Rosenrot - Rammstein Fan Forum -

Paul is right, obviously. Anyone can see that.

It's a shame that such a great beautiful country like Germany is so shameful of it's past... Not only the Germans but the whole world should remember there were a lot of good things in Germany before the nazis ruined it all, and there still are. You can find good people and bad people everywhere, doesn't matter whether you're in germany or in thailand!

What I don't understand are the dual standards some people have. Soo many people, millions of people, died victim of persecution in the Soviet Union, and yet no one thinks of the soviets in the same way they think of the nazis. Firstly because the nazis were quickly trialed and convicted, immediately establishing the ideia that nazis were criminals (rightly so, obviously). Secondly because a part of what went on in the USSR stayed buried for decades and there was already a feeling of hatred towards them before the system fell apart, so everything that was uncovered in 1991 didin't really make the west hate them more...they already hated them. Plus, since it had been going on for so long it wasn't really shocking... Hell, the Georgian government only decided to remove Stalin's statues from public places this week!! If there had been an equivalent to the Nuremberg trials in Russia after the fall of the USSR, things would be a lot different nowadays... I'll give you a specific example: Here in Portugal, the fascist party is illegal, but not the communist party and all the other marxist parties... It makes me soo angry really, it's incredibly disrespectful for all the people who died and are still dying everyday (in North Korea for instance) I've heard on a tv debate a respected member of the portuguese communist party saying she thought the North Korean regime was a democracy!! How is that possible in 2010??? I just don't get it.

I just want to make it clear I'm not defending the nazi regime, don't get me wrong. I despise every dictatorial regime, and that's exactly why I'm saying this.

...Plus, if all germans were nazis, then Karl Marx would also be a nazi.

The Russians didn't commit the holocaust, the nazis did, so its Nazi Germany's legacy, no one else's.
Also, Karl Marx was Jewish, so its pretty silly to call him a nazi...he would have been stripped of his German citizenship and shipped to Dachau like the other Jewish Germans. For example, Otto Frank, Anne Frank's father was a decorated German soldier in World war 1,but the nazis still put him in a concentration camp and murdered his whole family.
Please don't try to compare any portion of history with the nazi holocaust. It demeans and diminishes the horror the nazis commited and what their victims went through.
Having said that, modern Germans were not responsible for what their ancestors did, so I agree that they shouldn't be blamed or stereotyped for events that happened before they were born.

Exactly.

Barging in here and veering off topic, but before you imply nothing, not one area in history is comparable to the Holocaust, there is research to be done. Do you know the sheer amount of Native Americans who lost their lives, their land, their culture and were horribly deprived and terribly mistreated all across North, and many parts of South America, for example? Is pointing out facts really demeaning and diminishing? There have been all sorts of genocides and terrors comparable to what happened to the Holocaust victims. You demean millions of other victims of mass murder by brushing it all aside and saying no one should compare anything to the Holocaust.

By the way, I didn't see where MorgaineBlack ever directly said Karl Marx was a Nazi in her post, or where she ever said the Russians committed the Holocaust. I'm pretty sure she was pointing out a fact and something I agree with, that the Soviet Union (particularly the Soviet Union under Stalin) is responsible for several million more deaths than the Nazi Holocaust as well, but it's Hitler's dirty work that gets all the attention, and it's the present day Germans who are especially stuck with terrible reputations they don't deserve.

There have been, are, and continue to be examples of mass murder, genocide, rape as a war crime (it has only recently been given this designation - and it's about time), and other atrocities committed against people the world over.

I took a Criminology course on Terrorism during which the Prof made a point similar to that of streichholz' - that Stalin committed vile horrors during his reign of terror - against his own people and in numbers exceeding that of the Nazi regime. Going exclusively by memory (I *can* search out my study notes if necessary), I believe the Prof stated that it was Stalin who was the bigger monster in that he was responsible for murdering more people, and his own countrymen at that.
And yes I know that Hitler also had victimised and murdered his own people - but not exclusively, as Stalin had. And please don't "read" any more into my post than what I have said. I am not being an apologist for any historical figure's crimes, nor am I excusing them.

And if rape had been regarded as a war crime since, oh, maybe even as recently as WWI, - I think that EVERY nation who had participated in this and subsequent wars would have had plenty of war criminals amongst their officers and enlisted men alike.

There are two issues at hand here. The first is whether or not its acceptable to compare other horrors of history to the holocaust. The second subject is whether or not modern day Germans should have to bear the legacy of what their nazi ancestors did.

No one is suggesting that the holocaust is the only attrocity that ever happened. However I still maintain that it is completely counter productive to compare it to any of the many other incidents of human cruelty that have disgraced the planet. I personally think its ridiculous to compare any two attrocities to one another. It does demean the victims of both. Let's take the holocaust out of the equation for a moment. If someone were speaking of the 1994 Rwandan Genocide, would it make sense for someone to come along and say "Well yeah Rwanda was bad, but what about American slavery, millions more Africans suffered and died during that era as well"? While it may be true, it serves no purpose and dimishes the deaths of both sets of victims.
No event in history should be swept under the rug, it should all be discussed, however whatever period or event one is talking about, the best way of remembering it is to discuss it on its own merits. As a wise person once said "Don't dicksize opression."

Now on the second issue. As I already stated, modern day Germans should not be held accountable or stereotyped for what their grand parents or great grand parents did. However, its not because the grand parents of people in other countries also commited evil acts, its because they are simply not responsible for what their ancestors did, so again there's no reason to compare the others' history to that of nazi Germany in order to defend modern day Germans. Every person should be treated as an individual whose deeds belong to them, no one else.