There is only so much empathy you can lend out to a fascist black hole before it sucks you into its hateful gravitational pool. Purity tests like what you are proposing just makes them stronger.
I’m not saying you have to treat them with kindness. I am saying you have to reckon with the fact that they are still human. Or you will be doomed to follow the same path.
Is empathy only a human trait? Doubtful. Animals have been known to show empathy as well. Humans aren’t all that special, we’ve just learned to fuck over everything else on the planet.
I don’t believe they are the same species as me. They have devolved to the point where their brains lack empathy, a distinctly human trait.
-You
The subhuman is a biological creature, crafted by nature, which has hands, legs, eyes and mouth, even the semblance of a brain. Nevertheless, this terrible creature is only a partial human being. Although it has features similar to a human, the subhuman is lower on the spiritual and psychological scale than any animal. Inside this being is a cruel chaos of wild, unrestrained passions, nameless desire for destruction, the most primitive desires, the most naked meanness
-Der Untermenshen, Nazi propaganda pamphlet circa 1942
The difference, in my opinion, between Nazi ideology and believing Nazis not to be humans, is that one was a choice that someone made, and makes every day. The other was born a certain way and cannot change.
I think the idea that some people are subhuman has been abused a lot, most notably by the Nazis, and society is better off without that kind of thinking regardless of the context. We need to accept that these are people, just like us. We need to figure out what made them that way so we can stop making the same mistakes.
There is only so much empathy you can lend out to a fascist black hole before it sucks you into its hateful gravitational pool. Purity tests like what you are proposing just makes them stronger.
I’m not saying you have to treat them with kindness. I am saying you have to reckon with the fact that they are still human. Or you will be doomed to follow the same path.
I recognize what happened to them was wrong and shouldn’t have happened, but I am glad it wasn’t a person of better moral character to be the victim.
This is a much better and well reasoned take than the one in the OP image.
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Is empathy only a human trait? Doubtful. Animals have been known to show empathy as well. Humans aren’t all that special, we’ve just learned to fuck over everything else on the planet.
You sound an awful lot like a Nazi right now.
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-You
-Der Untermenshen, Nazi propaganda pamphlet circa 1942
You sound like a Nazi.
The difference, in my opinion, between Nazi ideology and believing Nazis not to be humans, is that one was a choice that someone made, and makes every day. The other was born a certain way and cannot change.
Bad choices = no moral value.
Some Nazis were raised. They believe what they believe because their parents were Nazis.
Some of them do leave that way of thinking, but it is not easy.
Do not treat people like things, just because you think they are irredeemable.
That is what Nazis do.
I think the idea that some people are subhuman has been abused a lot, most notably by the Nazis, and society is better off without that kind of thinking regardless of the context. We need to accept that these are people, just like us. We need to figure out what made them that way so we can stop making the same mistakes.
Wouldn’t the fascists even argue that empathy is toxic?
They do, but they also perform double speak to counter their hypocrisy. They’re rather famous for doing it.