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Auschwitz and the Prince

by rose-of-java

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Contributed byÌý: rose-of-java
Article ID:Ìý: A3521828
Contributed on:Ìý: 14 January 2005

Bear with me while I look back into a distant past. After all, that is what history is for: that we may learn from our mistakes.

Young Harry 'must to the court in the morning' His friends tell him he will be chid and that he should practise an answer. This is how they train him:

F. .."Harry, I do not only marvel where thou spendest thy time, but also how thou art accompanied. ... There is a thing, Harry, which thou hast often heard of, and it is known to many in our land by the name of pitch: this pitch, as ancient writers do report, doth defile... "

Do not for one moment believe that I want to belittle what happened recently. I have been interned myself, and for the last few days I have been reading Martin Gilbert's
"Auschwitz and the Allies" The sight of a swastika armband is like a blow in the stomach.

I have also been a teacher and I know that the young are not by nature vicious.
Stupid, perhaps. Unthinking, yes. Badly brought up, often. Traumatized in youth, alas often, too.
Before you gun someone down, would it not be wise to check if he really is the target?

Young Harry, in danger of being defiled by pitch in Act II,iv of Shakespeare's "King Henry IV" became the dashing King Henry V of another play: "Once more unto the breach.."
True, these are different times and that Harry was a Plantagenet.

The point is that he was taught to behave like a prince.

If we have learned anything, all of us writing on WW2, it should be that one cannot forgive evil. But also that we should be very careful before we stick that label on an action which is merely foolish.
And highly regrettable, grant you that.
The answer should be education rather than flame-throwers.

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Message 1 - Uaschwitz and the prince.

Posted on: 14 January 2005 by Frank Mee Researcher 241911

Dear Rose,
I feel this posting may be pulled as one of mine once was. There are somethings you are not allowed to comment on but while it is still here:

Good judgement comes from experience, and experience - that comes from poor judgement. Anon.

What twenty year old has not done things on the spur of the moment they regret the rest of their lives. I certainly did things that make me cringe 55 years later.
Think about it would History ever have been made if it were not for the foolishness of youth, "history is philosophy learned from examples" and wars are fought by the young in the name of the older folk who cannot fight. they need the foolishness and rashness of youth, they are the only ones daft enough to fix bayonets climb out of their holes and advance in the face of enemy fire. We must by that account allow them to do stupid things from time to time.
I well remember getting a thick ear for talking in the one minutes silence at a remembrance service as a lad. I had not grasped the meaning of that moment to the people who had gone through the 1914-18 war and lost relatives. To the young Prince the war is thirty or more years before he was born, he has not realised what that war means to the people who were there, he will certainly know now.
I have a feeling that if I was in his place right now i would be saying "I have a right to live my own life without constant watch being kept on me" and in the near future we may need him to fix bayonets and charge in the name of his government as they fight another unnecessary war.

If one could recover the uncompromising spirit of ones youth, ones greatest indignation would be for what one has become.
Andre Gide.
Let youth make its mistakes in the hope they become wise from those mistakes and thus learn.
Frank.

Ìý

Message 2 - Auschwitz and the prince.

Posted on: 15 January 2005 by anak-bandung

The Dutch have a saying â€˜hoge bomen vangen veel windâ€™, literally translated as â€˜high trees catch a lot of windâ€™, meaning that people in high placesâ€¦â€¦.
Personally I donâ€™t think for one moment the present Harry meant to cause any distress. Yes, he should have known better, especially in his position. However, youngsters are thoughtless and usually we learn to think about other peopleâ€™s feelings only when we grow up a little. This may be at any age, as some apparently do not grow up, only older.
Harry is also almost two generations removed from the holocaust. Those of the generation who are still alive and who have been personally involved or looked in horror at the atrocities perpetrated by the nazis, are steadily reduced in numbers. Our grandchildren are impatient with history. They live in the here and now. Some of them may feel awe or some sympathy if they have a grandparent who â€˜had been thereâ€™, but how many of the latest generation gives a hoot?
As you said, Roos, itâ€™s education that is needed and an understanding why he has been foolish. If his father, as mentioned on the news, keeps his word and sends his sons to Auschwitz to see for themselves, even better. The place, though empty, will contain such an atmosphere, they cannot but feel the horror.
I have a cynical thought though. Doesnâ€™t history show that, despite education, we still keep on making the same mistakes?
Rob

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