Sharing this powerful, historical speech from former President of the German Federation Richard von Weizsäcker commemorating the 40th anniversary of the end of WWII.
https://youtu.be/13pxvDk4PE8?si=e91rXJGAUZespFsy
Vielen lieben dank an @AwetTesfaiesus fürs Teilen.
I could not find an Italian translation, so for now English will have to do.
My favorite excerpts:
Nobody will, because of that liberation, forget the grave suffering that only started for many people on 8 May. But we must not regard the end of the war as the cause of flight, expulsion and deprivation of freedom. The cause goes back to the start of the tyranny that brought about war. We must not separate 8 May 1945 from 30 January 1933.
Oh, does it sound prophetic today?
Perhaps the greatest burden was borne by the women of all nations. Their suffering, renunciation and silent strength are all too easily forgotten by history. Filled with fear, they worked, bore human
life and protected it. They mourned their fallen fathers and sons, husbands, brothers and friends. In the years of darkness, they ensured that the light of humanity was not extinguished. After the war, with no prospect of a secure future, women everywhere were the first to set about building homes again, the "rubble women" in Berlin and
elsewhere. When the men who had survived returned, women often had to take a back seat again. Because of the war, many women were left alone and spent their lives in solitude. Yet it is first and foremost thanks to the women that nations did not disintegrate spiritually on
account of the destruction, devastation, atrocities and inhumanity and that they gradually regained their foothold after the war.
Fuckin' PREACH! Why do I have to hear more progressive and acknowledging words from an old, white, German man in the 80ies than I hear today, even from way too many so-called progressives?! MORE OF THIS!
Hitler had never concealed this hatred
from the public, but made the entire nation a tool of it
Sounds true today again? Because it is, goddammit.
There were many ways of not burdening one's conscience, of shunning responsibility, looking away, keeping mum. When the unspeakable truth of the Holocaust then became known at the end of the war, all too many of us claimed that they had not known anything about it or even suspected anything.
Yet here we are today, debating over the definition of genocide (or of child!), while looking away is literally impossible. Some of us will always be disgusting, some of us will always stick our heads in the sand in order to keep our lives undisturbed.
However, anyone who closes his eyes to the past is blind to the present. Whoever refuses to remember the inhumanity is prone to new risks of infection.
And here we are, running a high fever. We've denied the validity of the vaccine called "studying history and learning from it".
On 23 August 1939 Germany and the Soviet Union signed a non-aggression pact. The secret supplementary protocol made provision for the impending partition of Poland. That pact was made to give Hitler an opportunity to invade Poland. The Soviet leaders at the time were fully aware of this. And all who understood politics realized that the implications of the German-Soviet pact were Hitler's invasion of Poland and hence the Second World War.
Or: when madmen plainly tell you what shit they're going to do, fucking believe them and don't be an accomplice.
Time and again Hitler had declared that if the German nation was not capable of winning the war it should be left to perish.
Aspiring fascists todays don't give a fuck about anything by power, getting it, and keeping it. They don't give a fuck about the people they manipulate in order to grow consensus and grab that power. When (not if) shit hits the fan, the people are going to be sacrificed too.
Our aim is to seize the opportunity to draw a line under a long period of European history in which to every country peace seemed conceivable and safe only as a result of its own supremacy, and in which peace meant a
period of preparation for the next war.
And then the EU was born. It's not perfect, it's still but an infant, but can you even start to imagine what our collective European lives would be without it? We would likely still be bickering with each other and entangle in conflicts of all kinds. I want the EU to never forget its roots, dammit.
Transcending party differences, the democrats on the Council gave their answer to war and tyranny in Article 1 of our Constitution: “The German people therefore acknowledge inviolable and inalienable human rights as the basis of any community, of peace and of justice in the world.” This further significance of 8 May should also be remembered today.
The Constitution is being shat upon by the current Government. Shame on it.
If we remember how people persecuted on grounds of race, religion and politics and threatened with certain death often stood before the closed borders with other countries, we shall not close the
door today on those who are genuinely persecuted and seek protection with us.
Like her or not, Angela Merkel was the last German leader to open the borders in the face of Syrian refugee crisis. I'll always respect her for that. Because of course "Wir schaffen das", Europe is RICH and has the means to help! Our citizens and refugees alike. Merz is pushing repatriations as a means to win the favour of AfD voters, go figure.
We seek friendship with the peoples of the Soviet Union.
Ah, that sweet, sweet perfume of warming relations towards the end of the Cold War. I literally cannot wait to smell this perfume again, once we are done with the current wave of fascist idiocracy.
We are confident that the 8th of May is not the last date in the common history of all Germans.
In just 4 years time, a new, significant common date would emerge: the 3rd of October, Tag der Wiedervereinigung, day of reunification of the two German states. Good things can come, and they do, with communal will and a widespread desire for peace! Hang in there, everyone! Don't shut up, ever!
Yet elsewhere (in the Book of Judges) it is described how often the memory of experienced assistance and rescue lasted only for 40 years. When that memory faded, tranquility was at an end. Forty years thus invariably constitute a significant time-span. Man perceives them as the end of a dark age bringing hope for a new and prosperous future, or as the onset of danger that the past might be forgotten and as a warning of the consequences. It is worth reflecting on both of these perceptions
We are now 81 years away from the end of WWII and 41 years apart from this speech. Two generations past the horror, one generation past the optimism spreading in the 80ies, and the cycle is trying to repeat itself. But we have broken it once, in choosing to merge in the EU instead of remaining completely separated and isolated countries, and this has given us security and prosperity. We can fucking do it again! Send the nazis worldwide back to their corner! Make it shameful to be one again! FUCK 'EM AWAY FROM THE POLITICAL DISCOURSE EVERYWHERE!
From our own history we learn what man is capable of. For that reason we
must not imagine that we are now quite different and have become better. There is no ultimately achievable moral perfection – for no individual and for no nation. We have learned as human beings, and as human beings we remain in danger. But we have the strength to overcome such danger again and again.
HELL YES we can!
Hitler's constant approach was to stir up prejudices, enmity and hatred. What is asked of young people today is this: do not let yourselves be forced into enmity and hatred of other people. (...) Learn to live together, not in opposition to each
other.
I feel we have stopped teaching this, at some point, if we ever even properly started. This is both an individual responsibility of parents, and a collective responsibility of nations through their educational systems. Children are a blank page to fill up with color, not with gothic black letters.
On this 8th of May, let us face up as well as we can to the truth
In a world swamped in lies and fabrications, truth still matters and ultimately prevails.
Full English text here: https://www.bundespraesident.de/SharedDocs/Downloads/DE/Reden/2015/02/150202-RvW-Rede-8-Mai-1985-englisch.pdf
#8mai #8mai1945 #TagDerBefreiung #8maggio #8maggio1945 #8may #8may1945 #history #storia #Liberazione
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