So, horribly, utterly true-- I grew up in roughly the same generation you did--maybe you're a bit older. I played with toy soldiers--Good guys where the Americans, bad guys were the Germans (interchangeable with Nazis); this an irrefutable historical truth. I didn't even hear of slavery or really study the Civil War till I was a junior in High School. Whatever happened, even the domestic civil-type wars of the Sixties--demonstrations, etc.--we were, at bottom the Great Democracy.
Now I see what's happening--and that it might only get worse--and I have to confess to being in a state of shock. I've lived eighty years and have never seen anything like this in my country--Where the Villain and his crazy, dangerous henchmen are actually in charge! I've read a lot of detailed histories of Nazi Germany, but their history was always so different than ours. Maybe I was living in a daydream all this time...
So, horribly, utterly true-- I grew up in roughly the same generation you did--maybe you're a bit older. I played with toy soldiers--Good guys where the Americans, bad guys were the Germans (interchangeable with Nazis); this an irrefutable historical truth. I didn't even hear of slavery or really study the Civil War till I was a junior in High School. Whatever happened, even the domestic civil-type wars of the Sixties--demonstrations, etc.--we were, at bottom the Great Democracy.
Now I see what's happening--and that it might only get worse--and I have to confess to being in a state of shock. I've lived eighty years and have never seen anything like this in my country--Where the Villain and his crazy, dangerous henchmen are actually in charge! I've read a lot of detailed histories of Nazi Germany, but their history was always so different than ours. Maybe I was living in a daydream all this time...
So true
What was it like? ©Joel Baumwoll
In the waning days of the Second World War,
My child’s imagination created the battles
between America and its enemies, to settle the score.
Images from cartoons, comics, and photos,
of real scenes in large photo magazines.
My toys were lead soldiers, planes and tanks.
With canons, machine guns and weapons galore
dressed as Nazis, Italians, “Japs” and Yanks
Fighting bloodless battles with no sight of gore.
Some years after June 6 ‘44 won the day
And victory parades had faded away,
The damaged came home to places
they found hard to stay and live with
experiences of which none would say.
Slowly the bloody tide came in, bringing
The reality of a people who created a nation
Capable of things that beggared the imagination.
And my teenage thoughts strained to understand
How this could happen in such a land that
Gave us Beethoven and Bach.
What was it like as the Nazi passion captured the hearts
and beliefs of the nation to surrender their freedom to a cause
They adored and committed themselves
to what we’d think they’d abhorred.
What was it like to live in such a place?
To cheer the unthinkable and destroy a race?
I read many books that told of the way
The Nazi poison took hold to stay.
Yet none could let me really understand
How a nation would welcome such a cancer.
Until today, I am so sad to say,
Here in America, I now know the answer.
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