemned that this programme, which include sterilisation law, infringed human
liberty and also was an expression of Germany turning into a totalitarian racial
state, so the word “eugenics” become derogatory term to some eugenics societies
and journals, but it doesn’t a matter for
eugenists to find out ways to improve humankind.
This story reminds
me of “Japan Deputy PM Taro Aso retracts Nazi comments”, the recent story on
BBC news reported that Japan Deputy Prime Minister Taro Abe said Japan could
learn from Nazi Germany in revising constitution which caused China’s anger and
strained relation between two countries. I think Abe intends to show that he is
against to China in the Diaoyu Island case but he made a mistake in the way he expressed
it. Japan was with German and Italy in WWII,
starting with invading the Repulbic of China, which the history of these times are
still affecting on Sino-Japan relationship. After Japan surrendered in 1945, it
was under the US’s control and became U.S. alliance till now. So, when Japan’s saying
about Nazis and WWII, it is historically a sensitive topic, not only to China
but also to some Western countries like England or the US.
Hitler was a successful leader though he was defeated at
the end. There are many researchers do their research on WWII, and Hitler is
one of the most popular topic because Hitler is an important factor in WWII. I’ve ever seen a movie about
German’s surrenderer, the story talks about German in the last period of WWII,
and focus on the story of Hitler before admitted defeat. His character and
situation in the story made me think of North Korea chief leader which just became
an interesting point in a field of International Politics. Because of power of totalitarian
leader is extreme, their surrounding persons have to live with a fear and a
desire in power, so many times they concealed the truth for their personal interest,
and this brings the leaders about a lack of information and misconceptions,
which make them become too vain, as we have seen in Hitler or Mr.Thaksin.
__________
References
Japan Deputy PM Taro Aso retracts Nazi comments.(2013,
August 1).BBC News Asia. Retrieved August 5, 2013 from http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-23527300
Mee makes a few points that interest me in her post.
ReplyDeleteFirst, she reminds us that being a great leader does not mean being a good person, as her example of Hitler shows: he was a great leader, able to inspire the German people to follow him, even though where he led them was to disaster. And I guess the same in Japan, where the Japanese emperor and his generals led the Japanese people to defeat and humiliation.
Another interesting point for me was Mee's observation about leaders such as The Great Leader and the Dear Leader of the nation of North Korea, and their need to censor to hide the truth from their loving and devoted citizens. When we see pictures of North Korean events, thousands, even hundreds of thousands, of citizens are out waving flags, smiling and showing their clearly sincere love and admiration of their Dear Leader and his very well fed looking family. But if free speech were permitted, would they still have that same sincere feeling, or would it die under the truth that can only be discovered with free speech on the topic? Of course, North Korea strictly bans free speech to its own citizens on those topics, just as China strictly censors the Internet to keep its citizens ignorant about topics such as Mao Zedong and Tian An Men. Despots do seem to hate knowledge, even the mere possibility of knowledge, for their citizens.
Kind of related both to Mee's post and my comment, I just remembered that Germany now has a law that you cannot say the Nazi holocaust did not occur, and in Austria, which has the same law, at least one historian has been imprisoned for saying what the law bans.
DeleteI think this is both immoral and irrational: if opposing ideas, especially ideas that many people hate, cannot be stated, then errors cannot be corrected. I think this law means that law abiding German and Austrian citizens are ignorant and cannot have a well founded opinion about the evils committed by the Nazis against the Jews.
The strong legal protection that healthy democracies give to the right to free speech is essential not only moral grounds but also to be able to have knowledge and well founded opinion on any topic. And Germany is now failing by not allowing people in Germany to deny the Nazi holocaust.
If you want knowledge to be possible, or if you want a healthy democracy, then the law must protect the right to free speech, the right to say things that many people, even a large majority, find deeply offensive.
I think people in North Korean are blind by the misleading information they perceive from distorted media. Kim Jong Un is highly praised for wrong reasons. He has luxurious lifestyle by using expensive goods, and consuming western products, like having expensive wines. He doesn't really have good agenda to improve people's standard of living.
ReplyDeleteA lot of people are starved to death that, according to the news several weeks ago, some turned carnival - A man killed his own daughter and ate her because there's extreme scarce of food.
It's not only Korean people that were blind, I think Kim Jong Un, himself also blind, my professor told us that many of Chief leaders in North Korea didn't know too much about the world outside, they just followed their leader, but I think there is one or couples people who know the future of North Korean. Today's Communist governments are different from the past that concerned a lot about people.
DeleteI'm pretty sure that Kim Jong Un knows very well what is going on in the world outside. He was educated overseas and he and his senior leaders to have unrestricted internet access and do come into contact with foreign people and ideas. I think it's far more likely that they deliberately keep their own people ignorant and their sincere opinions worthless by blocking internet access and punishing any speech that is negative or critical purely to maintain their own privileged positions in their corrupt and despotic society.
DeleteI also like the question Mee raises about the value and moral status of communism, but I have to go to my next class now, so perhaps someone else would like to take that up in a comment?
So, is communism a good thing in principle? (And has it ever been a good thing in practice?)
DeleteAnd since so many countries today, from the US to Thailand, have adopted communist like notions of the state providing free education, free medical care, support for the old and so on, the question Mee raises does seem very relevant.