General Discussion

Back in grade school one of my very best friends was Jewish.

My father was intensely antiSemitic, my mother not so much.

She talked to me about it after she met my friend's mother, and figured out what was happening.

Her comment to me was, "Don't tell your father."

She said the same thing whenever I brought home books about Nazi Germany. It seems weird to me now, but the paperback editions of The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich and Berlin Diary were emblazoned with swastikas. My mother saw me with those books and freaked, wondering what the hell I was getting into. After I explained she told me to hide the covers, and again, "Don't tell your father."

My mom was apolitical but she hated the Nazis. It was a personal thing. There was one living in her apartment block who informed on others who weren't true believers. He slapped her once--and remember she was quite young at the time--for saying "Guten Tag" instead of "Heil Hitler." She also was pissed at him because as a die hard Nazi he was seemingly immune from the draft when all the other young men she knew were in the war, or dead, or POW's. Then too, he had access to real coffee when everyone else had to drink some horrid ersatz beverage made of acorns or something.

I credit public school with setting me straight on all this, especially a couple of social studies teachers who were just wonderful. I also grew up in a "mixed neighborhood"--lots of immigrants and first generation Americans such as myself.

Thanks for sharing, and best wishes.