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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Should Oskar Gröning be in prison?
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rolyn
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# 16840
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Posted
It wasn't aimed at anyone in particular NP, but it was most certainly aimed at the view that bomber command were war criminals.
And rather than derail this thread I be quite willing to take the matter to Hell if anyone is feeling offended at what I said about Georing.
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Change is the only certainty of existence
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lilBuddha
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# 14333
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by rolyn:
Thank you for that. Although I'm prepared to say raising whole cities to the ground wasn't only justifiable but also necessary.
Do not thank me. It was neither justifiable or necessary. Don't think Churchill would have tried to tapdance away from it afterward were it either of those.
quote:
Originally posted by rolyn:
At the Nuremburg trials Herman Goering, who signed the death warrant of countless Jewish people without a second thought, used Dresden as a comparison to the Holocaust.
If he's looking up from Hell I'm sure he'd be delighted to still find folks siding with a deliberately cynical and twisted attempt to soften Nazi atrocities.
People certainly have used it this way, but I do not think anyone here has.
quote:
Originally posted by no prophet's flag is set so...:
Hitler knew of the extermination of the native peoples in the western hemisphere, and referenced it. There's a difference in historical times, that's about it.
This has nothing to do with Dresden or Tokyo. Or, indeed, anything I said.
quote:
Originally posted by no prophet's flag is set so...:
Is it worse to gas people or firebomb them? Both are indiscriminate.
As far as a way to die? Gas is probably better than burning to death. Indiscriminate? Bombing certainly is, the gassing in the holocaust certainly wasn't.
quote:
Originally posted by no prophet's flag is set so...:
The bombing is less personal
And this is kinda my point. It is easy to get people to push a button and kill people they cannot see.
But to treat people the way they were in the Holocaust, the Japanese treatment of the Chinese and the Filipinos, the European treatment of natives in the Americas and Australia; those things required dehumanising the victims.
OK, language is a beautiful and terrible thing. It gives us the freedom of expression, but also imprisons us with definitions.
Is there a set of words to describe how something can be worse without it seeming like the compared thing has any good at all?
Try this. The Holocaust was evil. Firebombing of Dresden was evil. The Holocaust took more effort and investment in the rationale to do it.
If you take the view that any intentional killing of another person at all is evil, then there is less difference.
If you accept one exemption, then you are making the same case as I am.
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I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou
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no prophet's flag is set so...
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# 15560
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Posted
That clarifies. I don't make the exceptions.
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rolyn
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# 16840
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Posted
The only reason Churchill 'tap danced' away from Dresden was because he knew the war was won. The methods, he fully endorsed at the time, by which it was won, when srutinized, would have damaged his political career .
Anyone who thinks area bombing served no purpose in shortening WW2 has no knowledge of the facts. And anyone who thinks Dresden is the same as the Holocaust is spouting from the same dispicable soapbox as Goering did at Nuremburg.
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Change is the only certainty of existence
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Doublethink.
Ship's Foolwise Unperson
# 1984
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
Sorry, np, in an ideal world war crimes wouldn't happen.
As far as comparing war atrocities, it is problematic.
Dresden and Tokyo were horrific and unjustifiable.
But I think one can conclude that the systematic attempt to exterminate an entire people. The building of an industry to do so, whilst torturing them and working them to death. The casual treatment of humans as pests to be exterminated. Yes, that's worse.
If you prefer then - Nagasaki and Hiroshima, the second bomb being dropped *after* Japan had offered to surrender.
If we are going to implement today's values as justice - should we not prosecute those surviving individuals involved ? If not should we imprisoning people who did not actually murder anyone 70 years after the event.
[ 17. July 2015, 21:25: Message edited by: Doublethink. ]
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All political thinking for years past has been vitiated in the same way. People can foresee the future only when it coincides with their own wishes, and the most grossly obvious facts can be ignored when they are unwelcome. George Orwell
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lilBuddha
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# 14333
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by no prophet's flag is set so...:
That clarifies. I don't make the exceptions.
OK.
Do you support killing in self-defence?
Are you saying no human should kill another at all?
quote:
Originally posted by rolyn:
The only reason Churchill 'tap danced' away from Dresden was because he knew the war was won. The methods, he fully endorsed at the time, by which it was won, when srutinized, would have damaged his political career .
And it would have damaged his political career because the concern and protest started during the war regarding the bombings necessity.
quote:
Originally posted by rolyn:
Anyone who thinks area bombing served no purpose in shortening WW2 has no knowledge of the facts.
And anyone who thinks history = fact will believe anything.
There are arguments for the necessity of the bombing and there are arguments against.
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I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou
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lilBuddha
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# 14333
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Doublethink.:
If you prefer then - Nagasaki and Hiroshima, the second bomb being dropped *after* Japan had offered to surrender.
First, I think the use of the atomic bomb was horrendous and I do not accept the justifications.
In regards to the second bomb, what I am reading is that the Japanese were discussing surrender internally, but did not actually do so until after Nagasaki.
quote:
Originally posted by Doublethink.:
If we are going to implement today's values as justice - should we not prosecute those surviving individuals involved ? If not should we imprisoning people who did not actually murder anyone 70 years after the event.
With Oskar Gröning it is not applying today's values. He was going to be prosecuted by 1940's values, but the American's decided that further low-level prosecutions would push the German people communist and halted the process. Or at least that is the reason given and everyone went along.
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I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou
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Moo
Ship's tough old bird
# 107
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Doublethink.:
... Nagasaki and Hiroshima, the second bomb being dropped *after* Japan had offered to surrender.
The offer to surrender specified that no American soldiers would set foot on Japanese soil, and that Japan would continue to occupy all the countries it had conquered. They proposed to set these countries free when they saw fit. Meanwhile, people in those countries were dying of starvation and disease at the rate of 100,000 per month.
Moo
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Kerygmania host
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See you later, alligator.
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
The Japanese having liberated the Philippines from the nice Americans, but didn't manage to liberate Hawaii from them.
The origins of the Pacific war in WW2 are far more complicated that the caricature of evil Japanese conquering countries. Some of what they conquered was American, British, French imperial colonies, and their motivation was economic: America cutting them off from steel and oil. America from the Japanese perspective wanted war with them, with alternative being a fully ruined economy.
I'm not an apologist for the Japanese on this, my father's family was for the second time refugees within 5 years, this time from Singapore after the war began, but I am unwilling to ignore the root causes of the war, which lay between two imperial and colonial powers in the Pacific, the Americans and the Japanese (Britain was an impoverished cardboard version of its former self, and France was occupied/Vichy regime).
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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by no prophet's flag is set so...:
The origins of the Pacific war in WW2 are far more complicated that the caricature of evil Japanese conquering countries. Some of what they conquered was American, British, French imperial colonies, and their motivation was economic: America cutting them off from steel and oil.
America cut them off from those supplies after they began territorial expansion in Asia. After the Rape of Nanking. Not an apologist for []any[/i] imperialism, but Japan needed no motivation in that regard.
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I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
America cut them off from those supplies after they began territorial expansion in Asia. After the Rape of Nanking. Not an apologist for any imperialism, but Japan needed no motivation in that regard. [/QB][/QUOTE]
The motivation of Japan was economic. It saw the Russians, French and British as threats, with the Americans taking over from the Brits post-WW1. The Americans and Japanese were rivals.
Some friends of my parents, who didn't manage to get out were interned by the Japanese in Indonesia. I remember well Judy telling me about an American-educated Japanese telling her that the Japanese were treating the peoples they conquered no differently that Americans did native peoples in their expansion west. Different time periods, 100 years apart, different weapons which more efficiently kill people, and larger numbers of people to kill.
In my opinion we need a new paradigm entirely regarding all of it. I see more in common than many on this thread, lumping it all together as moral insanity though of the calculating kind, not the crazy kind. Wars being the most dishonourable and despicable things humans can involve themselves in. Shame on us.
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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
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Doublethink.
Ship's Foolwise Unperson
# 1984
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Posted
The main reason the Japanese surrender wasn't accepted, was because they offered to surrender to the Russians.
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All political thinking for years past has been vitiated in the same way. People can foresee the future only when it coincides with their own wishes, and the most grossly obvious facts can be ignored when they are unwelcome. George Orwell
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rolyn
Shipmate
# 16840
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Posted
Didn't the Japanese surrender only come after a third Atomic bomb was loaded into a US plane with the fear that Tokyo was it's destination?
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Change is the only certainty of existence
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Doublethink.
Ship's Foolwise Unperson
# 1984
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Posted
No
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All political thinking for years past has been vitiated in the same way. People can foresee the future only when it coincides with their own wishes, and the most grossly obvious facts can be ignored when they are unwelcome. George Orwell
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rolyn
Shipmate
# 16840
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Posted
Having looked further it appears the third A-bomb wasn't fully constructed after Nagasaki. The Japanese High Command were nevertheless led to believe it was. The hope being it would help them to make the right decision. Thank God it did.
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Change is the only certainty of existence
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Doublethink.
Ship's Foolwise Unperson
# 1984
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Posted
Hirohito's primary concern seems to have been their inability to defend against a ground invasion.
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All political thinking for years past has been vitiated in the same way. People can foresee the future only when it coincides with their own wishes, and the most grossly obvious facts can be ignored when they are unwelcome. George Orwell
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rolyn
Shipmate
# 16840
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Posted
No doubt it was up until the point he saw Hell falling out of the sky. His primary concern when putting paw print on a surrender he vowed never to sign was the belief that Tokyo was next.
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Change is the only certainty of existence
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Doublethink.
Ship's Foolwise Unperson
# 1984
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by rolyn:
No doubt it was up until the point he saw Hell falling out of the sky. His primary concern when putting paw print on a surrender he vowed never to sign was the belief that Tokyo was next.
That really isn't what the historical record shows.
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All political thinking for years past has been vitiated in the same way. People can foresee the future only when it coincides with their own wishes, and the most grossly obvious facts can be ignored when they are unwelcome. George Orwell
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Moo
Ship's tough old bird
# 107
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by no prophet's flag is set so...:
The Japanese having liberated the Philippines from the nice Americans, but didn't manage to liberate Hawaii from them.
The origins of the Pacific war in WW2 are far more complicated that the caricature of evil Japanese conquering countries. Some of what they conquered was American, British, French imperial colonies, and their motivation was economic: America cutting them off from steel and oil. America from the Japanese perspective wanted war with them, with alternative being a fully ruined economy.
America cut Japan off from steel and oil when it became clear that the Japanese planned to take over much of east Asia. In the 1930s, young army officers assassinated a prime minister and at least one cabinet officer. There were other failed assassination attempts. The perpetrators were not severely punished. The attitude was that you had to understand and sympathize with their impatience. The effect was to intimidate the politicians and convince some of them they should quit politics. Meanwhile, some other hot-headed young officers had started a war in China.
Since Japan was effectively controlled by the military, it made sense to deny them the raw material needed for military purposes.
I'm not saying that the Americans and Europeans were good guys; I am just saying that in this particular situation they were right.
As far as Japan 'liberating' the Philippines, is concerned, they treated the Filipinos far worse than the Americans ever had.
Moo
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Kerygmania host
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See you later, alligator.
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
I used the word ' liberate ' completely tongue in cheek. About the equivalent of the current liberation in progress of Iraq by ISIS and their previous lberation by the Americans.
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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
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Posted
ignoring this other rubbish for the moment.
Oskar Gröning's trial is important. Not because he was exceptionally evil, but because he wasn't.
That should be the take away from this, that is more important than whatever happens to the remainder of an old man's life.
Not because old people are unimportant, but that the message is more important than one person.
Not that it will matter, really. We are a greedy, selfish, shortsighted species with poor memory and the inability to learn from our mistakes.
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I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou
Posts: 17627 | From: the round earth's imagined corners | Registered: Dec 2008
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
That should be the take away from this, that is more important than whatever happens to the remainder of an old man's life.
Not because old people are unimportant, but that the message is more important than one person.
This reinforces my conviction that for you, this trial is much less about justice for the individual in the dock than about making a point.
Which as far as I'm concerned is absolutely the worst possible approach to criminal justice, and certainly not a just one.
I am very familiar with a couple of cases in which harsh sentences have been dished out precisely to make a point, and in which I strongly suspect the judges, like you, considered the message to be more important than the person, in those instances on the grounds that the persons were black and foreign and that irrespective of their individual guilt or innocence, the main thing was to impose a harsh sentence as a deterrent.
In at least one of those cases, to add insult to injury, I'm pretty sure that at least some of those convicted were not guilty as charged, and that in any case, the deterrent effect is zero (or if anything, negative).
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
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Enoch
Shipmate
# 14322
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
... Not because old people are unimportant, but that the message is more important than one person. ...
It's no good, LilBuddha. That seems very near to 'it is better that one man should die for the people than that the whole nation should perish'. I'm with Eutychus on this one.
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Brexit wrexit - Sir Graham Watson
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Bibliophile
Shipmate
# 18418
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
That should be the take away from this, that is more important than whatever happens to the remainder of an old man's life.
Not because old people are unimportant, but that the message is more important than one person.
Just one person? How about two, or three, or a hundred? How about a million? Where would you draw the line?
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Eutychus:
This reinforces my conviction that for you, this trial is much less about justice for the individual in the dock than about making a point.
Which as far as I'm concerned is absolutely the worst possible approach to criminal justice, and certainly not a just one.
This shows your misunderstanding. This is not about an approach to criminal justice. It is about war crimes. Which, while criminal, the prosecution of war crimes is about so much more. Symbolic verdict in Auschwitz case(from dw.de)
quote:
from above link:
herein lies the greatest symbolism of the case: the Auschwitz survivors, now old themselves, provided what will probably be the last official accounts of their suffering in the death camp. This is much more important than any prison sentence.
the most important message remains: there is no statute of limitations on genocide or crimes against humanity. Anyone who is implicated in such crimes – and even if only indirectly - should never be allowed to feel exempt from punishment.
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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
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Lamb Chopped
Ship's kebab
# 5528
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Posted
[coughs politely] Nobody's yet answered my earlier post, and I really would like to know. What has this man done that he should be treated on par with (say) an actual prison guard?
I'm with Eutychus when it comes to "making examples" of people regardless of the details of their individual circumstances. No amount of "learning value" can overcome the injustice of treating a person, not as he deserves, but as you think might provide a grim warning for others. I've seen this happen to one of my family, and it really really stinks.
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Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by no prophet's flag is set so...:
This shows your misunderstanding. This is not about an approach to criminal justice. It is about war crimes.
I'm willing to stand corrected on this, but I don't think the trial took place on a war crimes basis. It looks to have taken place in a normal criminal court under German criminal law, and not to fulfil the definition of a war crimes trial offered here.
German Wikipedia refers to it as an Auschwitzprozesse (see also here), but my German is too rusty to know what if any distinction that draws in German law (one would need to know the exact charge, on what legal basis it was brought, and the standing of the court); a quick read of the English article linked above suggests the Frankfurt Auschwitz trials weren't found to be very satisfactory.
What it looks like to me, at a distance but again drawing on my own criminal justice experience, is that the prosecutors simply went looking for the most convenient forum in which a successful conviction was likely - an impression that is further reinforced by the time it took to get to court at all, always a bad sign, again in my direct experience. quote:
the prosecution of war crimes is about so much more
Yes it is, but that doesn't address the issue of appropriate sentencing in this case, or the OP's question about it. quote:
quote:
herein lies the greatest symbolism of the case: the Auschwitz survivors, now old themselves, provided what will probably be the last official accounts of their suffering in the death camp. This is much more important than any prison sentence.
Precisely. And there have been plenty of arguments on this thread as to why serving a custodial sentence is unsatisfactory in this case. First and foremost, in my view, because of the nature of the offence and the huge length of time that elapsed before it came before a court.
quote:
Anyone who is implicated in such crimes – and even if only indirectly - should never be allowed to feel exempt from punishment.
That sounds fine and dandy until one starts to consider the whole rationale of punishment itself. Which is one of the big bugbears of restorative justice.
Even assuming conventional criminal punishment makes sense, my general feeling, and one that appears to be supported by survivor statements in this case, is that the further in time one gets from a crime, the unlikelier it is that any "punishment" appears just and acceptable - including to the victims. That sucks if you're a victim, but that doesn't change this perception.
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
[coughs politely] Nobody's yet answered my earlier post, and I really would like to know. What has this man done that he should be treated on par with (say) an actual prison guard?
Just as much, according to that same English Wikipedia article I just linked to.
It says that the prosecutor in the 1960s Frankfurt Auschwitzprozesse would have liked to see all those of Gröning's ilk charged with murder, not just accessory to murder.
His reasoning was that the mere charge of accessory to murder implied the Nazi regime of genocide itself was legitimate (I had to read that assertion more than once before understanding it).
His whole argument appears to be the opposite of lilbuddha's: none of those involved were ordinary people with little or no choice; they all were every bit as monstrous as Mengele and co.
Which I think is to be completely self-deceived as to the common man's ability to be thoroughly evil. I repeat: any attempt to relegate an entire class of human (that conveniently excludes oneself) to some especially depraved subset is actually to take the first step down the road of Auschwitz all over again.
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
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Enoch
Shipmate
# 14322
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Posted
No Prophet, No! No! No!
If an individual is standing in the dock, he or she is being tried for what it is alleged he or she did. It is determining his or her guilt for what is alleged he or she did. If found guilty, he or she is punished for his or her crime(s).
This is not symbolic. It is actual crime and a matter of his or her individual and personal guilt. Anything else is requiring them to be a scapegoat.
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Brexit wrexit - Sir Graham Watson
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Eutychus:
---
Germany is dealing with far right violence and a renewal of some of the racist agenda. This is causing the country to pay particular attention to this and similar trials, as well as current acts of violence against identifiable immigrants. They worry also about the far right in other countries, and want to stem it in Germany.
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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
\_(ツ)_/
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
That's as may be.
But if combating the rise of neofascisim is the court's motive for handing down a custodial sentence to this particular perpetrator it is, in my opinion, a complete abuse of the criminal justice system and likely to be wholly ineffective.
Did you miss the bit where the Auschwitz survivor said she'd rather Gröning received a community sentence requiring him to speak in schools on the dangers of Neo-Nazism?
[ 18. July 2015, 21:40: Message edited by: Eutychus ]
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Enoch:
No Prophet, No! No! No!
If an individual is standing in the dock, he or she is being tried for what it is alleged he or she did. It is determining his or her guilt for what is alleged he or she did. If found guilty, he or she is punished for his or her crime(s).
This is not symbolic. It is actual crime and a matter of his or her individual and personal guilt. Anything else is requiring them to be a scapegoat.
Indeed his individual guilt is important, but so is the general symbology. I think they view it differently than we do.
quote:
Originally posted by Eutychus:
That's as may be.
But if combating the rise of neofascisim is the court's motive for handing down a custodial sentence to this particular perpetrator it is, in my opinion, a complete abuse of the criminal justice system and likely to be wholly ineffective.
Did you miss the bit where the Auschwitz survivor said she'd rather Gröning received a community sentence requiring him to speak in schools on the dangers of Neo-Nazism?
I suspect that he will have a community sentence. Again, this is about the symbology of it
[ 18. July 2015, 21:50: Message edited by: no prophet's flag is set so... ]
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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
\_(ツ)_/
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Lamb Chopped
Ship's kebab
# 5528
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Eutychus:
It says that the prosecutor in the 1960s Frankfurt Auschwitzprozesse would have liked to see all those of Gröning's ilk charged with murder, not just accessory to murder.
His reasoning was that the mere charge of accessory to murder implied the Nazi regime of genocide itself was legitimate (I had to read that assertion more than once before understanding it).
His whole argument appears to be the opposite of lilbuddha's: none of those involved were ordinary people with little or no choice; they all were every bit as monstrous as Mengele and co.
Which I think is to be completely self-deceived as to the common man's ability to be thoroughly evil. I repeat: any attempt to relegate an entire class of human (that conveniently excludes oneself) to some especially depraved subset is actually to take the first step down the road of Auschwitz all over again.
If you understand it after re-reading, you are still far, far ahead of me. I don't understand it in the least.
![[Hot and Hormonal]](icon_redface.gif)
It seems to me that the only effective way to combat an evil that relies on groupthink to go unopposed is to vigorously enforce individual responsibility for choices. Yes, I would like to see charges of murder, and accessory to murder, and so forth. Such charges make it plain that, whether the wrongful death took place in Auschwitz or Arkansas, it is equally a wrongful death, and the individual responsible is equally guilty.
What I would NOT like to see is a group of people who get punished as symbols--as a way of "sending a message" (though the message recipients are never specified, oddly enough). When you punish someone for any reason besides "he deserves it," you make it easy, even effortless for him and his supporters to slide into "it wasn't that bad, what he did... it wasn't actually bad at all... he's a martyr, and it's all a political game." Why leave that psychological escape open to such people? Even worse, why allow them to think of themselves as a special, mystical, persecuted class that is somehow above the run of human depravity ("Yes, we are villains, but we're arch-villains, hear us roar!")
The only message I'd like to see sent is the one to the accused, which says "You did X and therefore justly deserve Y." It's nice if other people learn something from watching, but justice is not primarily a political teaching tool.
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Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!
Posts: 20059 | From: off in left field somewhere | Registered: Feb 2004
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Moo
Ship's tough old bird
# 107
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped
It seems to me that the only effective way to combat an evil that relies on groupthink to go unopposed is to vigorously enforce individual responsibility for choices.
The problem is that many Germans of that generation had been taught not to think for themselves when it came to government orders.
As I said earlier, I am very glad it's not my job to judge these people.
Moo
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Kerygmania host
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See you later, alligator.
Posts: 20365 | From: Alleghany Mountains of Virginia | Registered: May 2001
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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Eutychus:
This reinforces my conviction that for you, this trial is much less about justice for the individual in the dock than about making a point.
And this reinforces my belief that people cannot help but think in a zero-sum manner.
Life is not zero-sum.
quote:
Originally posted by Eutychus:
I am very familiar with a couple of cases in which harsh sentences have been dished out precisely to make a point,
This is not a typical case. Had Gröning been prosecuted just after the war, as he was going to be, he would have served a sentence. I would hazard a guess that it might have been longer than 4 years.
quote:
Originally posted by Enoch:
If an individual is standing in the dock, he or she is being tried for what it is alleged he or she did.
And Gröning was.
quote:
Originally posted by Enoch:
This is not symbolic. It is actual crime and a matter of his or her individual and personal guilt. Anything else is requiring them to be a scapegoat.
You might have missed it, but Gröning committed the crime he was accused of. Admits it and everything.
A scapegoat is one who did nothing or did less and is sacrificed so that others may avoid punishment. That is absolutely not the case here.
And as far as "symbolic", English law is precedent based, so you might wish to get used to this.
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Hallellou, hallellou
Posts: 17627 | From: the round earth's imagined corners | Registered: Dec 2008
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Gee D
Shipmate
# 13815
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Posted
Proper elements of a sentence (at least in Australia) include both individual and general deterrence. It's unlikely that Gröning will offend again, so individual deterrence has little part to play in his sentence, but the general aspect was and still is of importance.
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Not every Anglican in Sydney is Sydney Anglican
Posts: 7028 | From: Warrawee NSW Australia | Registered: Jun 2008
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
They speak of deterrence both of the individual and the general example to society here, along with denunciation.
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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by no prophet's flag is set so...:
I suspect that he will have a community sentence.
This thread exists because that is not what happened. Gröning received a custodial sentence.
As I pointed out, he isn't actually behind bars yet, because the sentence application magistrate (or whoever decides such things in Germany) has not yet determined how that sentence is applied in practice. I have argued in favour of community service (as one aspect of restorative justice) for him since the beginning of this thread, but the court didn't exercise that option straight off.
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
quote:
Originally posted by Eutychus:
This reinforces my conviction that for you, this trial is much less about justice for the individual in the dock than about making a point.
And this reinforces my belief that people cannot help but think in a zero-sum manner.
Life is not zero-sum.
No, but if, as I allege, you think the trial is much more about making a point than about individual justice, you still have your sums wrong.
At the very least, it should be the other way around. But in my experience, 'exemplary' sentences don't achieve the symbolic aim, and they are unjust from the point of view of the offender.
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
Posts: 17944 | From: 528491 | Registered: Jul 2002
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rolyn
Shipmate
# 16840
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Posted
This thing strikes me somewhat as Germany's Operation Yew tree.
If anyone remembers? We had a similar case couple years ago of a former SS member tried for being associated with a massacre near the end of the war. He was 16 at the time, not sure what the outcome of that was. It all looks slightly public atonement orientated to me.
Probably pretty rich coming from someone like myself but I do sometimes wonder if it wouldn't be better for all if we stopped rattling the bones of the past. Germany has behaved in a pretty much exemplary fashion for 70 years since the end of WW2. Providing it continues to do so then surely this best serves as atonement for former wrongdoing.
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Change is the only certainty of existence
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Saul the Apostle
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# 13808
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Posted
I'd agree with the disquiet about putting 93 year old Groning in prison. But as an SS SS-Unterscharführer who was stationed at Auschwitz concentration camp he knew very clearly what was going on then as he did after 1945.
In the 2005 BBC documentary he came across as an articulate and intelligent 83 year old. Ten years on and he's not in bad health for a 93 year old.
Only about 5% of the most heinous Nazis were ever caught. In all fairness as it then was West Germany washed it's hands of it's Nazis in the 50s 60s and 70s when there were plenty of fit, active and alive Nazis to prosecute.
On balance he probably should be in prison, but I'd have liked that sentence to have been carried out 40 or 50 years ago.
Today only a few frail men are left - hardly worth the bother in some respects, but the crimes were so wicked.
As an aside if you come across deniers of the holocaust look at this documentary. Well worth 50 minutes of your time. Senior German Officers were bugged secretly and their knowledge of the holocaust was beyond question.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NyE0SXDZ1uw
Saul
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"I cannot forecast to you the action of Russia. It is a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma; but perhaps there is a key. That key is Russian national interest."
Posts: 1772 | From: unsure | Registered: Jun 2008
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Marvin the Martian
Interplanetary
# 4360
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
Oskar Gröning's trial is important. Not because he was exceptionally evil, but because he wasn't.
That should be the take away from this, that is more important than whatever happens to the remainder of an old man's life.
Not because old people are unimportant, but that the message is more important than one person.
What actually is that message, though? Nazis are bad? I think pretty much everyone has got that already. Genocide is bad? Likewise. That this guy wasn't an evil man, but we're going to treat him as if he was in order to make a point that nobody was fucking missing anyway? That doing the book-keeping job you're told to do by a government with a proven track record of executing those who disagree with them is a heinous crime on a par with actually murdering women and children?
Do we really want to be pushing the message that if anyone finds themselves under an evil fascist government then their only choices are to resist and be killed, or keep their heads down and be tried as a war criminal after the regime falls?
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Hail Gallaxhar
Posts: 30100 | From: Adrift on a sea of surreality | Registered: Apr 2003
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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
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Posted
MtM, your post has the tone of condemning rigid thinking, but is itself a black and white view.
Gröning didn't care about Jews being killed when he first learned of the practice. Not quite an innocent little bookkeeper.
But I've said it is about more than that and it is.
Nazi Germany did not happen overnight and with no support.
It happened with a lot of willing accomplices.
It also happened because people didn't care what happened to "others".
And it happened because of fear.
You point to one conflict, dust your hands and say lesson learned. I call bullshit. That is still a they did a bad thing and misses the point entirely. The point is that we could do the same thing.
But you know what? Even in your "Hang on, when did this evil regime magically appear all around me"? scenario, yes, individuals are responsible for letting it continue.
Is this fair? No.
Is this easy to say from my relative safety? Yes.
Doesn't mean it isn't right.
Seems to me that there is a group of people, who are kinda revered by most Christians, who stood for what they believed right and were killed for this. Starts with m, I think. Magicians? No. Martians? Apparently not. I'll come to it eventually.
Anyway, the point is not about becoming a martyr, but about allowing that to become the option in the first place.
[ 20. July 2015, 16:26: Message edited by: lilBuddha ]
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I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou
Posts: 17627 | From: the round earth's imagined corners | Registered: Dec 2008
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Lamb Chopped
Ship's kebab
# 5528
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Posted
Look, if you're (general you) going to punish the man for knowing about the evil and allowing it to continue, at least SAY that's what you're punishing him for--instead of faking up a charge that makes his inaction equivalent to other people's (guards' etc.) actions.
But wait, that would require passing a new law.
Because at present, allowing innocents to die at the hands of a government and looking the other way whistling is not a crime, however disgusting a sin it may be.
The role of the courts is to punish those who break the law. Not to bend the law in order to punish people for things that are sins but not crimes.
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Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!
Posts: 20059 | From: off in left field somewhere | Registered: Feb 2004
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Lamb Chopped
Ship's kebab
# 5528
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Posted
... and as for the martyrs, I don't think you can morally pass a law that requires every human being to take such a stand. Most people haven't got the courage. Shall we criminalize cowardice, then? For freaking bookkeepers?
The usual way of dealing with such people is through social pressure and shame. That has its downside, too, especially in a nation where huge numbers of ordinary people knew enough to make them morally responsible, and still did nothing.
But we can't lock them all up.
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Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!
Posts: 20059 | From: off in left field somewhere | Registered: Feb 2004
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Crœsos
Shipmate
# 238
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
For freaking bookkeepers?
Let's remember that in this case "bookkeeper" is a euphemism for the looting of Holocaust victims. Cataloging the loot taken from Auschwitz arrivees before turning over to the Reich treasury seems like the kind of thing the phrase "the banality of evil" was coined to cover. Let's not forget that three of the Subsequent Nuremberg Trials dealt in part with the plunder of private property (the Flick, I.G. Farben, and Krupp trials).
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Humani nil a me alienum puto
Posts: 10706 | From: Sardis, Lydia | Registered: May 2001
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Lamb Chopped
Ship's kebab
# 5528
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Posted
![[Roll Eyes]](rolleyes.gif) Yes, I'm aware of that. I brought up bookkeepers in contrast to soldiers, who are as far as I know the only people who can be criminally prosecuted for cowardice.
And yes, he's an evil bookkeeper. A scavenger, a bottom feeder, a patsy of an evil state. Duh. But nobody says he was going through the suitcases and pilfering crap to take home. Which would be ordinary theft, and thus criminal.
In short, we're back to the original charge: You (meaning him) hung out with some really evil dudes, you knew what they were doing and didn't lift a finger to help their victims, and you provided support services* to their evil organization, though you did not yourself actually murder, torture, or imprison anyone.
*services of a type that are not evil in themselves, e.g. going through suitcases and removing items at the behest of authorities is what the TSA does too. The evil comes in who you're doing it for, and their motives.
So again--we're looking at fudging things so that what is sin but not crime can be punished as a crime.
[ 20. July 2015, 19:34: Message edited by: Lamb Chopped ]
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Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!
Posts: 20059 | From: off in left field somewhere | Registered: Feb 2004
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Crœsos
Shipmate
# 238
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
And yes, he's an evil bookkeeper. A scavenger, a bottom feeder, a patsy of an evil state. Duh. But nobody says he was going through the suitcases and pilfering crap to take home. Which would be ordinary theft, and thus criminal.
Part of the Nuremberg defense was that various actions, up to and including genocide, were not criminal because they were done under color of law. You seem to be reviving this argument.
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
In short, we're back to the original charge: You (meaning him) hung out with some really evil dudes, you knew what they were doing and didn't lift a finger to help their victims, and you provided support services* to their evil organization, though you did not yourself actually murder, torture, or imprison anyone.
*services of a type that are not evil in themselves, e.g. going through suitcases and removing items at the behest of authorities is what the TSA does too. The evil comes in who you're doing it for, and their motives.
Doesn't the same reasoning apply the Nazi elite, who also didn't personally "murder, torture, or imprison anyone". Eichmann is a particularly good example of this: an upper level bureaucrat whose job was to collect information on Jews, organize the seizure of their property, and arrange for and schedule trains to take them to various facilities. He neither created this policy nor carried it out at the ground level. Just following orders, etc.
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
So again--we're looking at fudging things so that what is sin but not crime can be punished as a crime.
Once again, given that the Third Reich rewrote the law to legalize virtually all of their actions, couldn't that be said of virtually all their actions?
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Humani nil a me alienum puto
Posts: 10706 | From: Sardis, Lydia | Registered: May 2001
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Lamb Chopped
Ship's kebab
# 5528
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Crœsos:
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
And yes, he's an evil bookkeeper. A scavenger, a bottom feeder, a patsy of an evil state. Duh. But nobody says he was going through the suitcases and pilfering crap to take home. Which would be ordinary theft, and thus criminal.
Part of the Nuremberg defense was that various actions, up to and including genocide, were not criminal because they were done under color of law. You seem to be reviving this argument.
Note. Not at all. My point is simply that you can't criminalize something after the fact, retroactively. The man appears to be guilty of nothing but being a colossal weasel who knew of the evil and did nothing to stop it. But that is AFAIK not criminal and never has been criminal.
His personal actions did not involve any murdering, imprisoning, or torturing. Nor did he filch objects for personal gain, which could be classed as looting or theft. There is simply no criminal category to fit him under.
quote:
Originally posted by Crœsos:
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
In short, we're back to the original charge: You (meaning him) hung out with some really evil dudes, you knew what they were doing and didn't lift a finger to help their victims, and you provided support services* to their evil organization, though you did not yourself actually murder, torture, or imprison anyone.
*services of a type that are not evil in themselves, e.g. going through suitcases and removing items at the behest of authorities is what the TSA does too. The evil comes in who you're doing it for, and their motives.
Doesn't the same reasoning apply the Nazi elite, who also didn't personally "murder, torture, or imprison anyone".
No, it does not. These people were actively responsible for implementing murder (and that on a grand scale). They gave the orders that led to torture, imprisonment, and murder. That is equivalent to actually holding the gun etc.
AFAIK this particular man did nothing that, if he had left it undone, would have prevented anybody's suffering, imprisonment, or murder. He is neither directly or through delegation committing those crimes. His sin (not crime) is to fail to even try to prevent those crimes--in short, refusing to be his brother's keeper when he bloody well ought to have been.
quote:
Originally posted by Crœsos:
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
So again--we're looking at fudging things so that what is sin but not crime can be punished as a crime.
Once again, given that the Third Reich rewrote the law to legalize virtually all of their actions, couldn't that be said of virtually all their actions?
And do you think the Third Reich is a particularly good example for US to follow?
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Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!
Posts: 20059 | From: off in left field somewhere | Registered: Feb 2004
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Crœsos
Shipmate
# 238
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
Note. Not at all. My point is simply that you can't criminalize something after the fact, retroactively. The man appears to be guilty of nothing but being a colossal weasel who knew of the evil and did nothing to stop it. But that is AFAIK not criminal and never has been criminal.
Theft and looting have never been criminal? I'll note once again that a lot of the actions taken by the Third Reich you say people should have been punished for were also not crimes (under Reich law) at the time they were committed. If Oskar Gröning isn't a criminal because his actions were sanctioned by the Third Reich, why doesn't the same logic apply to SS troops who took a more active role in carrying out those policies? Their actions were also not "crimes", as defined by their government of the time.
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
His personal actions did not involve any murdering, imprisoning, or torturing. Nor did he filch objects for personal gain, which could be classed as looting or theft. There is simply no criminal category to fit him under.
This is not a distinction that's been made in the past. As I noted earlier a number of Nuremberg defendants were convicted for participating in state-sanctioned theft. Nor do we consider lack of personal profit to be a particularly mitigating circumstance when it comes to any of the other crimes committed by representatives of the Third Reich. Why do you consider participating in the theft half of a murder-theft conspiracy to be non-criminal provided it's sanctioned by the state? And why doesn't the same logic apply to the murder half? I know we all agree that murder is a much more serious crime than theft, but that doesn't make the theft half of a murder-theft plot non-criminal.
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Humani nil a me alienum puto
Posts: 10706 | From: Sardis, Lydia | Registered: May 2001
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Lamb Chopped
Ship's kebab
# 5528
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Posted
Fine, haul him in for state-sanctioned theft if you want. That's not what they did at his trial, is it? "State sanctioned theft" would at least have some semblance of reason about it. He did actually participate in taking victims' goods, even if he did not profit from the objects taken.
But making him criminally responsible for thousands of murders is not reasonable or sensible. Unless you know something I don't about his actions.
[ 20. July 2015, 22:31: Message edited by: Lamb Chopped ]
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Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!
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