"Who
speaks today of the extermination of the Armenians?"
In the first 3 chapters of Naimark’s
book: The Fires of Hatred, the
subjects generally revolve groups maintaining dominance over other groups through
the process of dehumanization and genocide. These chapters illustrated many
instances in history of the power dehumanization has over people and how it can
easily bring about the genocides of races and minorities. Usually backed by the
collective power of nationalism, groups who sought to maintain power and control
over minorities/groups would do so through imposing their ideologies upon them.
Also, if the group in power felt threatened by the possibility of losing their
position of power or identity because of another group, they will do whatever
it takes in order to continue their reign of authority. Even if it means
marking the members of these groups as less than being human.
An example of dehumanization would
be the Ottomans and the Armenians. At the time, the system that was obeyed was
called the millet system. It separated non-muslims into a “second class” which
were discriminated against through heavier taxation, limits to achieving
positions of authority, and other regulations. Overtime, the groups (Jews, Greeks
and Armenians) who followed this system were eventually able to gain an
economic and industrial advantage in the country over that of the Muslims who
were not allowed to work with them. This led to the growing “second-class’”
formation of Ottomanism. Unfortunately, when Sultan Abdul Hamid took power, he
despised the Armenians and almost everything about them. The Armenians
supported reform and constitutional change, had close alignment with the Russians,
and their business/ professional elites were secular, western, and wealthy. He
also believed that the Armenians had taken advantage of the “the sweat of the
simple and devout Muslim laborers and the naïve support of government
procurement officials.” (Naimark, 22.) To top it off, the Armenians violated
the millet system by refusing to pay the double taxation. That meant that the
Armenians were no longer under the protection of the Islamic State. The Sultan sent troops as punishment to the Armenians
and massacred Armenian population. The massacres were aimed to control the
Armenians, not to exterminate them entirely. Eventually Armenians were, as
written by Von Trotha, “slaughtered like sheep.” The dehumanization of the
Armenians increased to the point of the Ottomans viewing the Armenians as
nothing more than animals as they slaughtered them.
The Jews became victim to
dehumanization and eventually their genocide by the Nazi party in Germany
through the imposing of ideologies and nationalism. The Nazi described the Jews
as liars, parasites, and just down right pests. They were thought to be so evil
that the evil went all the way down to their blood. The Nazi party began a
campaign of destroying the reputation of the Jews. They would depicted to be
like an infection of sub-humans, corrupters of the German bloodlines, as well
as even the reason for Germanys defeat in World War II. Because the Nazi
ideologies became so prominent in German society, when it the orders to kill
the Jews took effect, they were ruthlessly killed off. The nation viewed the
Jews as the filth of Germany. The killing of a Jew in Germany was viewed by the
people as simply the extermination of a pest. The Jews became so dehumanized
that they were even used as guinea pigs in brutal medical experiments. Like the Armenians, Jews became victim to
severe dehumanization which contributed to the accelerated rate of their
genocide.
Whenever I think of dehumanization
and imposing of ideologies, the first thought that comes to mind is Pol Pot and
the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia. The Khmer Rouge takeover of the Cambodians began
with the imposing of policies that completely stripped all social classes and
rights previously held by the Cambodians. The urban populations were herded out
of the cities like cattle into farmlands for a life of forced labor (For those who survived the march). Virtually everything involving anything other than working
in the fields was outlawed and punishable by death. Anyone with any specialized
skills or professions were executed. Even the suspicion of being an intellectual,
such as those who wearing glasses, were executed. The children were separated and
trained to turn in anyone, including parents, of any rule violation. There was
no family under the Khmer Rouges rule, nor a shred of even the most basic of
human rights. The Khmer Rouge shaped populations of Cambodia to becoming nothing
more than disposable farming tools. Even the thought of becoming more than just
a disposable tool was a ticket to a mass grave. An estimation of up to 3
million people were killed under their rule. This is what I believe to be one
of the most extreme examples of the use of dehumanization to control and bring
about the genocide of a group. Despite such horrific tragedies in the past and
those that Naimark’s The Fires of Hatred
brings to light, I noticed a lack of awareness of the true destructive power of
dehumanization. After all…
"Who
speaks today of the extermination of the Armenians?"
-Adolf
Hitler
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