#IS EVERYONE BUT EVA SECRETLY VOLUNTARY?

[thejakeformerlyknownasprince]

Question: why do people refer to Tobias in Megamorphs 4 as a "quasi-voluntary" controller? I don't have access to my copy right now but I don't recall anything that would imply he had any knowledge of what he was joining/cooperated in any way? Did I miss something?

So I call Tobias quasi-voluntary, because I think — from my read of MM4 — that Tobias is about as voluntary as any "voluntary controller" ever gets. Which is not that voluntary. Tobias goes to a Sharing meeting because Jake's there, but pretty soon he gets sucked into the cycle of love-bombing: "When you attend your second meeting of The Sharing they assign you a guide" (MM4). In Tobias's case it's a guy named Bill, a few years older, who spends every meeting praising Tobias, and talking up how the Sharing cured his depression and being a full member changed his life.

Bill waits for Tobias to say "I want to be a full member." And then he asks if Tobias is sure, and Tobias says "Yes." Bill presses all the way to "You trade a little bit of freedom for a lot of belonging" and gets Tobias to agree a third time. When the time comes for the "ceremony" (infestation), Chapman makes Tobias explain why he's joining, and Tobias does. Three more times Chapman asks, and three more times Tobias says, out loud, that he wants what's going to happen next. Chapman explains why they want Tobias's consent: "We only have problems in twenty-one percent of willing members. And there are... fewer incidents of contested control." Tobias withdraws consent when he realizes they're about to put a slug in his brain, but by then it's too late.

Later Tobias says "Most painful of all was the image of myself swallowing everything the Sharing told me. I had walked, willingly, to my own destruction. At the time I'd seen no alternatives." So is Tobias voluntary? Well, is Chapman voluntary? He agrees not to resist in exchange for Melissa not being recruited, and he keeps his end of the bargain (#2). Not only does he not fight back while there's a yeerk in his brain, but there's every possibility he's one of the people allowing the yeerk to slip out of their brain and then quietly walking to go wait in the break room without supervision.

Okay, but surely the taxxons are voluntary. They chose to ally with the yeerks... Only it turns out their options were ally with the yeerks or starve to death (#53), and just because their leaders chose the yeerks doesn't mean individual taxxons were okay with it (Andalite Chronicles).

But then, we all know Taylor is voluntary. Because she gave up her freedom for little old things like... relief from pain. And escape from discrimination. And basic health care that didn't cost her family their life savings (#33). And she could never change her mind, because she got punished by Sub-Visser Fifty-One for misbehaving (#43).

But Mr. Tidwell's definitely voluntary. He chooses to have a yeerk in his brain even after joining the YPM. Only he was so depressed he couldn't take care of himself when he joined (#29), and probably would have literally died without the yeerks.

Hang on, is Tom voluntary? He spontaneously offers to "be quiet" and "never trouble you again" when Temrash 114 starts trying to recruit Jake (#6). We don't know for sure that Tom isn't hanging out in that same break room after the events of #1, in exchange for Jake not being recruited.

So on. We know the Sharing targets people who are unhoused and/or mentally ill, and that the ones with happy, stable home lives (Tom, later Jake) tend to go unconvinced. You have to be vulnerable to end up voluntary, the series shows, so vulnerable that your whole ability to consent is seriously called into question.

[dirjoh-blog]

So many people think that the Holocaust started in 1939 or 1940, but the fact is it started years before that. In 1933 already it had become clear what the Nazis were planing to do, although the Jews were targeted already before that they weren’t the main focus as of yet.On July 14 1933 the Nazis  passed the  “Law for the Prevention of Offspring with Hereditary Diseases” empowering the state to sterilize  certain individuals with physical and mental disabilities. Propaganda material as the picture above (which dates from 1934) used to fool the people to believe that this was a necessity for the greater good of the nation. Slogans like “Life only as a burden.” were used.

This law was preceded by the enabling act , the act which basically gave Hitler absolute power, the act passed the German parliament on 23 March 1933 and was signed by President Bismarck that same day. The scary thing is this was done via democratic measures. Below is the translation of the act. The official title of the act was “Law to Remedy the Distress of People and Reich”

Law to Remedy the Distress of the People and the Reich

The Reichstag has enacted the following law, which is hereby proclaimed with the assent of the Reichsrat, it having been established that the requirements for a constitutional amendment have been fulfilled:

Article 1

In addition to the procedure prescribed by the constitution, laws of the Reich may also be enacted by the government of the Reich. This includes the laws referred to by Articles 85 Paragraph 2 and Article 87 of the constitution.

Article 2

Laws enacted by the government of the Reich may deviate from the constitution as long as they do not affect the institutions of the Reichstag and the Reichsrat. The rights of the President remain unaffected.

Article 3

Laws enacted by the Reich government shall be issued by the Chancellor and announced in the Reich Gazette. They shall take effect on the day following the announcement, unless they prescribe a different date. Articles 68 to 77 of the Constitution do not apply to laws enacted by the Reich government.

Article 4

Treaties of the Reich with foreign states, which relate to matters of Reich legislation, shall for the duration of the validity of these laws not require the consent of the legislative authorities. The Reich government shall enact the legislation necessary to implement these agreements.

Article 5.

This law enters into force on the day of its proclamation. It expires on 1 April 1937; it expires furthermore if the present Reich government is replaced by another.

AUGUST 19, 1934.

17 days after the death of President Hindenburg  and Hitler becomes the absolute dictator of Germany; there are no legal or constitutional limits to his authority.

APRIL 1, 1935

Often forgotten but the Jehovah Witnesses were also persecuted by the Nazis. An estimated 2,500 were killed in concentration camps or by execution. On April 1,1945 the German government bans Jehovah’s Witness organizations. This is because the Jehovah’s Witnesses refuse to pledge allegiance to the state; their religious convictions forbid an oath of allegiance to or service in the armed forces of any temporal power.

The picture above is from the Kusserow family, who  were active Jehovah’s Witnesses and distributed religious literature and taught Bible study classes in their home. They were constantly harassed by the Gestapo and the SS. In 1936 most of them were arrested and send to concentration camps where they remained until after the end of the war.

SEPTEMBER 15, 1935

On  15 September 1935 the Nuremberg laws were passed. The Nuremberg Race Laws consisted of two pieces of legislation: the Reich Citizenship Law and the Law for the Protection of German Blood and German Honor. These laws specifically targeted the Jewish populations. Below are just some examples.

Article 1 Marriages between Jews and citizens of German or related blood are forbidden. Marriages nevertheless concluded are invalid, even if concluded abroad to circumvent this law. Annulment proceedings can be initiated only by the state prosecutor. Article 2 Extramarital relations between Jews and citizens of German or related blood are forbidden.

Article 3 Jews may not employ in their households female citizens of German or related blood who are under 45 years old.[46]

Article 4 Jews are forbidden to fly the Reich or national flag or display Reich colours. They are, on the other hand, permitted to display the Jewish colours. The exercise of this right is protected by the state. Article 5 Any person who violates the prohibition under Article 1 will be punished with prison with hard labour [Zuchthaus]. A male who violates the prohibition under Article 2 will be punished with prison [Gefängnis] or prison with hard labour. Any person violating the provisions under Articles 3 or 4 will be punished with prison with hard labour for up to one year and a fine, or with one or the other of these penalties.

JULY 15, 1937

The Nazis open the Buchenwald concentration camp for male prisoners in east-central Germany.

NOVEMBER 9, 1938.

Kristallnacht.

MAY 13, 1939

On May 13, 1939, the German transatlantic liner St. Louis sets sail from Hamburg, Germany, for Havana, Cuba. On board are over 900 passengers, almost all of them Jews fleeing from Nazi Germany.

The majority of the Jewish passengers had applied for visas to enter the United States, and had planned to stay in Cuba only until they could enter the United States. However, after Cuba and then the United States denied these refugees entry, the St. Louis was forced to return to Europe.

MAY 20, 1940.

Auschwitz is established and opened ,on May 20,1940. I don’t think I have to say much more then that. Everyone knows about the horrors of that place.

SEPTEMBER 1, 1941.

Two years after the invasion of Poland which triggered WWII. The Nazis pass a lawthat all Jews  six years of age and older

in the Reich, Alsace, Bohemia-Moravia and the German–annexed territory of western Poland (called the Warthegau), are to wear yellow Star of David on their outer clothing in public at all times. The word “Jew” is to be inscribed inside the star in German or the local language.

JANUARY 20, 1942.

On January 20, 1942, this villa was the site of the Wannsee Conference, at which the decision to proceed with the “Final Solution to the Jewish Question” was announced.What is so disturbing about the conference is not so much the fact that the Nazis came up with a plan to kill all the Jews, because that had already been clear for a while, but the business like language used during the conference. It could easily be mistaken for a conference on supply chain demand issues.

NOVEMBER 3, 1943

On November 3,1943 SS and police units implement Aktion Erntefest (Operation Harvest Festival), the murder of the Jewish laborers in concentration camp Lublin/Majdanek and the forced-labor camps Trawniki and Poniatowa. It became the largest single-day, single-location massacre during the Holocaust.

DECEMBER 11, 1944

At Hartheim, German authorities carry out the last gassing of inmates. Hartheim was one of the T4 euthanasia clinics. Although the T4 program was officially suspended in August 1941, secretly the gassing of people with disabilities had continued until December 11,1944. Political opponents were also branded as mentally disabled. In fact it took very little to become marked as someone with a disability not fit for life.

APRIL 30, 1945.

On this day Hitler and his wife Eva Braun killed themselves. The following day Goebbels and his wife killed their children and then themselves.

I limited the timeline to just a few events but I could have put down thousands and thousands of events, 1933-1945 was by far the darkest era in history. Ahistory that should never be erased or forgotten.

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    Sources

https://www.ushmm.org/learn/timeline-of-events/1942-1945

https://theconversation.com/the-forgotten-mass-destruction-of-jewish-homes-during-kristallnacht-123301

  1933-1945 Darkest era. So many people think that the Holocaust started in 1939 or 1940, but the fact is it started years before that.