What effects does discrimination have on our lives?
In the poem “First they came for the Jews” by Martin Niemoller, the author explains how “they” came for the Jews, but he did not feel compelled to speak out because he wasn’t a Jew. He does the same for the Communists and the trade unionists. In the last stanza of the poem, he explains how “they” came for him, but he realized there was no one left to speak out for him. If you research the other, you find out that he was a Lutheran pastor, with anti-Nazi leanings. His motivation for the poem was the fact that at the beginning of the holocaust, he wasn’t for for against the Nazis, so “first the came for the Jews/And I did not speak out/Because I was not a Jew” , but as soon as he realized that all the minorities were being deported, he quickly realized what was happening, and realized that Religion was the last thing for the Nazis to target, he realized that because he didn’t speak out about the discrimination, nobody was left to speak out for him when the Nazis came for him. Therefore, “They came for me/And there was no one left/To speak out for me” because religion was the last thing left for the Nazis to target.
Photo source: http://bkwriters.weebly.com/night-culminating-projects.html