Groups victimized by the Nazis:
Asocial: defined as vagabonds, gypsies, beggars, prostitutes, alcoholics, eccentrics, delinquents, work-shy, and juvenile delinquents. Divided into the order that were given work, they were forced to wear black triangles. Thousands were sent to concentration camps, where many died. Thus the asocial became, in the Nazi view, unworthy people who needed to be extracted via sterilization or murder.
Mentally ill: For the Nazis race, not class, was the key to history. Unhealthy genes weakened the race. Considered to be worthless and life-meaningless and useless, the Nazi regime decided, as one of the first moves allowed a compulsory law, which consisted in sterilizing hereditary illness carriers. This step was taken in order to stop and prevent the spread of such genes to pass on to children. About 350 000 people were sterilized, of whom 100 died as a result of “Hitler cuts”.
Homosexuals: 15000 gays were sent to caps where they were forced to wear a pink triangle. Parts of them were castrated and became the object of medical experiments designed to correct their unnatural feelings.
Religious sects: Severe actions were taken against minority sects, especially Jehovah witnesses. Their families were arrested and one third of Germany’s Jehovah’s witnesses died in concentration camps.
Gypsies: There were only about 30 000 Gypsies in Germany, therefore they weren’t seen as a major threat, because couldn’t “contaminate” German blood. Despite of that fact, in the late 30s this group also became a victim of radicalization. Representatives of this group were sent to camps before being expelled to Poland. When transferred to Auschwitz, 11 000 of the 20 000 Gypsies in Auschwitz were gassed. All over Europe, ½ a million Gypsies were killed during Nazism.
The Jews: hostility towards Jews was due to the wealth and position of some of the Jews. Often regarded as scapegoats to blame for problems (mainly of the economic origin), Jews got even more discriminated when the Nazis came to power.
Deprived of their jobs and of their citizenship, they were driven out of German life. By winter 1941 700 000 Jews have been killed (mainly by mass shooting). The SS decided afterwards that gassing was more efficient. Between 1942 and 1945 over 5 million Jews were systematically killed.
DEFINITIONS:
Aryan: a term used by the Nazis to describe the non-Jewish race. The Nordic of Germanic subgroup was the superior form of the Aryan race.
Eugenics: it was the belief in improving a race by selection. Ideas of Social Darwinism were enhanced by fears of a declining birth rate, by improving medical advances allowing weaker people to live longer and by scientific theories explaining anti-social behavior in hereditary terms. This can be seen as a positive point in the field of science research. But the way the Nazis performed it was more than negative.
Euthanasia: “Mercy” killing putting painless to death, especially in cases of incurable illnesses with the person involved desiring death. This was used to kill mentally ill patients in Nazi Germany where the motivation was to help the nation. This process is justifiable from the economic point of view: getting rid of the mentally ill person is less expensive than keeping him or her alive = the government spends less on people who are a burden to the society and thus can spend more on those who belong to the healthy group.
Genocide: The killing of a whole race.
Holocaust: the word comes from the Greek for whole and burnt, and originally was used to describe the sacrifice in which the whole victim was burnt. It is now used to describe the mass slaughter of human life and especially to describe the Nazis murder of 7 million Jews. Nazis were sending Jews to the concentration camp and gassing them and then burning. It was an inhuman thing to do because no one would imagine that one human would do something like that to other one. No on of us would be ready to gas hundreds of people and then burn them just like a paper.
In our conclusion we want to say that Nazi’s reason for mass murder was to create an ideal community. Their ideal community was without any foreigners in their country and no ill people. All they wanted is healthy strong and able to work people. Nazi’s main idea was ‘a healthy, pure race would gain mastery in the struggle for survival in the world. Unhealthy genes weakened the race. The mentally ill were ‘burdens on the community’. Following these beliefs and mainly their law, Nazis were getting rid of people whom they didn’t want. Reason for Nazis committing mass murder was because they wanted to create a country, which would be mastery in the world.
By Munkhbayar & Alberto (Alberto didn’t do anything)
