Talk:Persecution of Germans

Suggestion

You should add a section for "Wikipedia" under "Specific Locales". This "free encylopedia that anyone can edit" is rife with anti-German authors and it greatly diminishes the utility of this resource. What is wrong here? Do special rules need to be crafted so that people understand that it's not okay to insult other nationalities in their articles? This is not good scholarship, and I wish that more of the fair-minded authors would take a stand against this kind of mudslinging. A person really has to try to find one article on German culture/people/history on Wikipedia that doesn't have some sort of negative slant.

A NPOV isnt possible with Americans. And I say that, as an American. Ƿōdenhelm (talk) 11:31, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

This article stays

I don't know what anyone is thinking, but this article title is a vast improvement on the POV Pursuit of Nazi collaborators. Sam [Spade] 23:54, 24 Oct 2004 (UTC)

It is not. Please read the Talk:Pursuit of Nazi collaborators. This article title is pushing the POV

1. prosecution of Germans was based on ethnicity
2. it was unjust (persecution)

Title Pursuit of Nazi collaborators is biased the oposite way, because of negative connotations of the word collaborator, but nothing better was found in discussion.

--Wikimol 08:37, 25 Oct 2004 (UTC)

No matter of the title, contents of this article is duplicit to Pursuit of Nazi collaborators. And clearly inferior both in NPOV and facts. If anybody reverts, I won't revert again, but insted add merger and total dispute.

If you only object the title, lets resurect discussion of title of Pursuit of Nazi collaborators. Please note this is a well-known controvarsial topic and there was sort of consesus. --Wikimol 08:48, 25 Oct 2004 (UTC)

This title is overly broad where the other one specifies a context. AndyL 11:14, 25 Oct 2004 (UTC)

This is absurd. We have two almost identical articles with different titles. AndyL 03:44, 26 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Possible solution: A different "organised persecution of ethnic Germans" took place in the US in 1917-1918 (and in fact there had been friction between German-American and Anglophone populations in many areas long before then). I would imagine similar things have happened in other countries with large ethnic German populations. What would people say to expanding or redefining this article to encompass all cases of organized anti-ethnic-German activity? Then this article might contain only a stubby summary of the post-Nazi campaigns, which could be uniquely dealt with in-depth in Pursuit of Nazi collaborators. ... Given the current state of tension here, I hesitate to implement this, but it seems like a workable solution. Visviva 16:09, 30 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Sure, if you have info you can contribute it to the article. Perhaps there's info on the treatment of Germans in Alsace-Lorraine once it was ceded to France (perhaps even a reference to Alfred Dreyfuss would be appropriate?) AndyL 17:12, 30 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Well, I've added sections on Italy and the US, and rewritten the header paragraph a bit. Hope nobody bites my head off for it. My style isn't great (it could use a little rewrite), but at least I think it's fairly NPOV. The US and Italian situations are areas where I've done some reading before, so I could be fairly sure that the limited stuff I could find online was accurate. There's definitely a lot more content that could be added for these and other countries (France, obviously; probably Australia, UK, various South American countries). 220.64.213.126 10:22, 31 Oct 2004 (UTC)

That's me, by the way. Visviva 10:23, 31 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Dispute

This article title is pushing the POV

1. prosecution of Germans was based on ethnicity
2. it was unjust (persecution)

First paragraph is complete nonsense.

Rest of article is duplicit to Pursuit of Nazi collaborators.

I hope those reverting the redirect will fix this. --Wikimol 08:54, 26 Oct 2004 (UTC)

persecution of Germans after WII was based on ethnicity, and was very unjust. This is not an article about nurenburg, or some war crimes/war criminals, its about ethnic cleansing/violence against ethnic germans based on their ethnicity after WWII. Sam [Spade] 14:09, 26 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Sam left me a message at my talk page about a documentary he saw that showed "a lot of horrible abuses (raping, people nailed to barns by their ears, random shootings and murders, etc...) after the war, and often against german speakers who had lived in e europe or russia prior to the war (as well as others of course)". I have heard about such things from a reliable friend but cannot present sources for it. Does anyone know more? Get-back-world-respect 23:33, 26 Oct 2004 (UTC)

The section about Czechoslovakia refers to the article "Pursuit of Nazi collaborators". As people were expelled for their ethnicity and not based on any evidence that they had personally collaborated with the Nazis, this is not neutral. Get-back-world-respect 23:42, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I would like to know why the US section doesn't explicitly mention 1) that the town of Fredericksburg, Texas was occupied by Confederate troops and placed under martial law because of the pro-Union stance of many German-Texans, 2) The Battle of Nueces as commemorated by the "Treue der Union" monument in Comfort, TX, 3) the fact that second generation German-Americans were in fact interned in WW2. I would also like to see a paragraph about the Mason County Range Wars between Germans and Anglos.

Stop the edit war now

These are two different topic areas as a) not all Nazi collaborators were German and b) not all persecuted Germans were actual or alleged Nazi collaborators. Let's try to reduce the redundancy between the two articles and please stop the redirection - if anyone thinks this article shouldn't be here then list it on Wikipedia:Votes for deletion and make your case there. Continued edit warring *will* result in an RFC being drawn up so please stop. AndyL 20:37, 27 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Exactly, these are separate topics, the redundancy needs to be delt w, but a redirect is not the answer. Sam [Spade] 21:24, 27 Oct 2004 (UTC)

There is a difference between Wikipedia and the Last Judgement!

I understand you want one article about "(unjust) persecution of ethnic Germans" and the other about "(just) prosecution of criminals". The problem is this distinction is impossible to do NPOV way. First reason - majority of war criminals, collaborators, traitors etc. were German ethnicity or self-declared German ethnicity. And for some groups even the reversed implication is true. Second reason - what was just depend on POV. Third reason - even if we wont have NPOV policy, judging what prosecution was just / unjust is problematic, you usualy have to impose some todays ethic on some historical events.

Example, why these articles have to be merged - and why its impossible to draw the border you would like. Or please answer to which article following persecution belong (and how you decided): 'Nuremberg Trials

• POV A Nuremberg Trials are typical example of victor's justice. Only German war crimes were prosecuted, and tribunal was not fair. It was unjust and against Germans.
• POV B Nuremberg Trials were clearly act of law and justice.

Czechoslovakian law, stating supporting Nazi rule and occupation by any means, including verbal support, was a criminal offecne

• POV A It is clearly anti-German, because Germans living in Czechoslovakia were never happy with the post WWI settlement of borders and so called "occupation" percieved as liberation.
• POV B Czechoslovakia was democratic state and breaking its law and constitution. Support for Nazi tyrany cannot be excused by the German resentment originating in loss of supreme position in state. In time of war even verbal crimes are crimes.

Czechoslovakian law, stating people of German ethnicity loose their citizenship, however if they can proove they were anti-nazi, their citizenship will be restored

• POV A It is openly unjust punishment of all ethnic Germans.
• POV B It is problematic, but it had practical reasons. Majority of Czechoslovakian Germans were pro-nazi, so it was more manageable to restore citizenship to those who were not. It was harsh, but it was law.

Resistance group come to village and shoot all Germans. Proclaimed reason was they believed the Germans were informants.

• POV A It is ethnic cleansing.
• POV B It war revenge to alleged German collaborators.

Again, I repeat, the distinction is impossbile to make NPOV way. It would be much better to have one article dealing with whole continuum of what happened rather than two highly redundant articles, each one-sided, presentenig and emphasizing one POV.

I'll take the case to vote for deletion or other appropriate institution on monday (now I'm leaving for several days outdoors). In the meantime, something to read. If you are eager to dive into horrible abuses [1] and something more balanced [2]. Unfortunately, I dont know about good online resources for other POVs, but there are credible reports of atrocities commited by normal civilian population portrayed in [1] as victims.

Personal note - the more I know about it the less I judge.

Btw, reverting one way isnt much better that the other. --Wikimol 22:41, 27 Oct 2004 (UTC)

My personal opinion is along the lines of those who criticise James Bacques, ie those who dwell on post war anti-German sentiments and actions tend to do so as a means of minimising German atrocities during the war possibly with the intent of equating what happened to the Germans with what the Nazis did to others, particularly the Jews. (That being said there are some very real abuses such as the treatment of the Volga Germans). Nevertheless, I don't think the way you've been dealing with this article in past days has been terribly useful or productive. If you think the article is unbalanced then balance it out. If you think it shouldn't be listed then list it for deletion. AndyL 01:42, 28 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I agree that the extreme right tries to abuse the abuses of Germans and to downplay the holocaust. I however do not think that an encyclopedia should censor facts because some may abuse them. Censure is the easiest thing to abuse. One reason why some feel so bitterly about the abuses is that because of the unthinkable preceding events their misery went unnoticed. Get-back-world-respect 01:14, 29 Oct 2004 (UTC)

RFC

I´m merely restating previous post.

Some contributors of this article want one article about "(unjust) persecution of ethnic Germans" and other about "(just) prosecution of criminals", the unjust persecutin described in this article and the just in Pursuit of Nazi collaborators.

The problem is, IMO this distinction is impossible to do NPOV way. First reason - majority of war criminals, collaborators, traitors etc. were German ethnicity or self-declared German ethnicity. And for some groups even the reversed implication is true. Second reason - what was just depend on POV. Third reason - even if we wont have NPOV policy, judging what prosecution was just / unjust is problematic, you usualy have to impose some todays ethic on some historical events.

Examples, why we should have one article - under whatever title - and why its impossible to draw the border between "Organised persecution of ethnic Germans" and "Pursuit of Nazi collaborators". For example, try to decide where following persecutions belong: 'Nuremberg Trials

• POV A Nuremberg Trials are typical example of victor's justice. Only German war crimes were prosecuted, and tribunal was not fair. It was unjust and against Germans.
• POV B Nuremberg Trials were clearly act of law and justice.

Czechoslovakian law, stating supporting Nazi rule and occupation by any means, including verbal support, was a criminal offecne

• POV A It is clearly anti-German, because Germans living in Czechoslovakia were never happy with the post WWI settlement of borders and so called "occupation" percieved as liberation.
• POV B Czechoslovakia was democratic state and breaking its law and constitution. Support for Nazi tyrany cannot be excused by the German resentment originating in loss of supreme position in state. In time of war even verbal crimes are crimes.

Czechoslovakian law, stating people of German ethnicity loose their citizenship, however if they can proove they were anti-nazi, their citizenship will be restored

• POV A It is openly unjust punishment of all ethnic Germans.
• POV B It is problematic, but it had practical reasons. Majority of Czechoslovakian Germans were pro-nazi, so it was more manageable to restore citizenship to those who were not. It was harsh, but it was law.

Resistance group come to village and shoot all Germans. Proclaimed reason was they believed the Germans were informants.

• POV A It is ethnic cleansing.
• POV B It war revenge to alleged German collaborators.

IMO its clear the distinction is impossbile to make NPOV way. It would be much better to have one article dealing with whole continuum of what happened rather than two highly redundant articles, each one-sided, presentenig and emphasizing one POV. I do not advocate current state of Pursuit of Nazi collaborators or its title. (I contributed Czechoslovaki section).

The question is whether Wikipedia should have one article trying to decsribe both aspects or two articles each emphasizing one side. If one article, how to achieve that, when redir was subject of revert war, merger notice was reverted and vote for deletion is not suitable (by Deletion policy this is NOT the case for VfD). If two articles, how to divide content of existing article between them.

--Wikimol 15:54, 30 Oct 2004 (UTC)

Could you please stop doubling whole paragraphs at discussion pages? Thank you.

wikipedia articles are not meant to judge. As you may agree, many people of an ethnicity may not identify with or even know of everything a government does that has the same ethnicity. "Pursuit of Nazi collaborators" and Amish people in the US or expulsion of ethnic Germans regardless of their political views simply do not match. Get-back-world-respect 18:35, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Not everything needs a plethora of articles, and this is one that doesn't. It can do its job and reflect an encyclopedaic overview of all the above, quite happily in one article. FT2 23:34, Nov 10, 2004 (UTC)

Minor question

I do not understand the sentence "In the General Government there were ~120,000 Volksdeutsche." What does "government" mean here? Get-back-world-respect 18:20, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I think it refers to the satrapy created by the Nazis from the piece of Poland that was not incorporated into Germany itself after the invasion of 1939. In terms of "government" in this context it was the autocratic administration imposed by the Nazis on the Poles for fivish years. The whole section on Poland is vague and misleading and needs some serious work. Hope that helps Lisiate 23:44, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Even for an administration rather than a government 120,000 seems a lot to me. Get-back-world-respect 23:55, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)

The entire area was called the General Government so the figure referes to all the Germans living in that part of Poland at the time rather than those directly involved in the administration. Lisiate 23:59, 4 Nov 2004 (UTC)

POV

From the article:

The organised persecution of ethnic Germans is a historical myth invented to try to impose some sort of rationality upon the sufferings of the widely dispersed and historically divergent populations formerly found in Eastern and Central Europe.

Is there a reference for this? Do a majority of historians support this view?

To have this statment as the first sentence in the article is, in my opinion, certainly in violation of the NPOV policy.

Agreed. This is, unfortunately, one of those articles which is inherently prone to POV warring. The POV partisans -- and we have several on both sides -- tend to refuse to acknowledge that this article's scope should extend beyond the rather tedious incidents of the mid-20th century. I have restored the introduction which was removed in November, which clearly frames this article as addressing the entire history of anti-German persecution, which includes a number of interesting and complex phenomena as discussed in the article body. -- Visviva 09:34, 26 December 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for that. I'll make sure I watch this article, and see what I can do to add some more info. --Dextux 04:27, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

This passage may need some more clarification:

The property that belonged to Germans, German companies or the German state, was confiscated by the Polish state, along with many other properties in communist Poland. German owners, as explicitly stated by the law, were not eligible for any compensation.

Considering that after Germany conquered Poland in 1939 and all the land and property therein became de facto German property, some clarification should be made to differentiate between property legally held by German nationals/state/corporations, either in pre-1939 Poland proper or in formerly Germans lands "traded" to Poland by Stalin, and with previously Polish property that was siezed by Germans after the 1939 invasion. There is a difference between a factory in the western part of Poland that was in German hands for a seventy years, and a Polish factory taken over by a German firm in 1939. From a German point of view, at least during a war, both would be considered German property, but the distinction is rather clear.

Also, these events did not exist in a vacuum. There was some historical context here. Some mention should probably be made that Stalin forced a redrawing of the Polish borders in 1945 which explained why a lot of formerly German lands now were situated in Poland, which made neither Poland nor Germany very happy, but neither country really had much say in the matter. Repeter 08:07, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

Recent vandalism

An anonymous user has been consistently vandalising the article with extreme POV bias, and most recently did so while still logged in as User:Space Cadet. I'd like to address what I feel are bad-faith edits before it turns into a revert war.

• you removed the historical context and distinguishing between persecution by german, and persecution by outsiders. You replaced it with the words "in the twentieth century"
• You then say it's important to stress there's no global conspiracy, that is unencyclopedic, nobody ever suggested there was
• you then accuse Germans of having "imaginary conspiracies and persecution complexes", and break Godwin's Law repeatedly
• you then say Germans are barbaric
• you then describe the persecutions as "well-merited justice"
• you then say they brought it on themselves by being Nazis

These are clear POV vandalism, and I will not hesitate to revert them, unless others say on this talk page that they feel your ideas have merit. Sherurcij ^{(talk) (Terrorist Wikiproject)} 12:53, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

*you then say they brought it on themselves by being Nazis Before the war 25% of German minority in Poland belonged to organisations supporting Nazi aggression against Poland, while 82 thousand joined Selbstschutz that engaged in Genocide of Polish people-Selbstschutz was seen as justification for removal of German population etc. Also during the occupation Germans had priviliaged status over Poles etc. --Molobo 15:24, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

Molobo, I've seen your statement about the percentage of ethnic Germans in Selbstschutz many times before (Source?) but it doesn't excuse the rest of the statements. As for the rest, it is just another case of POV pushing and I'm pretty sure you know that so don't support it. Sciurinæ 17:03, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

Dear Sciurinæ,

I'm sure that Molobo's quote about the percentage of ethnic Germans who joined the Selbstschutz wouldn't "excuse the rest of the statements" (as you put it on 9th February) if such statements had actually been made.

However, if you actually read the various versions of the article as it has evolved over the last two weeks you will see that the inexcusable statements never appeared in the article itself.

Sherurcij made the statements here on this discussion page - having misunderstood what had actually been written.

(17:49, 13 February 2006)

No I didn't, every thing I included in quotation-marks was a verbatim copy/paste from the main article. You know you can't really lie about these things, when there's a "Page History" feature, right? Sherurcij ^{(talk) (Terrorist Wikiproject)} 18:14, 13 February 2006 (UTC)

Sherucij - you're talking bollocks mate.

The statements that YOU made above (e.g. *you then say they brought it on themselves by being Nazis) are not copy/pasted verbatim from any text that I have ever written.

Yes - there is a "Page History" feature and I suggest that you read it - carefully.

Had you read carefully it you would have seen that:

• I have never written that the Germans [in general] had "imaginary conspiracies and persecution complexes" - for a start that statement is bad English - and I pride myself on my written English style .

• I never wrote that "Germans are barbaric" - I spoke of "Nazis barbarities"

• I did not describe the persecution as "well-merited justice" - I said that a minority of ethnic Germans (who had collaborated with the Nazis) fled from their former homelands in the East in order to escape well-merited justice for well-documented crimes

• I never said that "they [presumably you mean ethnic Germans] brought it [I presume you mean the persecution] on themselves by being Nazis. Show me where I wrote this

GET YOUR FACTS STRAIGHT MATE

T.S. 11:18 14 February 2006

No problem, here is the edit you made. Notice I said the things in quotation marks were exact quotes. Now let's look at your edit. "Such imaginary conspiracies and persecution complexes", "the worst excesses of Nazis barbarity", "undoubtedly fled to escape well-merited justice". From there you moved into moral relativism basically saying 'well Germans might sometimes be persecuted, but not like Jews!'. The two are unrelated, this isn't an article about Jews, this is an article about organised persecution of ethnic Germans, as the title suggests. Sherurcij ^{(talk) (Terrorist Wikiproject)} 12:22, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

Dear Sherucij,

I never mentioned Jewish people in any of my previous edits - or anti semitism.

I never wrote/said anything along the lines of 'well Germans might sometimes be persecuted, but not like Jews!' (your quotation marks).

TS 11:44, 17 February 2006 An example of German website demanding justice for alledged persecution of Germans postwar, using antisemitism and Nazi propaganda: http://www.ety.com/berlin/ --Molobo 01:13, 9 February 2006 (UTC)

Canada Section

the article is rather vague in this section. It says "Ukrainians and other Eastern Europeans" were interned in camps. Growing up in Canadian schools, I had always been told that those interned were from areas of the Central Powers, for instance the said Ukrainians would probably of been from Austro-Hungarian eastern territory, and the other eastern europeans would of been Austro-Hungarian as well. Am I wrong on this? or could it be after the October Revolution they were interning the Ukrainians as fears of the Bolsheviks spreading there revolution through there immigrant populations grew.

--Jadger 22:26, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

Expulsion articles

Parts of the texts are similar to Epulsion articles, which also repeat the same data in two or more articles. Some cleaning is needed.Xx236 08:24, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

Robert Graves

I've requested an additional source to support the claim that in 1919 the anti-German sentiment started to diminish in Britain. The only reference given is a quote from a writer of German descent and thus he may have had a POV to express. An anti-French POV it seems. Was his view the common view in Britain as is implied in the article? A reference other than Graves is needed. 125.7.44.167 21:40, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

Furthermore, Graves isn't considered an authority on this subject and the book from which the quote is taken is not a referenced scientific publication but an autobiography. Autobiographies are not a recounting of facts but a recounting of perspective. I will remove the quote if it remains unsupported by other references. 125.7.44.167 12:27, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

Poland

There is very little in the section on Poland that could really be construed as "organized persecution" of ethnic Germans. There is discussion of Germans' conscription into the Nazi Army, there is discussion of offering ethnic Germans the opportunity to become Polish citizens or be expelled to Germany, there is discussion about Germanic countries partitioning Poland in the beginning of the section, etc. I think this entire section is utterly useless and should be eliminated if specific acts of organized persecution of ethnic Germans (on a wide scale) aren't included.--Atwardow (talk) 23:23, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

You raise an interesting point, but I'm not sure how profitable it would be to distinguish 'organized' from 'disorganized'. On Kristalnacht there was covert organization behind most but not all of the violence, but I would argue that the creation of conditions of impunity for spontaneous violence also fall within the scope of this article. There is also the de jure confiscation of property described in the last paragraph. The next to last is very confusing:

Volksdeutsche of Polish origins were treated by Poles with special contempt, and the fact of their having signed the Volksliste constituted high treason according to Polish underground law.

I suppose "Volksdeutsche of Polish origins" might mean either those of mixd descent, ethinic Germans born within [which?] boundaries of Poland, or assimilated Poles who claimed privileges of the Volksdeutsche. One might also ask whether "underground law" is inherently organised or unorganised. ;-)

The opening bits admittedly read more like background to a more extensive discusion, but do bear on the definition of "German". I'm sure we agree that the lack of references is a major problem. I dont command the sources myself, but the Flight and expulsion of Germans from Poland during and after World War II article might be of a little help. Sparafucil (talk) 20:53, 12 September 2010 (UTC)

These are very helpful thoughts. Thank you very much. I'll try to come up with something this week and post it here for your opinion.--Atwardow (talk) 00:15, 13 September 2010 (UTC)