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Archiver > GEN-DE > 1996-11 > 0847601148


From: "W. Fred Rump" <>
Subject: Re: Silesia and Sudetenland
Date: Sun, 10 Nov 1996 04:45:48 GMT


Arthur Teschler <> wrote:

>On Fri, 8 Nov 1996, Alan Seth Weiner wrote:
>
>> Although history is very important to genealogy, current treaty
>> negotiations do not have anything to do with genealogy. Arthur Teschler was
>> right about this. Therefore, the negotiations about current politics
>> between Germany and the Czech Republic would be appropiate for a group on
>> international politics or something similar.
>
>At least there is one reader on this group who understood my intention
>correctly.

While Alan's post has not arrived (at least not under this thread)
here yet, a couple points to Arthur's post. I very much agree that
history is an everchanging and evolving theme. From its very nature it
needs time and less personal involvement of the authors to deliver it
objectively. On the other hand, future historians will always attempt
to gather the opinions of people who actually experienced some part of
history - that is the task they set themselves while attempting to
unravel those differing views of the same thing. That is what history
is all about. Still, it will always have a subjective basis as we
chose, perhaps even unconsciously, which fact we wish to write about
or analyze. In this sense every history is from a personal viewpoint.

Genealogy is a part of history. We are not doing genetics here. We
are trying to place our lives and those of our ancestors into a
historical perspective which makes sense to us personally. Often this
is difficult without a basic knowledge of what transpired in the past.
Wwe see misconceptions arising from this here all the time. Yet, so
many genealogists who read these pages are very interested in learning
more about the past. They constant ly ask about how they can find out
more about a time or place. The need exists. The German genealogical
web pages were designed to deliver on some of these needs.

My own personal involvement in getting this whole thing off the ground
was to help others fill the void in both their genealogy and history.

Now, when someone tells me that the events of yesterday are not
history or do not belong in discussions involving genealogy, I think
they are wrong. The people who wrote to me privately about the
property they or their recent ancestors lost in Bohemia or the
Sudetenland obviously think this discussion is part of their life and
genealogy - no matter what Arthur or Alan Seth think about the matter.

Again I remind of the personal nature of this subject. It is not for
anyone else to decide what is politically or otherwise correct to
bring to the table here.

Germans, in general, have been bending over backwards not to get into
politically sensitive matters which only bring bad memories into play.
It much easier not to talk about this past and move on to the present.
There are groups in Germany and Europe which don't want to forget and
they keep getting in the way. The recent mess in Austria, Switzerland
and France; the revelations about the behavior of the German medical
community, the book on VW, the expatriate groups harping about how
they too were wronged - all are items that are part of somebody's
genealogy and yet some people don't want to talk about these events
here. I do agree that we don't want to replicate a soc.culture.* group
here, but there are some items which are otherwise not available to
the American genealogist (and that is still the primary audience)
which to my knowledge more people appreciate seeing then not.

As I've written privately, I have no connection to Silesia or the
Sudetenland just like I don't with many other parts of today's
Germany. Does that mean I should not discuss or be involved in those
areas? I don't think so.

Fred

PS And by the way, none of this has anything to do with my political
convictions.

W. Fred Rump
26 Warren St.
Beverly, NJ
609-386-6846 http://www.k2nesoft.com/~fre

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