Not evil, nor good.
"In war, whichever side may call itself the victor, there are no winners, but all are losers."
~Neville Chamberlain
"So, what's our destination?"
Gerald Tucker opened his eyes, shaking his head of lingering mental cobwebs. He wasn't looking forward to today. Turning to face the speaker, he sighed as he relayed the coordinates.
"49°21′37″N, and 0°51′26″W" he said, rubbing his eyes.
"Uh, Tucker, you're going to have to give me something more." his friend replied, frowning.
Oh. Right.
"Imagine a building. One with a half-circle. No, one that is a half-circle. And there's a pool perpendicular, a, uh, rectangular pool." he said, scratching his head.
"Alright. I'm still not really sure on this, though." she said rather dubiously.
Tucker stared straight ahead in deep thought, wondering how he could possibly describe this place in better detail, when it struck him. For her part, she
"It lies in the middle of a field of crosses." he said, his expression darkening almost imperceptibly.
"Huh?" she asked, frowning.
"White crosses. Barely reaches my waist. Fields of them . . ." he trailed off, frowning.
His companion stared at him blankly for a moment, before a look of realization transformed her face.
"Here we go!" she gasped as her eyes began to glow a solid, incredible white.
But it wasn't the realization he was looking for . . .
~
One moment a space of air above a blank patch of dying grass, the next a blinding flash.
Tucker shook his head and patted himself down. Satisfied that all his limbs were still intact, he took a moment to take in the completely new environment. It was like someone had slapped his entire body with a sheet of ice, minus the sensation of his bones breaking. Northern France in the winter time was, to put it mildly, different from the flight deck of an aircraft carrier cruising in the Caribbean Sea.
He zipped up his jacket, and turned to his companion.
"Twilight?" he asked to the unmoving creature.
When she did not respond, he followed her gaze to the sight before him. Lo and behold, simple white crosses stretched on for hundreds of feet in tidy rows, wilting flowers popping up here and there to add a burst of fading color to the sea of white. Off in the distance, a half-circle monument stood solemnly over the fields.
One could almost feel the somber nature of the area emanating off the ground.
Neither Tucker nor his equine companion moved for some time. Minutes, seconds, hours; they blended and mixed in the enveloping silence, punctuated solely by the howling of the raw, cold wind as it twisted among the unnatural forest. Finally, the one called "Twilight" broke the stillness.
"Tucker, where are we?" she asked.
He opened his mouth to answer, then paused, letting the wind wear his throat dry. Fitting, given the location.
In time, he too spoke. "A memorial."
"Very specific of you." she huffed, rolling her eyes.
He didn't respond for a few seconds, never taking his gaze off the rows of crosses. Finally: "Are you familiar with our history yet?"
Her gaze dropped. "No, I'm still only in prehistory. There's so much culture to learn, so many foods and languages and customs and-"
"Let me give you a quick lesson," he interrupted. "Second World War."
"Second World War . . ." she repeated to herself, frowning over the words as she did so.
"Yes. We're in Normandy, France, where Allied forces landed in 1944 to liberate Western Europe from Nazi Germany," he said.
Her frown grew. "Wait, what? Can you explain this?"
"Come with me." he called, walking off through the crosses on a well-worn path.
As she caught up, he continued. "You want a sum of things? A man named Adolf Hitler took control of Germany in 1933, invaded Poland in 1939, then Norway, France the year after, then Russia. Oh, and there were Japanese, Italians, and Americans, just to name a few other belligerents."
"What?!" she said, wide-eyed.
"Wasn't called World War Two for nothing." he said with a bitter smile.
"Wait, so there was a first world war, then, right?" to which she got a nod. "You went to war? Over what? Why would you fight each other?"
Tucker paused, a thoughtful expression crossing his face. "An absurd of amount of 'reasons', Twilight. But looking back, most people say because Hitler murdered twelve million civilians."
"Twelve millio-" Twilight stopped abruptly, color draining from her face as the number sank in. "Twelve million!? MILLION? How? Why-"
"Yes. And here was where liberation started. These beaches." Tucker said forcefully, as a dazed Twilight Sparkle followed his hand as it swept across the stark sands.
"Bu-" she started, the took a deep breath and looked up. "Why?"
"Americans, British, Canadians - they swarmed up these beaches into machine-gun fire. Are you familiar with machine guns?" he said.
She nodded. "Uh, yes. I've read about them, at least. But . . . these beaches are totally flat. How did they protect themselves?"
He laughed bitterly at that. "They didn't. Thousands were cut down."
Twilight sat back on her haunches, contemplating the thought. She looked horrified - then understanding, if no less horrified.
"So, that's what that memorial was to?" she said finally.
"Yes. The fallen." he agreed.
She blinked away a few tears, the information of the day not letting go. "Why would you tell me this?"
"Mhm?"
"Why? You said humans were capable of monstrous things when we first met, that you had a history of violence, that you even killed each other - but, but - this? Why, Tucker?" she said rapidly, shaking her head slowly.
"Why did this happen? There are reasons, none of them remotely good enough. Why did I show you this?" Tucker said, getting a nod to both queries. "I have another place we need to go . . ."
~
Blink.
~
Different. Same.
Twilight shook her head once and looked up to her new position. All around her, were bleak, roughly-hewn stone crosses and little grave tablets. In the center of it all was a large earthen mound, with a huge cross perched atop it. It was different in details to the other memorial, but no less bleak. Just as cold, and bitter, in both senses.
"Tucker?" she asked.
"La Cambe Cemetery." he said.
"More dead from the beaches?" she said, downcast.
"Yes. These were the men, some of the graves, at least, who were behind the machine guns." he said. He anticipated a reaction. He got one.
She backpedaled, wide-eyed. "This . . . is a German cemetery?"
"Precisely."
"Why does this exist? You said the killed millions! There were evil!" she nearly screamed. Luckily, no one else was outside to hear in the unpleasant weather.
"Twilight listen to me."
She glared at him, then slowly relaxed. "Alright."
He smiled and glanced around him, and began speaking. "This is a lesson about humanity that I've needed to do for a long time. Ever since we discovered each others' species existed, really. Not wanted, mind you - but need to."
She nodded once.
"Before you really start reading about our history, you need to understand a couple of things. Yes, Nazi Germany was directly responsible for twelve million dead innocents - but!" he said, putting emphasis behind the last word as Twilight looked more and more disgusted with the graves around her.
"-but, these men were not. They weren't fighting for the right to kill millions of defenseless people - what truly human being would do that? Sure, there were SS. And Gestapo. You'll be reading about those names for sure. My point is, these men fought for their country, for each other. Not for genocide, but because of duty to their orders, duty to each other, duty to defend their territory from attack!"
Twilight stared at him blankly.
"My point is - my point is that you can never take things at face value with us humans, with out history. There were moral, good men in the Wehrmacht, and sadistic barbarians in the US Army. There is no black and white, only grey. Really, World War Two was one of the clearer greys, as far as wars go."
Twilight closed her eyes in thought.
"Humans are capable of great evil, of unspeakable cruelty and horrendous deeds on an incomprehensible scale - and of great kindness, selflessness, and love. We're not evil, and sure as hell not good."
He pointed out the La Cambe. "Respect these men, the ones with the MG-42s, as much as you respect the ones who charged into their fire. None of them were evil. War is a silly, cruel thing that causes humans that never had a problem with one another in their lives to kill each other. War isn't evil, either. Hell, it's a lot darker of a grey than kissing puppies, but sometimes the consequences of not fighting would be even worse.
"The soldiers who fought here, died here, who lie in tens of thousands of millions of graves around the world cannot be judged. Not like things in your world can.
"Maybe someday you'll learn how lucky you are. In your world, it seems, in Equestria - there is black and white. Harmony. Humans are pretty chaotic, as things go - but chaos isn't evil. Not here, at least.
"Twilight, you're going to learn a lot of things with me about this world, and I hope I'll learn a lot about yours in time. Just remember this is a spectrum of grey. You'll see humanity at its worst, most vile and cruel self - and I dearly pray you'll see humanity at its best, most loving, understanding, self. I hope you don't hate us by the end of this."
She nodded once, but with realization filling her already-huge eyes.
And finally, for better or for worse, it was the realization he was looking for.
~
In memory of all those who gave their lives at Normandy. In the bunkers, and in the beaches.
They all deserve it.
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I feel like there could be a little better closing to this.
It also included references to things that had nothing to do with the story, like the aircraft carrier. That made it a little confusing.
Still worth an upvote, though.
A very good write. I urge you to continue.
Perhaps one topic could be the use of child labour. On one hand, there's the argument that the exploitation of children to make cheap products is horrible, cruel, etc. On the other, there's the argument that the money that they earn can mean the difference between feeding their families or going to bed hungry.
I wished this story continue, but it says complete!
Might have gotten a bigger hit around Memorial day or on June 6th, but a really good lesson none the less.
Brilliant and beautiful!
The story reminded me of the men who fought for my freedom.
Continue this story!
Decent story, love the idea.
No mention of the 20 million Russians who died?
Defending any aspect of the Third Reich and the Untermensch in it?
Bro, you get all my hate.
3669080
I personally blame the Cold War that occurred almost directly after WWII, most of the countries kind of had to pick sides and I guess most of them forgot that it was teamwork that won the war. Seriously, Russia kicked ass, it sucks how they were kind of left out because everyone was worrying about the east front and the enormous stockpiles.
As for defending the Reich, I believe it was supposed to be defending the people who fought to defend it, not the Reich themselves and what they did. Nationalism was a big thing back then, where fighting for your country was the biggest honor you could have. From what I've seen, people tend to think that once Hitler was elected (yes, democratically elected with majority vote) that the entire country slowly turned evil. Really it was a series of propaganda and shallow promises that the Nazis passed laws to give themselves more power and eliminate those they deemed "unworthy". Reminds me of a... quote I guess, regarding stuff like that.
People didn't know what they were doing was wrong, most of it took place behind closed doors or was twisted to make it seem like it would make the country prosper. In a nationalist mindset, if it helps the country, it must be good right? A main trigger for most Germans was WWI, they just lost about twenty years ago, Germany was forced to pay out to all it had wronged, lost most of it's original land, and was stripped of its military. Considering the events that lead up to WWI, the Germans really just jumped on the bandwagon and took it farther than anyone else. Now all of these guys are in a depression, and this Hitler guy, he fought in the war, he knows what's going on. Now he's saying that our country can be great again, just put him right up there. It's an offer that almost no one could refuse. It's not like he really had that much power, there were plenty of things Hitler wasn't allowed to do. They didn't know that this guy was going to lead millions to their deaths. Some say even Hitler wasn't planning on genocide, and that the power went to his head. Sure, when push comes to shove the people are to blame, but it was out of ignorance that they did so. In their eyes, from what they knew, and from what they were told, what they were doing was right. And we have no right to judge them for doing what they think is right.
some grammatical errors, try running this through word and autocorrect, should get 'em.
Also, going into further detail about Twilight's final revelation, about what she's experiencing on the inside, would make this a masterpiece.
3669080
Sometimes you need to think objectivley, and focus on a narrow aspect of things.
No one is ever in the right in war. Take my country England. Everyone always thinks 'we're the people who held the line' tried liberating France etc. But we still did things like loot Glücksburg castle, desecrate coffins and bomb civilian areas
3669731 Amen
Brings a tear to my eye...
My Granddad was a Panzer IV commander in the war and died in allied bombing along with his crew...
I'd like to see this continue.
3669080
That wooshing noise is the sound of the point flying right over your head. The atrocities committed by Nazi Germany were undeniably evil and are rightly condemned by anyone with an ounce of humanity in them. That doesn't change the fact that there were plenty of decent Germans who did not fight out of malice, but out of the very same virtues we ourselves laud. To protect their friends and family, and to defend their country.
From our perspective, yes, they were misguided. I'd go as far to say that many of the Germans who fought against the Allies in WWII would share our opinions if they were looking at it from the same viewpoint, and would be horrified if they knew what they had been inadvertently supporting.
The actions of Nazi Germany were evil. There were evil people on both sides. There were good people on both sides. One can acknowledge these facts without minimising or defending the horrific acts that took place.
That…was…AWESOME!
Gimme more!
Interesting. Very interesting. I can't wait to see what you do with this.
it just cuts off there
what
This should be part of a full story :P
lord twopenis approves
Wait, what? This isn't a story. It's just a lecture, and a pretty cliché and poorly-written one at that. Another victim of the "I can write about D-Day, look at me being deep and thoughtful!" epidemic.
This is quite good, I hope to see a talk about the holocaust and Judaism in general (if you have any questions about that, you can ask me via a message, I'd be happy to help/give my opinion).
3669731 3671235
3670222
I see your point, and I'll reiterate; the 'misguided' Germans ended up causing the deaths of somewhere along the lines of thirty million people.
Nothing about those who weren't actively opposed to the government is redeemable. No one can truly be called innocent at that point
There is no objectivity and there should be none when we're talking about the single largest event in human history.
I fully understand the points brought across by the fic. The problem here is, people are too busy picking out the potential good, when the bad is often considered the worst thing anyone has ever done.
Humanity has its good and the bad. We've achieved great wonders, and our good certainly outweighs our evil. But there are some things that cannot be waved away as a mistake or poor judgement. There might have been innocent people in Germany, but even they deserved every horror inflicted upon them, from the firebombings to the murderous rape-machine known as the Red Army.
-SNS, AKA Jacob T.S.
3673634
>There might have been innocent people in Germany, but even they deserved every horror inflicted upon them, from the firebombings to the murderous rape-machine known as the Red Army.
>There might have been innocent people in Germany, but even they deserved every horror inflicted upon them,
>but even they deserved every horror inflicted upon them,
>deserved
Is that a quote? Or is that you saying this, I came onto this story to read the description and then read the comments to which I read this quote.
Personally when I read this quote I felt the one saying it either you or the whoever said it sounded like a cold, unfeeling, moronic individual.
Yes the Germans did basically do Genocide whether that was the original intention or not thats besides the point, however the innocent have been killed on both sides of the war. However that never justifies the death of said individuals.
The innocent never deserve the treatment they gotten.
A quote is a simple set of words said by one single individual, an individual with one point of view and that doesn't make it the one truth.
Personally I think war never has a right side but there are people who participate in it and those who try to stay out of it.
There are always the death of innocent people that much is certain and can't be avoided in war. That doesn't make it right for the people on the 'right' side to condemn those innocent or those protecting there families on the 'wrong' side.
3673634
My country once sent crusades along with the italians to 'liberate the holy lands' at the promise of absolution, killing tens of thousands ourselves. Can you truly begrudge a person their beliefs? If a starving homless individual tries to rob you at knifepoint, you're still going to defend yourself, possibly lethaly, regardless of his reasons. Simply for the fact you believe you should defend yourself.
So many people in wars are indoctrinated, they never know the full picture of what happens. How many do you think were honestly aware of death camps, when in todays 'society of free speech' people like snowden still uncover things? All these people knew is they were at war, and that someone would raze their homes to the ground if they didn't defend their soil, regardless of who began the war.
3673807
How about something simple enough for you; if they didn't want all eleven timezones of Joseph Stalin, they shouldn't have let things go that far.
The war only lasted so long because they let it.
"I was only following orders" isn't an excuse, as they found out.
The people suffered because they stood by a war of aggression and genocide.
The modern German is generally a fine and reasonable person, that's fine. They aren't having a wunderbar kristallnacht, now are they?
3673876
So, tell me about all the people who were very much aware of what was happening, and never lifted a finger.
I gotta admit...this just didn't do it for me. The concept of Equestria being fundamentally more innocent to the point of not being able to easily comprehend Earth is one that's already been explored quite a bit, and I don't really feel like this developed the concept enough to really stand out.
It kinda felt like the story merely pointed and said, "Hey, everyone thinks that they're right in a conflict, and people's ideals don't always align with their country's actions", and didn't push it further. How does Twilight grow as a result of this? How can she reconcile ambiguous morality on Earth with the stark black and white of Equestria? These ideas are bigger than the content of the story. There needed to be more work put into it, more words put into it. If this was presenting a novel point of view, it'd be a little easier to accept, but this is ground that has been tread upon many times. It needs something more to have weight, else all of these broad philosophical statements of morality just become so much white noise.
This isn't out of malice or anything, I'm just trying to put out some constructive criticism. Sorry, but I can't say that the story in its current state really lives up to the ideas it presents.
3674828
QFT.
There's something here, but you really only scratched the surface. The characters feel very flat and undeveloped, the dialogue is reminiscent of a cardboard cut out (I've seen a lot of those phrases almost word for word by now), the 'moral' is dropped without much subtly or contemplation.
By the way, shame on your western bias for writing that the liberation of Europe "began in Normandy." The Russians pulled most of the weight of the war, and never get the credit they deserved.
I feel like you could have found a way to show the 'point' of this story, rather than having our Mr. Exposition spell it out for the audience.
Might I recommend next time, if you want to show a moral ambiguity, have them walk down a street, and have Tucker point out some of the buildings.
"Here was the shop of a Jewish baker. His shop was broken into on the "Night of Broken Glass", and the resulting fire forced his family to the street as he tried to find someone willing to repair a Jew's business. And down this alley a German family who could trace its roots back to the time of Charlemagne kept that same baker and his family safe for six months when the Nazi government started gathering Jews for shipment to one of their 'work' camps."
Then just pile on the visceral minute stories of saints hidden among monsters and monsters hidden among saints. People aren't stupid, if you show it enough times, the people who are worth writing for will gradually conclude on their own, "Hey, it was a pretty mixed lot that lived on this street between '39 and '45." Or better yet, show Twilight slowly wrangling with the stories to draw her own conclusion about it all.
3673914 What was the common German who didn't care for the war to do exactly? No doubt the sensible Germans did help the Jews as well as others who suffered at least thats what I like to think.
But getting caught meant more then likely getting gunned down for treason or getting put in prison for who knows how long or what exactly they would do to you.
And those that lived in America at the time were no doubt ostracized from american society, being blamed for a government across the atlantic ocean they had nothing to do with.
Just what were they supposed to do? People in that time weren't like the people of our time where many of us riot and some of us are crazy enough to throw a Molotov or two if the government was severely overstepping there bounds.
3673634
While we're talking about shit that happened before our lifetimes, how about we glass Europe for their whole Crusades nonsense? And, in the same vein, we'll glass the Middle East too, for all their Jihads and terrorism.
EDIT: If you're arguing with multiple people over the same thing, and they're all against you, you have lost the argument and should probably shut up.
I remember going to Japan and visiting a memorial museum for Tokubetsu Kōgekitai pilots, better known as the Kamikaze. God that was depressing. Most of them were only 15 and 16...
And the museum in Hiroshima, a the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum. Most depressing place I have even been to.
3673634
I find myself at a loss for words.
3673223
Sadly, I have to agree with this. More detail would have helped make it more enjoyable to read, but as it stands, it's just a lecture stating what the author believes. At least camouflage your message a bit--it makes for a better read.
3673634
Since this discussion is already about Nazis, the rules governing the invocation of Godwin's Law allow me to say that you are exactly the kind of person who would have made an excellent Nazi: a nasty, extreme, overly opinionated little man who believes he is right regardless of what other have to say.
3671235
I love you, Abstract Indigo, buuut...
I feel like you're trying to claim your own sense of morality as fact and disparage anyone, who doesn't hold your same values. That's a really Nazi thing to do, bro.
3677802
My own opinion: The only truly evil people in Nazi Germany (and some of them were probably insane) were those who knew what was going on (Holocaust and all), knew what Hitler planned to do, had the power to stop it, and were on board with it, and even went above and beyond Like, for instance, that doctor at Auschwitz who did some horrific experiments (sans anesthesia) on Jews. I've seen movies portraying the victims of the Holocaust, and I can't bring myself to sympathize with the people who ordered it. However, you're right, and most Germans didn't really have a clue about what was going on. They were just following orders, and the reason Hitler got into power in the first place was because he promised, (and, of a sort) delivered on his promise, relief to the nasty troubles that Germany was suffering (rampant inflation being one of the biggest ones) because of the terms of the end of WW1. And some Germans were nationalists (As indeed Hitler was; but he's an insult to German nationalists) and wanted to see Germany have a superpower position in the world. Everyone has a motive. Even Hitler. Not all motives are the best, but they must exist.
If you disagree with this position in any way, feel free to post your argument.
3678030
Well, thinking that the Nazis weren't evil is a pretty Nazi thing to do. You're silly.
3678030
No, the Nazi thing to do would be to look for those that disagree and then murder them. Reasonable discourse and talking your problems out is what non-Nazis do. And since you'd be hard pressed to find any group of people that thinks murder is moral, he's correct: What they did was undeniably evil and condemning them for it is the right thing to do.
3679768
Quit persecuting me!
I know how this game works, you Nazi. First you say "we just want an open dialog about how bad you are", then you say "well, we've established you're bad, so let's fix that", and finally you kill me!
i would like to say great job at showing her our our humanity.
I hope too tell you this that war will never end for our life and of like, this is a fool way of thinking to think war will ever stop
You had an interesting premise, but you told more than you showed. I think your story would have had a greater impact had you wrote it with a bit more subtlety.
Ironically, Neville Chamberlain's pacifistic outlook led to severe delays in Britain's reactions against Nazi aggression.
Very interesting, I like what you did with this.
this is so profound... I love your view on human life ( mostly because its the same as mine) and your right, there is no good or bad but only, that's why in history you'll read about the good people and the bad people. The reason for this is because victors write the history... I'm getting off track I just wanted to thank you for such a good read
3679799
3679766
Oh shit, the signs are all there!
3669080 I bet you're the type of person who likes to wear orange hats and dress in camo everywhere you go, aren't you? Most soldiers in the German army were unaware of just how badly the jews and other cultures were being treated. They were ordered to go to war, and so they did. Get your head out of your ass, and start looking at the big picture.
3679766
That was my intention.
3673634
You probably believe that sending the Japanese to segregation camps during WWII was necessary as well. Jesus, how in the fuck do you seriously think that the innocent Germans deserved to be killed? I am at a loss for words at this blatant lack of sensibility and the fundamentals of being fucking human.