If the The German Nation can send the best human beings to die, why can it not also ask its worst human beings to forfeit their lives (see essay below on "The Origins of Mass Murder in German)?

The Logic of Euthanasia (exterminating mental patients

The Logic of the Holocaust: (exterminating Jews)

What a preposterous assumption: that the Generals of the First World War were trying to "win" the First World War--by asking young men to get out of trenches for four years and to run into machine-gun fire and artillery shells--to the tune of 6000 dead men per day.

I more parsimonious hypothesis is that the Generals of France, Great Britain nad Germany--were will to sacrifice these young men--in order to demonstrate the depth of their devotion to their nations.

Hoche and Binding--as well as Hitler (see below)--understood what was going on:

  • Hoche and Binding (100 years ago) observed how wasteful the state was with its best human beings (soldiers), observing how the nation "sacrificed the finest flower of humanity." They went on to develop the argument: "If the state can kill its best people, why can't it also kill its worst?" Thus, the euthanasia movment was born (killing of mental patients).
     
  • Hitler (80 years ago) declared: "If I have the right to send the pick of the German people into the Hell of War--without regret for the spilling of precious German blood--then naturally I have the right to destroy millions of an inferior race that breed like vermin." Thus, the Holocaust (killing of Jews) was born.

As soon as we say what is obvious--that Germany in waying war was acting to kill its own soldiers, then both the Euthanasia movement and the Holocaust are not difficult to understand. It grew out of this syllogism: "If our nation has the right to ask its best human beings to die, why does it not also have the right to ask its worst citizens to forfeit their lives?"

Richard Koenigsberg, PhD
Director, Library of Social Science
 
The Origins of Mass-Murder in Germany:
The Destruction of Life Unworthy of Life
by Richard A. Koenigsberg
 

Allowing the Destruction of Life Unworthy of Life: Its Measure and Form

by Karl Binding (Author), Alfred Hoche (Author), Cristina Modak (Translator)

For information on purchasing this book through Amazon, click here.

The Germans were methodically killing fellow Germans before they killed Jews, gypsies, and dissidents. 'Action T4' was a medical program that quietly whisked disabled and mentally ill people for extermination. Germans of all ages were targeted. Hundreds of thousands received 'treatment.' The philosophical foundations for the Nazi actions grew out of this book..

In a sober, philosophical discussion, professors Karl Binding and Alfred Hoche argued that there were 'lives unworthy of life'--and for the good of society, indeed out of compassion for worthless individuals, these people could be ethically killed. Binding and Hoche's book was a turning point in German culture and served as a catalyst for the T4 program, out of which the Holocaust grew.

One of the most significant passages shaping the history of the twentieth century—appeared in Allowing the Direction of Life Unworthy of Life (1920) by Alfred Hoche and Karl Binding:

Are there human lives which have so completely lost the attribute of legal status that their continuation has permanently lost all value, both for the bearer of that life and for society? Merely asking this question is enough to raise an uneasy feeling in anyone who is accustomed to assessing the value of individual life for the bearer and for the social whole.

It hurts him to see how wastefully we handle the most valuable lives (filled with and sustained by the strongest will to live and the greatest vital power), and how much labor power, patience, and capital investment we squander (often totally uselessly) just to preserve lives not worth living--until nature, often pitilessly late, removes the last possibility of their continuation.

Reflect simultaneously on a battlefield strewn with thousands of dead youths, or a mine in which methane gas has trapped hundreds of energetic workers; compare this with our mental hospitals, with their caring for their living inmates. One will be deeply shaken by the strident clash between the sacrifice of the finest flower of humanity in its full measure on the one side, and by the meticulous care shown to existences which are not just absolutely worthless but even of negative value, on the other.

This passage—quoted repeatedly by historians of Nazism—provided the philosophical foundation of the “Euthanasia Program” that took hold in Germany in 1939. The authors, eminent academics, proposed that the state was justified in killing “life unworthy of life.”

The authors ask us to reflect upon a “battlefield strewn with thousands of dead youths,” and to compare this scene with “our mental hospitals with their caring for their living inmates.” Making this comparison, one will be “deeply shaken by the strident clash between the sacrifice of the finest flower of humanity,” on the one hand, and the “meticulous care” shown to existences which are “absolutely worthless,” on the other.

The authors present their proposal for euthanasia—the destruction of life unworthy of life—based on a comparison of the two cases: “If the state is willing to kill its best people—healthy young men who contribute significantly to society without compunction or guilt, why should the state hesitate to take the lives of people who make no contribution, indeed are burdensome to society?”

The Nazi euthanasia movement arose out of the perception of what could not be uttered: that the state already was involved in a project of extermination--the war itself. If the state killed its best and healthiest human beings (that presumably contributed substantially to society), why could it not also kill the worst or least healthy human beings (who were incapable of contributing to society)?


If the Nation Can Kill Its Best Citizens, Why Can’t It also Kill Its Worst?

Hitler  fought in the First World War and experienced is horrors. Yet he refused to criticise the German leadership. Though death had “snatched so many dear comrades and friends from our ranks,” Hitler averred in Mein Kampf, it would have been “a sin to complain” because, after all, were they not “dying for Germany”?

Like Hitler, Hoche and Binding are unable to critique Germany directly, posing the simple questions: “Why did my nation sacrificed the finest flower of its humanity?”  “Why—during the First World War—was the battlefield strewn with thousands of dead youths German soldiers?”

They refused to adopt an anti-war stance. Rather, they perform an oblique, indirect critique,  comparing the care that the nation provided for soldiers--with the care provided for mental patients. Why is Germany so wasteful with its most valuable lives yet provides excellent care for lives that are worthless?

Arising from the wreckage of the First World War, Hoche and Binding lay the ideological foundation for the Holocaust.  Unable to pose the question, “Why did our nation kill its healthiest or best citizens,” Hoche and Binding thet declare, “If our nation can kill its healthiest or best people, why can it not also kill its unhealthiest or worst people?”