flaja wrote:My understanding is that Germany targeted the Gypsies because they moved around a lot and thus did not live settled lives- meaning they were "work shy" and difficult to monitor. I am not aware of any specific German claim that the Gypsies were racial inferiors.
Gypsies were already discriminated against before the Third Reich. During the Weimar Republic, for example, the
Amt für Zigeunerangelegenheiten (Office of Gyspy Issues) was renamed
Zentrale zur Bekämpfung des Zigeunerunwesens (Central Office to Combat the Gypsy Mischief) in 1929. This office authorised the police to have Gypsies do forced labour if they were found without employment.
However, all the existing prejudices, the discrimination against Gypsies and the existing laws were melted into one theory of 'racial inferiority' by the Nazis. In a publication by the
Deutsche Ärztebund in 1938, it read like this:
Quote:"Ratten, Wanzen und Flöhe sind auch Naturerscheinungen, ebenso wie die Juden und Zigeuner ... Alles Leben ist Kampf. Wir müssen deshalb alle diese Schädlinge biologisch allmählich ausmerzen, und das heißt heute, die Lebensbedingungen durch Sicherheitsverwahrung und Sterilisationsgesetze so grundlegend ändern, dass alle diese Feinde unseres Volkes langsam aber sicher zur Ausmerze gelangen."
(Rats, bugs and fleas are natural phenomena, too, just like Jews and Gypsies ... All of life is a struggle. We therefore have to biologically expunge all that vermin step by step, which means today to radically change living conditions through preventive detention and sterilisation laws, so that all those enemies of our people will slowly but surely be eliminated.)
In 1938, the
Rassenhygienische Forschungsstelle was charged by Heinrich Himmler with recording all Gypsies in the territory of the Reich. In cooperation with the
Reichssicherheitshauptamt, 24,000 racial profiles of Sinti and Roma were created to document the racial inferiority of Gypsies.
Quote:"Ziel der staatlichen Maßnahmen zur Wahrung der Einheit der deutschen Volksgemeinschaft [muss] sein einmal die rassische Absonderung des Zigeunertums vom deutschen Volkstum, sodann die Verhinderung der Rassenvermischung... Der Erlass des Reichsführers SS am 8.12.1938 ordnet zunächst die Erfassung der im Reichsgebiet lebenden Personen an, die bei der Bevölkerung als Zigeuner gelten... Wenn einwandfrei feststeht, wie viel Zigeuner es im Reichsgebiet gibt, können weitere Maßnahmen ergriffen werden."
(The goal of governmental measures to protect the unity of the German national community [must] be the racial isolation of the Gypsydom from the German people, and then the prevention of racial mixture... The decree of the Reichsführer SS from December 12th 1938 orders the registering of all persons living in the Reich territory who are regarded as Gypsies by the population... Once it is established without doubt how many Gypsies are living within the Reich territory, further measures can be taken.)
To illustrate the theory of the racial inferiority of Gypsies, models of Sinti and Roma heads were cast. Mouth, pharynx, nostrils, the root of the nose, eye colour, eye brows, ears, neck, throat and hands were measured and thousands of photos taken to 'scientifically' substantiate the claims of inferiority.
flaja wrote:T-4 was directed at the chronically ill, mentally handicapped and physically disabled among the German population. Its purpose wasn't genocide.
It's purpose was to 'eliminate detrimental elements from the national community'. It merely wasn't genocide (in that sense of the word) because it wasn't directed at a national, ethnical, racial or religious group.
However, the goal of the T-4 mass killings was identical to that of the mass killings of Jews and Gypsies.
flaja wrote:old europe wrote:T-4 officially ended in 1941 (partially because large areas were seen as 'cleared',
I believe you may be thinking of Judenfrei, but T-4 was not directed specifically at the Jews.
No, I'm not thinking of
judenfrei. In 1941, the asylums and sanatoria of large areas were empty. Either because the inhabitants had been killed in T-4, or because relatives had them either transferred to private clinics where the state-run T-4 did not extend or withdrawn them to take care of them at home.
In that sense, the goals of T-4 were partially achieved.
flaja wrote:old europe wrote:"In Nazi usage, "euthanasia" referred to the systematic killing of those Germans whom the Nazis deemed "unworthy of life" because of alleged genetic diseases or defects.
Jews, Gypsies et cetera were not considered to be German by Nazi law.
As you noted before, the T-4 programme was not specifically directed at Jews or Gypsies. The systematic killing of "unworthy life" in T-4 (and the ongoing euthanasia programmes until 1945) was directed at Germans.
