donald drumpf's threats against the LGBT community are just not against them, they mask a authoritarian agenda against all Americans. He disparaging remarks to and about women, Muslims, Mexicans, liberals, and others are a warning that if he is elected president nobody who doesn't hold his narcissistic, xenophobic, hateful attitudes and opinions is or will be a target for him and his followers. I offer first Martin Niemoeller's poem 'First They Came' and then the article on drumpf....
First they came ...
"First they came ..." is a famous statement and provocative poem written by Pastor Martin Niemöller (1892–1984) about the cowardice of German intellectuals following the Nazis' rise to power and the subsequent purging of their chosen targets, group after group. Many variations and adaptations in the spirit of the original have been published in the English language. It deals with themes of persecution, guilt and responsibility.
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"First they came ..." is a famous statement and provocative poem written by Pastor Martin Niemöller (1892–1984) about the cowardice of German intellectuals following the Nazis' rise to power and the subsequent purging of their chosen targets, group after group. Many variations and adaptations in the spirit of the original have been published in the English language. It deals with themes of persecution, guilt and responsibility.
The best-known versions of the speech are the poems that began circulating by the 1950s.[1] The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum quotes the following text as one of the many poetic versions of the speech:[2]
“
First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Socialist.
Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Trade Unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.
”
Niemöller created multiple versions of the text during his career. The earliest speeches, written in 1946, list the communists, incurable patients, Jews or Jehovah's Witnesses, and civilians in countries occupied by Nazi Germany. In all versions, the impact is carefully built up, by going from the "smallest, most distant" group to the largest, Jewish, group, .... and then finally to himself as a by then outspoken critic of Nazism. Niemöller made the cardinal "who cares about them," clear in his speech for the Confessing Church in Frankfurt on 6 January 1946, of which this is a partial translation:[1]
“
When Pastor Niemöller was put in a concentration camp we wrote the year 1937; when the concentration camp was opened we wrote the year 1933, and the people who were put in the camps then were Communists. Who cared about them? We knew it, it was printed in the newspapers.
Who raised their voice, maybe the Confessing Church? We thought: Communists, those opponents of religion, those enemies of Christians - "should I be my brother's keeper?"
Then they got rid of the sick, the so-called incurables. - I remember a conversation I had with a person who claimed to be a Christian. He said: Perhaps it's right, these incurably sick people just cost the state money, they are just a burden to themselves and to others. Isn't it best for all concerned if they are taken out of the middle [of society]? -- Only then did the church as such take note. Then we started talking, until our voices were again silenced in public. Can we say, we aren't guilty/responsible? The persecution of the Jews, the way we treated the occupied countries, or the things in Greece, in Poland, in Czechoslovakia or in Holland, that were written in the newspapers
I believe, we Confessing-Church-Christians have every reason to say: mea culpa, mea culpa! We can talk ourselves out of it with the excuse that it would have cost me my head if I had spoken out.
”
This speech was translated and published in English in 1947, but was later retracted when it was alleged that Niemöller was an early supporter of the Nazis.[3] The "sick, the so-called incurables" were killed in Action T4. A 1955 version of the speech, mentioned in an interview of a German professor quoting Niemöller, lists communists, socialists, schools, Jews, the press, and the Church. An American version delivered by a congressman in 1968 anachronistically includes the industrialists, who were not persecuted by the Nazis, and omits the Communists.
In 1976, Niemöller gave the following answer in response to an interview question asking about the origins of the poem.[1] The Martin-Niemöller-Foundation considers this the "classical" version of the speech:[4]
“
There were no minutes or copy of what I said, and it may be that I formulated it differently. But the idea was anyhow: The communists, we still let that happen calmly; and the trade unions, we also let that happen; and we even let theSocial Democrats happen. All of that was not our affair. The Church did not concern itself with politics at all at that time, and it shouldn't have anything do with them either. In the Confessing Church we didn't want to represent any political resistance per se, but we wanted to determine for the Church that that was not right, and that it should not become right in the Church, that's why already in '33, when we created the pastors' emergency federation (Pfarrernotbund), we put as the 4th point in the founding charter: If an offensive is made against ministers and they are simply ousted as ministers, because they are of Jewish lineage (Judenstämmlinge) or something like that, then we can only say as a Church: No. And that was then the 4th point in the obligation, and that was probably the first contra-anti-antisemitic pronouncement coming from the Protestant Church.
”
The best-known versions of the speech are the poems that began circulating by the 1950s.[1] The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum quotes the following text as one of the many poetic versions of the speech:[2]
| “ |
First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Socialist.
Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Trade Unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.
| ” |
Niemöller created multiple versions of the text during his career. The earliest speeches, written in 1946, list the communists, incurable patients, Jews or Jehovah's Witnesses, and civilians in countries occupied by Nazi Germany. In all versions, the impact is carefully built up, by going from the "smallest, most distant" group to the largest, Jewish, group, .... and then finally to himself as a by then outspoken critic of Nazism. Niemöller made the cardinal "who cares about them," clear in his speech for the Confessing Church in Frankfurt on 6 January 1946, of which this is a partial translation:[1]
| “ |
When Pastor Niemöller was put in a concentration camp we wrote the year 1937; when the concentration camp was opened we wrote the year 1933, and the people who were put in the camps then were Communists. Who cared about them? We knew it, it was printed in the newspapers.
Who raised their voice, maybe the Confessing Church? We thought: Communists, those opponents of religion, those enemies of Christians - "should I be my brother's keeper?" Then they got rid of the sick, the so-called incurables. - I remember a conversation I had with a person who claimed to be a Christian. He said: Perhaps it's right, these incurably sick people just cost the state money, they are just a burden to themselves and to others. Isn't it best for all concerned if they are taken out of the middle [of society]? -- Only then did the church as such take note. Then we started talking, until our voices were again silenced in public. Can we say, we aren't guilty/responsible? The persecution of the Jews, the way we treated the occupied countries, or the things in Greece, in Poland, in Czechoslovakia or in Holland, that were written in the newspapers I believe, we Confessing-Church-Christians have every reason to say: mea culpa, mea culpa! We can talk ourselves out of it with the excuse that it would have cost me my head if I had spoken out. | ” |
This speech was translated and published in English in 1947, but was later retracted when it was alleged that Niemöller was an early supporter of the Nazis.[3] The "sick, the so-called incurables" were killed in Action T4. A 1955 version of the speech, mentioned in an interview of a German professor quoting Niemöller, lists communists, socialists, schools, Jews, the press, and the Church. An American version delivered by a congressman in 1968 anachronistically includes the industrialists, who were not persecuted by the Nazis, and omits the Communists.
In 1976, Niemöller gave the following answer in response to an interview question asking about the origins of the poem.[1] The Martin-Niemöller-Foundation considers this the "classical" version of the speech:[4]
| “ |
There were no minutes or copy of what I said, and it may be that I formulated it differently. But the idea was anyhow: The communists, we still let that happen calmly; and the trade unions, we also let that happen; and we even let theSocial Democrats happen. All of that was not our affair. The Church did not concern itself with politics at all at that time, and it shouldn't have anything do with them either. In the Confessing Church we didn't want to represent any political resistance per se, but we wanted to determine for the Church that that was not right, and that it should not become right in the Church, that's why already in '33, when we created the pastors' emergency federation (Pfarrernotbund), we put as the 4th point in the founding charter: If an offensive is made against ministers and they are simply ousted as ministers, because they are of Jewish lineage (Judenstämmlinge) or something like that, then we can only say as a Church: No. And that was then the 4th point in the obligation, and that was probably the first contra-anti-antisemitic pronouncement coming from the Protestant Church.
| ” |
Trump’s Supreme Court nominee: States should be able to jail people for ‘homosexual sodomy’
Donald Trump wants to nominate a judge for the Supreme Court who argued that states should be free to make “homosexual sodomy” an imprison-able offence.
The billionaire reality TV star-turned-Republican Presidential candidate this week suggested he would nominate Texas justice William H. Pryor Jr for the vacant spot on the US Supreme Court.
Pryor has previously attracted attention for being one of the most virulently anti-LGBT justices in America – having argued in a 2003 brief that Texas should be allowed to keep its sodomy law.
Liberal group People for the American Way notes that he argued in the 2003 brief: “[There is] no fundamental right to engage in homosexual sodomy just because it is done behind closed doors.
“Homosexual sodomy has not historically been recognized in this country as a right — to the contrary, it has historically been recognized as a wrong — it is not a fundamental right.”
He added: “Texas is hardly alone in concluding that homosexual sodomy may have severe physical, emotional, psychological, and spiritual consequences, which do not necessarily attend heterosexual sodomy, and from which Texas’s citizens need to be protected.”
In their report, PFAW notes: “Pryor would deny gay men and lesbians the equal protection of the laws. He believes that it is constitutional to imprison gay men and lesbians for expressing their sexuality in the privacy of their own homes and has voluntarily filed an amicus brief in the Supreme Court urging the Court to uphold a Texas law that criminalizes such private consensual activity.
“Despite Supreme Court rulings to the contrary, Pryor has expressed the view that the Constitution should not apply to certain critical issues pertaining to the rights and freedoms of individual Americans, such as reproductive choice, the civil rights of gay men and lesbians, and religious liberty issues.
“Instead, Pryor has urged that these rights be determined by majority vote within each state, with the result that these rights could be diluted or eliminated in particular states.
“The effective and devastating result of this ideology would be that the fundamental guarantees of the Constitution would not apply equally across the country.
“Pryor’s ‘majoritarian’ views would create an America in which a person’s individual rights under the Constitution as the Supreme Court has articulated them would be fewer or greater depending on where that person lives.”
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