German police arrest 22 in neo-Nazi internet raid

[tater]

Originally Posted by Penguin

Though Germany started an attack war, many soldiers thought they were defending their country and were fighting for a just cause.

They were not fighting for a just cause. The Confederates might have thought they were fighting for a just cause, but they were wrong. They were fighting for the right to own human beings. The Germans—all of them—were fighting for the right to murder people based on surname. They may have deluded themselves otherwise, but that's what it boiled down to.

This fact is the true horror of Nazi Germany. If millions were fooled by a few it is a lot less scary that millions of people who were otherwise decent people enabling (or actively participating in) genocide. The pattern appears in other genocide/democide as well. Regular people doing horrible things.

Failure to recognize this is a real problem if the goal is to not let genocide happen going forward. Placing the blame on a tiny handful and ignoring the culpability of the masses of active and passive enablers is dangerous.

Personal accounts by anyone who has an interest in not looking like an accomplice to genocide (which is virtually everyone) are suspect, and must be filtered under the assumption they will try and minimize their culpability.

Note that I similarly impugn my own country WRT slavery, which was also horrific.