{"id":1642,"date":"2013-04-19T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2013-04-19T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/%20rroma.org\/19-04-2013-the-history-of-sufferings-of-sinti-and-roma\/"},"modified":"2022-08-05T09:26:29","modified_gmt":"2022-08-05T08:26:29","slug":"19-04-2013-the-history-of-sufferings-of-sinti-and-roma","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rroma.org\/de\/19-04-2013-the-history-of-sufferings-of-sinti-and-roma\/","title":{"rendered":"19.04.2013 The History of Sufferings of Sinti and Roma"},"content":{"rendered":"

Stankiewitz (2013) \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\treports on the still poorly acknowledged destruction of Rroma under National \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSocialism. In the centre he presents the now eighty years old Hugo \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tH\u00f6llenreiner, who is one of the few survivors of this crime of the State. \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSpeaking at a memorial in the Munich town hall, H\u00f6llenreiner calls the horrors \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tof the past back to life. About half a million Rroma were victims of systematic \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\textermination policies of the National Socialists. Food for thoughts is the fact \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tthat theses crimes were only very insufficiently investigated. Stankiewitz \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\temphasizes the often misinterpreted fact that the apparent wandering of the \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tRroma is not a willed way of life, but rather is the result from the fact that \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tthey were not allowed to settle anywhere. Forced to constantly wander, the \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tstereotype of the vagabond Rroma was created. He notes:<\/p>\n

It is \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tcertain in any case that the immigrant groups and extended families – like the \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tJews \u2013 were not allowed to settle, and he could only exercise certain \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tprofessions. Thus, the stereotypes of the eternally wandering, nomadic, asocial, \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tor the \u201cfree, funny gypsy life\u201d were created. A kitschy representation in art, \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tliterature, film and operetta (\u201cThe Gypsy Baron\u201d) which is maintained to this \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tday.<\/em><\/p>\n

At the end of the 19th \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tCentury, a systematic monitoring service on Rroma was established. The former \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tpolice director Alfred Dillmann even set up a \u201cGypsy Police\u201d, which was to be \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tdedicated on the \u201ccontainment of dangerous vagrancy\u201d. In inflammatory articles \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tpublished in the March 1912, \u201cThe Gypsy plague\u201d, Rroma were accused of introducing \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tepidemics and of terrorist activities. In Bavaria, in 1926, the \u201cGypsy and \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\twork-avoiders\u201d laws, which among other things criminalised the \u201ctravel in \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\thordes\u201d were introduced. Besides this, however, there were always well \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tintegrated Rroma who were valued and respected in their professions, \u00a0\u00a0mostly artisanal ones.<\/p>\n

With the rise of the \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tNazis, the systematic criminalization of the Rroma in Germany began. \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tEugenicists such as Josef Mengele measured the physiognomy of members of the \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tRroma and presented abstruse theories of racial inferiority and relationships \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tbetween physique and behaviour. Rroma were identified black triangles, the \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tRroma equivalent of the Jewish star, \u00a0and branded as anti-social and deported to concentration \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tcamps. After the war reparation were not paid, as it was claimed that no racial \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tpersecution had existed. Databases on travellers were continued well after the \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tWar and only disbanded in the 1970s. Stankiewitz concludes:<\/p>\n

After \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tthe war, the persecuted Sinti and Roma had no political advocates in contrast \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tto other groups of victims. The H\u00f6llreiner family, those who survived, were \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tnever compensated for their stolen property and for the time in camps. A reparation \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\twas out of the question after the Federal Court in 1956 decided that deportations \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tof Rroma were not a racial persecution, but a \u201ccrime-preventive measure\u201d.<\/em><\/p>\n

Source: <\/strong><\/p>\n