When Living History Becomes "Just History"...

[liz_marcs]

I was pretty much away from the computer most of the weekend (except for my one post Sunday), so I (thankfully) missed the (justified) outrage over the Harry Potter RPG called Kristallnacht at InsaneJournal. By the time I read about it, the offensive name had been changed, so I didn't see the point of piling on

Comments

[leenah]

i'd like this story to be more widely known.

thank you for telling it.

[liz_marcs]

Feel free to link if you want.

Myself, I'm gob-smacked that 1) There isn't a whole lot of information about it; 2) What little there doesn't seem to involve the women who were forced into this position.

It's an utter mystery to me.

[thebratqueen]

My guess? The Nazis weren't inclined to document it. Esp if it involved touching boys and/or Jewish women. After all, if they don't document it it doesn't exist, right?

It's possible those who went through it didn't talk either due to survivor's guilt. Plus it's not like the 40s were a time of enlightened mindsets about rape for women or boys. It may be one of those aspects of history that both sides were content to sweep under the rug, albeit for different reasons.

I'm just stabbing in the dark here though. And thank you so much for sharing this.

[liz_marcs]

Oh, agreed. I pointed the same thing out to my mother while she was busy sputtering over the fact that this aspect of the camps doesn't seem to be well-known, or tends to be talked about almost in passing in larger works.

[fufumira]

Wow. I think that it is so important to keep stories like these alive. Thank you for sharing!

[liz_marcs]

Yeah, object lesson I had to re-learn while I was pulling together links for this.

You'd think that something as well-documented as the Holocaust, something like this wouldn't get lost, yet somehow it kind of did. Or if not completely lost, than pushed aside.

[imaginarycircus]

Oh my god. I'm just ... yeah. I was around for the RPG thing, but I stayed out of it. I never need to be involved in an HP fandom wankfest ever again. And I honestly didn't think there was a single thing I could say that would get through to people stupid enough to pick a name like that for an RPG and not realize it was a boneheaded move

[liz_marcs]

Ummm, I'm not crying. I swear I'm not. Okay, maybe a little.

The Holocaust Memorial in Boston...yeah. I've taken visitors through that. The fact that as you walk through there are vents releasing steam seems to freak most people out. But it is a lovely memorial which...yeah...is an odd thing to say about something like this, but it is a lovely memorial.

[imaginarycircus]

I take people there too. And the quotation about the raspberry? My best friend said "You would do that. Give me your one raspberry." And we burst into tears and then had to go get drunk at The Ritz Carlton.

[leenah]

oh - that made me laugh and cry at the same time. laughter winning out, because of the joy of living and loving in that statement.

[deird1]

Thanks for writing this, Liz.

[liz_marcs]

Thanks for reading.

[tnrkitect]

This is scarily close to the results of the Records Department of the Ministry of Truth. (George Orwell's 1984 for those not remembering the reference)

History can only be rewritten when the people decide to no longer care.

May there always be people such as you who care.

[liz_marcs]

Y'know, my mother and I talked about the fact that this isn't a terribly well-known. We came to the conclusion that the women might've been afraid they'd be blamed for doing whatever they needed to do to survive, and that's probably why not too many of them spoke up.

Certainly, the prevailing attitude even now seems to be that these women "had it easy" in some way.

But still, I'm finding it hard to fathom that there seems to be a little bit of debate about just who the women were in the brothels and how they got there.

[tnrkitect]

Shame of the acts and shame over the perception of lesser hardships does a lot to close lips.

Without people speaking out, those who wish to rewrite history have had free reign.

[ad_kay]

We came to the conclusion that the women might've been afraid they'd be blamed for doing whatever they needed to do to survive, and that's probably why not too many of them spoke up.
I'm certain that is the case. Thank you for writing about this so eloquently. I never knew the brothels existed, although it shouldn't be surprising.

I imagine the women forced to work as sex slaves must have suffered from truly horrible survivors' guilt as they supposedly had it "easy."