60 years after Auschwitz
Updated: 31 January 2011, 23:46
Originally written: 27 January 2005
“Genocide” has a nasty sound to it. Genocide has a deadly history. Genocide is horrific, and horrifically, genocide continues.
60 years ago — 27 January 1945 — the Red Army marched into the Auschwitz and Birkenau death camps in Nazi-occupied Poland. By the end of 1945, World War II was over, but for the memories. Those memories should have meant, as these famous words suggested: Never Again.
But “never again” really meant, “we are all terribly upset, but let’s forget about it.” A recent survey in Poland shows how well people forget. Only about half of those surveyed knew that the majority of Auschwitz victims were Jews.
The following genocides, politicides, and massacres, were taking place in 2005, according to Genocide Watch:
- Sudan (Darfur) — 2001 - present
— Politicide, Genocide - Uganda — 1994 - present
— Massacres - Congo — 1994 - present
— Politicide, Genocidal massacres - Ethiopia — 2001 - present
— Genocidal massacres - Columbia — 1975 - present
— Politicide - North Korea — 1949 - present
— Politicide - Nepal — 1996 - present
— Political massacres - Afghanistan — 2001 - present
— Political terrorism, war - Burma (Myanmar) — 1979 - present
— Politicide, Genocidal massacres - Sri Lanka — 1983 - present
— Politicide, Genocidal massacres - Indonesia — 1966 - present
— Politicide, Genocidal massacres - India — 1949 - present
— Politicide, Genocidal massacres - China — 1977 - present
— Politicide - Philippines — 1972 - present
— Political massacres (by terrorists) - Uzbekistan Fergana Valley — 1991 - present
— Political massacres - Russia (Chechnya) — 1994 - present
— Politicide, Massacres - Iraq — 2003 - present
— Politicide, Genocidal massacres
In 2003, there were more than 7,000 hate crimes reported by police agencies in the United States. In April 2004, a Jewish elementary school in Montreal, Canada was fire-bombed.
None of that reduces the horror of the Holocaust. All of it — including 6 million slaughtered Jews — shows that class-divided society is incapable of ending the hatred.
Class-divided society is inherently divisive. That division, acknowledged or not, sets the tone for other divisions which focus hatred upon anyone or any group which is perceived to be “different.”
Hatred, however, is not the root of the problem. Hatred is firmly rooted in poverty, which in turn is welded to class-divided society. Capitalism is the last of a string of class-divided societies. Capitalism should be a class-divided society we can look back upon as the last stage before civilization. Today, however, the working class continues to acquiesce to a system of society which has made civilization possible, but blocks or attacks that possibility at every turn.
Reference
Hate Crime Statistics — 2003
As reported by the United StatesFederal Bureau of Investigation
- In 2003, 11,909 agencies actively participated in the hate crime portion of the UCR Program, and 1,967 of those agencies reported 7,489 hate crime incidents involving 8,715 separate offenses, 9,100 victims, and 6,934 known offenders.
- Of the 7,489 hate crime incidents, 7,485 were due to a single-bias, and 4 were due to a multiple-bias.
- More than half (51.4 percent) of all single-bias hate crime incidents in 2003 were racially motivated. Law enforcement investigators attributed nearly 18 percent (17.9) of hate crimes to a religious bias, 16.6 percent to a sexual-orientation bias, 13.7 percent to a bias based on ethnicity/national origin, and 0.4 percent to a disability bias.
- In 2003, 63.3 percent of reported hate crime offenses were classified as crimes against persons, 36.0 percent were classified as crimes against property, and 0.7 percent were classified as crimes against society.
- Law enforcement agencies indicated that intimidation was the most frequently reported hate crime. Intimidation accounted for 31.5 percent of all hate crime offenses and 49.7 percent of crimes against persons.
- Destruction/damage/vandalism of property, the most frequently reported hate crime against property, comprised 30.0 percent of all reported hate crime offenses and 83.4 percent of hate crimes against property.
