There were posters:
This one designed to show that “inferior traits”
are passed on to future generations more quickly and easily
than more “highly valued traits”.
and this one that declares that 60,000 Reich marks
is what this person suffering from hereditary defects
costs the community during his lifetime.
“Comrade, that is your money, too” it warns.
Then there’s this one
maintaining that the cost of feeding one person
with a hereditary disease for one day
is the same cost to feed an entire family of healthy Germans.
There were also films:
Opfer der Vergangenheit, 1937
And this, a quote from the documentary I was watching
when The Big Idea came to call.
(I can’t find the video outside of the documentary.)
“The German people are unaware
of the true extent of all this misery.
They are unaware of the depressing atmosphere
in these places in which thousands of
gibbering idiots
must be fed and nursed.
They are inferior to any animal.
Can we burden future generations with such an inheritance?”
. . . all designed with one purpose in mind:
sell the public on the idea of
murdering those who are not deemed perfect.
~~~~~~~
This must not happen again.
Won’t you become part of
The 70273 Project and help us commemorate
those with disabilities who were murdered,
celebrate those with special needs who live among us today,
and educate all who will listen so we can make sure
this never, ever happens again?
Places to gather around The 70273 Project water cooler:
Subscribe to the blog (where all information is shared).
Join the English-speaking Facebook group – our e-campfire –
where you can talk to other members of The 70273 Project Tribe.
Join the French-speaking Facebook group – our other e-campfire –
where you can chat with other members of The 70273 Project Tribe.
Like the Facebook page where you can check in for frequent updates.
Follow the pinterest board for visual information.
Post using #the70273project on Instagram.
(Please tag me, too, @whollyjeanne, so I don’t miss anything.)
And if you haven’t yet made some blocks,
perhaps you’d like to put some cloth in your hands and join us.
Or maybe you’d like to gather friends and family,
colleagues or students,
club or guild members, etc. together and make a group quilt.
Oh, Jeanne, this, this, this is just … it defies description. It started as a charade — telling doctors in the sanitariums that their patients were being moved to other facilities, where they could be cared for better… all the forms and the triplicates and the SS guards dressed in white … Clearly, the charade didn’t last very long… these posters and films were made to convince the German population of the danger these poor people posed to the Master Race and justify the unspeakable, in case anyone found out… what sickens me is that the 70,273 victims were murdered in 1940-41, but the film footage you included was made in 1937 — three years earlier … and, if you change the names and pictures in the posters and the films, you have the Nazi explanation for all the other exterminations they carried out… the Jews, the Romani, the Poles, anyone who did not display the perfect traits of the Master Race …. such evil is indescribable and we must not let anything even remotely like this happen again — we must be vigilant against a modern, scientifically driven version with a message that is aimed to make us feel sorry for the victims (rather than hatred) and believe that the “new and improved version” is better for them and their families… all I can do is shake my head and feel the weight of “man’s inhumanity to man.” We will have our own impact, we will tell the stories of each and ever one of the 70,273 lives that the Nazis obliterated in the name of saving money and preserving the traits of the mythical Master Race — I have a vision of many quilts filled with red Xs lining the walls of an exhibition hall or hung from the ceiling throughout the space — bringing home the sheer magnitude of this evil action to people who have never heard of them ….
On a happier note, my red ribbon arrived today — all 20 yards of it. As soon as the white cloth arrives, I will set my hands to work on making squares… reverently remembering the life that each one represents … <3