WO ES WAR, SOLL ICH WERDEN. Translating the Unspeakable: The Moral and Civilizational Hecatomb of the Holocaust and Ethnic Genocide in Rwanda. No Stories Are Harder to Tell in All of Human History

Abstract

Through this article, we intend to clarify the reasons that led European civilization to the implementation of the Holocaust, as well as to analyze how the rupture of national unity in Rwanda took place. With regard to the Holocaust, it is proposed to give meaning to the inconceivable ingenious and bureaucratic methodology that was implemented as a form of extermination, precisely at a time when the supposed height of civilization and reason was being celebrated (ADORNO, HORCKEIMER, 1985). It departs from a paradigm peculiar to that of traditional historiography, in the sense of understanding that it was not sadists, psychopaths or perverts who practiced such barbarities, although among these there may have been some, but, in the vast majority, the evil was exercised by common and ordinary human beings who acted in this way in respect of the belief related to the moral duty of the categorical imperative (KANT, 1785), loyalty to the superior and submission to the State. The man who obeys, who does not question, who loses individuality, spontaneity and who is not psychologically aware of himself, but involved in the psychology of the masses, in short, this “man of duty”, or “drawer killer” ( ARENDT, 2013) became the epicenter of monstrosity, which needs to be analyzed so that it is not reproduced by future generations. In turn, research on ethnic genocide in Rwanda intends to demonstrate how the disastrous state action produced immeasurable tragedy, even though it was coated with good intentions.