Language:
German
Year of publication:
2004
Titel der Quelle:
Zeitschrift für Geschichtswissenschaft
Angaben zur Quelle:
52,1 (2004) 50-71
Keywords:
Genocide History 20th century
;
National socialism Philosophy
;
Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945)
Abstract:
Refutes arguments that the same orders for extermination were applied to "Gypsies" and Jews. In some ways their treatment was similar: the methods of killing, its utopian-racist basis, the conditions of dictatorship and war that made it possible, escalation through the interaction of local and central officialdom, and its legitimization through Hitler's ideology. But while Jews loomed large in that ideology, "Gypsies" were of negligible importance. Extermination of the Jews was to be total, that of the "Gypsies" selective: in Germany, "pure" Gypsies were spared, whereas Gypsy "Mischlinge" endangered the purity of the Volk and therefore, unlike Jewish "Mischlinge", must be eliminated. The Jews were under the authority of the Gestapo, the "Gypsies" under that of the criminal police. In some of the occupied or satellite countries, "Gypsies" were not persecuted at all. But comparison with the Jewish Holocaust should not lead us to underrate the suffering of the "Gypsies".
Note:
A Hungarian version appeared as "Cigányok és zsidók: a náci népirtások összehasonlítása" in "A Holokauszt Magyarországon európai perspektívában" (2005) 379-398.
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