Maybe I read too much Vonnegut as a teenager, but....

[pot_t_mouth]

All this talk about the new Pope and Hitler's Youth has got me agitated. Super agitated, for a few reason. I have been stewing on it all day so hopefully, I can get my point across. I wish I were a better writer

Comments

[prettyfool]

I understand what you mean completely. Ideally, we should live up to our ideals. But people don't, when faces with life or death. I don't even know how well I'd manage in any serious situation. And that's important to keep in mind; what we'd say and what we'd do are often very different.

I'm nervous lately about how much has gone under the raydar...

[pot_t_mouth]

Don't you go reading Mother Night now! I was thinking when I wrote this how similar it is to The Fall in that it is a study in judgement.

Just kidding. Read it.

[pot_t_mouth]

Thank you. I may make a grad student after all.

[notmarcie]

The news report I heard tonight stated that Ratzinger was the son of very Anti-Nazi parents and was forced to be in the Hitler Youth. So any emphasis on what he did or did not do as a teenager is ridiculous. As you rightly point out, which of us would be able to say for certain that we would have the strength to resist something knowing the potential risk to ourselves ?

I am far more concerned that the man who is now Pope hates so many things that I hold as fundamental to a modern society. That he openly doesn't agree with multicultural society as currently practised in Europe. In addition to his views on divorce, homosexuality, contraception etc. I feel as though the "different uniforms" are somehow vindicated by the new Pope.

[pot_t_mouth]

Oh, I agree. I am not so much concerned as disappointed that they didn't do something good with the position. Maybe even elect a guy that would agree that in Africa a rubber might be a pretty good thing to have. Or maybe elect a guy who thought that women weren't lesser beings than men.

[notmarcie]

I have pretty much accepted that I am going to hell because my reaction was "well, he is old and has heart trouble. He will die soon."

[astronautical]

I'm going to write more about this in my journal, but on fresh air today I heard a historian talking about how slowly the slide into the holocaust really was -- it wasn't just because germans are BAD inherently, or because there were a few evil people. It was a "rational chain of events." It's a good illustration of how ALL war is bad, because it leads to really bad things.

[brdgt]

Great points.

When I kept hearing that Hitler Youth comment on the news I got so mad. Like you so eloquently pointed out, there is so much more to it, and things that really should be discussed, because, well, you know, that whole "history repeating itself" thing....