Can I ask a sensitive question?

[carolfoy]

This is not here for debate I'd just like a bit of feedback,
My Son who is 10 is doing a project on the second world war, He has to write an essay on why Hitler was so mean to the jews, I don't live in a jewish community nor do I know anyone who is jewish so I don't know who to ask.
The comments we've had so far (and I stress these are comments not opinions!) suggest..
1, He didn't like them because they are by nature hard workers and were 'taking jobs away from the aryan community'
2, He didn't like them simply because they are naturally dark skinned, dark haired. (this confuses me as although I know he wasn't actively pro black or pro asian he didn't seek these ethnicities out to torture)
3, Jewish people believe they are the sons of god and are therefore 'above' the rest of the christian race
4, they were just a minority in that area and should be destroyed in case the wiped out the blond, blue eyed 'majority'
I know this is a highly sensitive subject but please could I have some honest feedback or further suggestion as to why this particular group of people were singled out.
Many thanks

 

[poohandwendy]

How about because he was threatened by anyone different than him?

 

[Barb D]

"The Jews killed Jesus." (Jesus was a Jew, as were most of the first Christians, so this has never flown.)

Bottom line: Hitler was EVIL.

 

[poohandwendy]

Because he needed a scapegoat to rally the working class people behind a common cause, to drive the people's minds away from the true cause of their misery. He also benefited from taking their money to finance his regime.

 

[Barb D]

More:

DS14 just studied this in school. He says:

"Germany was going through an economic depression and Hitler wanted to rise to power, so he started targeting anyone with controversial opinions to make them scapegoats. He told the Germans that they (the scapegoats) were the reason for the problems. Other people he targeted were liberals, gypsies, gay people, communists, and any opponents to his political party. Also anyone who refused to join the SS or comply with him."

DH says Hitler taught the Semitic race was an inferior race. The Jews were the major intellectuals, the bankers, etc. They had the money.

He put Christians in the concentration camps, too. (Corrie Ten Boom wrote a book about her experiences as a Christian in a concentration camp. Her family hid Jews in their house.)

 

[poohandwendy]

2, He didn't like them simply because they are naturally dark skinned, dark haired. (this confuses me as although I know he wasn't actively pro black or pro asian he didn't seek these ethnicities out to torture)

I have read that their not being blonde/blue eyed made them an easier group to target because they stood out. (not sure about that, just something I read)

 

[carolfoy]

Thanks so much for your input and help, I'm sure Callum will use these points effectively,
BTW I totally agree he was evil beyond comprehension.

 

[golfgal]

More:

DS14 just studied this in school. He says:

"Germany was going through an economic depression and Hitler wanted to rise to power, so he started targeting anyone with controversial opinions to make them scapegoats. He told the Germans that they (the scapegoats) were the reason for the problems. Other people he targeted were liberals, gypsies, gay people, communists, and any opponents to his political party. Also anyone who refused to join the SS or comply with him."

DH says Hitler taught the Semitic race was an inferior race. The Jews were the major intellectuals, the bankers, etc. They had the money.

He put Christians in the concentration camps, too. (Corrie Ten Boom wrote a book about her experiences as a Christian in a concentration camp. Her family hid Jews in their house.)

Change "Germany was going through an economic depression" to the "WORLD was in an economic depression". Hitlers rise to power was between WWI and WWII, the years of the Great Depression.

Hitler believed in a "pure" race and was trying to make Europe and eventually the world into his ideal race. While Jews suffered the most, Catholics and other groups were also put into concentration camps.

Like someone else said, bottom line, Hitler was Evil.

 

[puggymom]

One documentary I saw, stated a theory that it was a Jewish doctor that treated his mother, who died and he blamed the doctor for her death. That combined with the harsh economics of the time (and how the Germans hands were tied due to the Treaty of Versailles) they were an easy scapegoat for him.

 

[Sparx]

I never under stood the blonde/blue eyed thing. Hitler had brown hair and brown eyes.

I don't really know the answer to your question. I think that it is a little of all of them. Like another poster said, Hitler was evil.

 

[GoofyDad869]

There are also unsubstantiated rumors that Hitler's father, Alois Schicklegruber (he changed it to Hitler in his 40s), had an affair with a Jewish maid/cook when Adolf was very young, and that Hitler may have been part-Jewish from an ancestor. Alois S. (he used his mother's maiden name) was born out of wedlock and his father - Adolf's paternal grandfather - is unknown, but it was probably Johann Georg Heidler or his brother Johann von Nepunik Heidler. Johann Georg Heidler raised Alois as a stepfather, and the Heidler family was Jewish. If this is true, Adolf Hitler was 1/4 Jewish. That's a big if, though.

Hitler simply had a pathologic repulsion of Jewish people. He also unfortunately had an adequate number of willing accomplices to carry out his wishes. He set up a machine (political, bureaucratic, governmental, call it what you will - I think it was all of the above) that made it fairly easy for the Jewish race to be marginalized (early-mid 30s), criminalized (mid 30s-late 30s), explicitly ostracized (late 30s-early 40s), and finally liquidated (Nazi's term, not mine) in the mid-40s through the end of the war.

If your son is able and willing (probably not the right choice of word), I might consider letting him watch "Schindler's List" with an adult. The book by Thomas Keneally his quite a bit more back-story, but may be over the head of your average 14 year old. The last couple of episodes of HBO's miniseries "Band of Brothers" deals with the liberation of a small concentration camp and the discovery of Hitler's & Himmler's wider scheme as the troops march through Germany. The episode (I think it was the 2nd to the last episode) shows your typical small German town's varying levels of awareness of the existence of c.c.'s very well.

A great book (actually two graphic novel books) by Art Speigelman are the "Maus" books. These were written in the late 80s/early 90s and tell the story of the author's father & mother (and family) who were prisoners at various c.c.'s during WWII. They're good psychological studies, even if they are graphic novels. Art S. uses various anthropomorphic animals (the Jews are mice, the Germans are cats, the French are frogs, the Polish are pigs, the Americans are dogs (G.I. dog-faces, get it?) but it is thinly veiled. There are some very unsettling images and scenes (the author's enactment of his mother's suicide comes to mind), and the books are not for everyone. Might make it easier for a young teenager to understand.

Go to the Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page) for some more information, search for Adolf Hitler or Holocaust (I used it to fact-check this post).

None of these movies or books are pleasant, but it's (The Holocaust) not a pleasant topic. I don't think it's appropriate to sugar-coat it, either. It happened, and I don't think it's in anybody's interest to forget that it happened.

As golfgal said, he also persecuted just about all sects of Christian (she mentioned Catholics explicitly) faith, but to a lesser extent than the Jewish persecution. He legalized the euthenasia (sp?) of the mentally ill and the elderly. And (as Barb D said) also sent homosexuals, intellectuals, gypsies, homeless, political enemies, etc to c.c.'s (I'm tired of typing 'concentration camps').

For a truer, grander portrait of evil - look at Joseph Stalin. Within the Nazi party (and the German government itself) there were at least some checks and balances of Hitler's power. Hitler also had a very strong sense of morality, although incredibly stunted in some (most?) areas. Stalin wasn't held back in any way, and he had absolutely no sense of morality.

 

[CathrynRose]

Because he needed a scapegoat to rally the working class people behind a common cause, to drive the people's minds away from the true cause of their misery. He also benefited from taking their money to finance his regime.

 

[GoofyDad869]

Wait a second - for some reason I thought the OP said her son was 14, not 10. My son is 11 and there's no way I'd let him view any of the books/movies I suggested. At 10 or 11, I think generalities are appropriate, maybe I'd suggest "Diary of Anne Frank" for a child that young.

 

[olena]

The Jewish family name rumored to be in Hitler's family tree was Salomon or something like that. When Germany took over Austria, Hitler went to his home town and saw to it that any family history left there supported his carefully crafted public image. Any contradictory evidence was destroyed. Now all we have are rumors based on tidbits and clues that survived.

 

[diznygirl]

I have a slightly OT ? - what grade do children start finding out about Hitler and the Holocaust? At age 6, I'm teaching my son that there is no such thing at monsters...I just want to know when I have to give him the head's up on this one. TIA!

 

[Pea-n-Me]

I recently read the obituary of an 80-something year old man. His life story was interesting, but horribly sad - I cried when I read it. For most of his life he could not even talk about it. As a teenage homosexual man, he was arrested and imprisoned by Nazis because of his homosexuality. He was regularly harrassed, beaten, raped and sodomized. One day he and other "prisoners" were forced to watch as a man was led, naked, into the camp yard. He was horrified to see it was his former lover. Two German Shepherd dogs were released and mauled the naked man/former lover to death, while the guards laughed. That memory haunted him more than any other his whole life.

Somehow this man made it out alive but went on to deny not only his homosexuality, but any aspect of his inprisonment and torture. He married and had a family. Plagued by symptoms of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder throughout his life, he later, with the support of his wife and children, told his story and then wrote a book about his experiences. Very sad, but I'm glad that before his life ended he had come to terms with his past. I'm sure there are thousands of stories like these from the ones who made it out alive.

 

[cherylp3]

There also is a movie called Paperclips
http://www.miramax.com/paperclips/

 

[reddixie]

I think that you can't quanitfy the evil of Hitler! Why was he "mean" to the Jews? First I am offended that you would ask that in that way. He wasn't "mean" he was sadisitic, inhumane, lethal, and downright hate filled. Mean implies that is was not so horrible. So I would suggest that the first thing you do is explain that at 10 your son can't begin to understand or comprehend Hitler. Then I would explain that he was afraid of anyone different. He had his idea of a perfect world. As many have stated he didn't just target the Jews. They were the worst offenders in his mind though. He thought that they were God's chosen people and made God mad at the rest of the world. He said they took all the good jobs Bankers, Jewelers, Professorers, etc.. That for Aryans to live up to their full potential these parasites (Jews his words not mine) had to be exterminated. He said without this plaque of unpure blood that corrupted the world that the Arayans would succeed. He thought Jews were the reason that we were in a Great Depression. He felt they sinned against God. It is really to much to explain on a Disney board the hatred and vile filth he spread but I think at 10 if he has to write a report on Hitler it should first explain that he wasn't merely mean to the Jews. That does a dishonor to the 6.2 million Jews that lost their lives to the Death Machine. He should simply explain some people fear things they can't control and act as bullies. Hitler was one of the world's biggest bullies. Sorry this is long but I feel passionately that we shouldn't minimize or belittle the people massacred for their race, sexual, and or religious beliefs.

 

[can'twait]

I'm guessing that the OP used "mean" because that's what 10 year olds understand, and to expose kids that young to the full horror of the holocaust might be too much for them. I don't think it should be sugarcoated either, but sometimes you need to make things age appropriate.

To answer the original question, I saw a show on the History Channel once that talked about a book that was published in the late 19th century that was basically anti-Semitic propaganda. I can't remember the name of it, but it has since been proven to be a pack of lies. Hitler believed it to be true and was obviously strongly influenced by it. He managed to use propaganda to convince the rest of Germany to feel the same way about Jews. He came to power during the Depression and made Germans think Jews had all the jobs, $, etc. People who were suffering from the Depression and angry began to think the Jews were the cause of their suffering. They needed a scapegoat and an outlet for their frustration, and Hitler gave them an excuse and permission to take it out on the Jews. I personally think he had a few screws loose. I would say mental illness and propaganda are big factors. In any case, none of us really "knows". We are all just guessing.

 

[barkley]

Maus is an excellent set of books to give an overview on the holocaust and could be easily read by a ten year old (comic book style). i would suggest renting "Paperclips" (now available at blockbuster) because it shows how other kids learned about it and what they discovered in the process.