WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.480 --> 00:00:03.520 I found this, perhaps not in the strangest of places, 2 00:00:03.520 --> 00:00:06.839 but while watching a travel food show in Anthony Bordain 3 00:00:07.200 --> 00:00:10.439 No Reservations, somewhere in the seventh season, when he goes 4 00:00:10.480 --> 00:00:14.000 to Cambodia. Half Way through the episode, a woman begins 5 00:00:14.039 --> 00:00:17.120 talking about the Khmer Rouge regime led by Paul Pott, 6 00:00:17.640 --> 00:00:19.640 and I looked it up and began to learn about 7 00:00:19.640 --> 00:00:23.640 the horrors involved, not in the supernatural sense, although I 8 00:00:23.679 --> 00:00:27.600 couldn't believe humans could be capable of such atrocities, especially 9 00:00:27.679 --> 00:00:31.120 after what happened in Nazi Germany. Searching for patterns, I 10 00:00:31.199 --> 00:00:33.799 learned about the Uigurs and the Turkic Muslims and re 11 00:00:34.000 --> 00:00:39.119 education centers in Shinjang, China, the disappearances, torture and forced 12 00:00:39.200 --> 00:00:42.679 labor and eritrea of up to four hundred thousand people 13 00:00:42.759 --> 00:00:46.799 since nineteen ninety one, The Russian filtration camps during the 14 00:00:46.880 --> 00:00:50.679 Chechen Wars, the Volune, the Almarscot camps in Bosnia, and 15 00:00:50.719 --> 00:00:54.840 the nineties North Korea's prison camps me and mars Rohinga 16 00:00:54.880 --> 00:01:00.560 ethnic cleansing. These stories terrified me to my core. Ideas 17 00:01:00.560 --> 00:01:04.120 that spread like viruses and cause so much pain, and 18 00:01:04.120 --> 00:01:08.719 the way the messaging affects belief. I'm convinced if there 19 00:01:08.799 --> 00:01:12.959 is true evil in the world, this is it. And 20 00:01:13.000 --> 00:01:15.359 in all of these cases, they started with people having 21 00:01:15.359 --> 00:01:18.519 a hard time believing what was happening, justifying it with 22 00:01:18.599 --> 00:01:23.200 the law with seemingly valid reasons, allowing themselves to be cruel, 23 00:01:23.640 --> 00:01:26.319 saying that it can't be that bad, that those who 24 00:01:26.359 --> 00:01:31.519 sound the alarm are exaggerating, that's just politics, that it 25 00:01:31.519 --> 00:01:37.560 couldn't possibly happen again, And then it did, and it does. 26 00:01:38.480 --> 00:01:41.799 It happened with the Native Americans, with African Americans during 27 00:01:41.799 --> 00:01:46.319 the times of slavery, the Japanese interment caps never again, 28 00:01:46.680 --> 00:01:52.159 we say, and then it happens once more. Today, I'm 29 00:01:52.200 --> 00:01:55.280 going to tell you about the most horrifying acts carried 30 00:01:55.319 --> 00:01:58.400 out by humans. So please take care as you're listening. 31 00:01:59.400 --> 00:02:04.959 This is how governments disappear humans. My name is Edwin, 32 00:02:06.159 --> 00:02:13.919 and here's a horror story. One call them names. In 33 00:02:14.000 --> 00:02:18.080 nineteen thirties Germany, the Nazis didn't invent the hatred, they 34 00:02:18.199 --> 00:02:21.199 just made it. Formal laws like the Nuremberg Laws of 35 00:02:21.280 --> 00:02:24.759 nineteen thirty five legally defined who counted as a Jew 36 00:02:25.000 --> 00:02:29.159 based on ancestry if her grandparents were Jewish, you were Jewish, 37 00:02:29.360 --> 00:02:32.759 even if you've never stepped inside a synagogue. Religion turned 38 00:02:32.800 --> 00:02:37.599 into a racial identity that the state could regulate. In Rwanda, 39 00:02:37.800 --> 00:02:41.439 the division was even more rigid. The Belgian colonial government 40 00:02:41.560 --> 00:02:45.000 issued ID cards labeling, and these labels locked you into 41 00:02:45.080 --> 00:02:50.680 legal categories that shaped everything access to schools, jobs, political roles. 42 00:02:51.360 --> 00:02:54.280 When the genocide began in nineteen ninety four, these ID 43 00:02:54.360 --> 00:02:58.680 cards became a death sentence. At checkpoints, perpetrators would asked 44 00:02:58.680 --> 00:03:01.080 to see your papers and it could be killed on 45 00:03:01.120 --> 00:03:05.080 the spot based on what it said. The Ottoman Empire 46 00:03:05.159 --> 00:03:08.039 had its own versions of this during the Armenian genocide 47 00:03:08.039 --> 00:03:12.400 in nineteen fifteen. Armenians were already second class under Ottoman 48 00:03:12.520 --> 00:03:15.520 law for centuries, but they were further singled out as 49 00:03:15.639 --> 00:03:18.919 enemies of the state during World War One. The government 50 00:03:19.000 --> 00:03:22.400 claimed Armenians were conspiring with Russia and pose a threat 51 00:03:22.479 --> 00:03:26.800 to national security, and that label enemy was enough to 52 00:03:26.919 --> 00:03:32.919 justify entire communities being deported or killed. In Nazi Germany, 53 00:03:33.000 --> 00:03:36.800 Jews were called rats, and Rwanda Tutsis were called cockroaches 54 00:03:37.360 --> 00:03:40.879 and me and mar Rahinja Muslims were labeled illegal Bengalis 55 00:03:41.680 --> 00:03:45.120 labels like these are tools. They make violence easier by 56 00:03:45.120 --> 00:03:49.599 making people seem less than human. And it's subtle. But 57 00:03:49.680 --> 00:03:52.560 it's not just other countries. This kind of naming has 58 00:03:52.599 --> 00:03:56.840 happened here in the United States too. In nineteen forty two, 59 00:03:57.000 --> 00:04:00.639 following the attack on Pearl Harbor, the US government ordered 60 00:04:00.639 --> 00:04:03.240 the force removal of over one hundred and ten thousand 61 00:04:03.360 --> 00:04:06.919 Japanese Americans, two thirds of them were U S citizens 62 00:04:07.400 --> 00:04:10.719 that were taken from their homes. They were labeled enemy, 63 00:04:10.879 --> 00:04:16.160 aliens or potential threats based solely on their ancestry. There 64 00:04:16.240 --> 00:04:20.040 was no trial, no evidence of wrongdoing, and entire families 65 00:04:20.120 --> 00:04:23.959 were uprooted in place into interment camps. Under Executive Order 66 00:04:24.079 --> 00:04:28.759 nine oh sixty six, the government created detailed records, maps, 67 00:04:28.759 --> 00:04:34.279 and property inventories. Japanese Americans were fringer printed, assigned family numbers, 68 00:04:34.800 --> 00:04:40.040 and tracked. A century earlier, the force displacement of Native 69 00:04:40.040 --> 00:04:44.079 American nations followed a similar path. Through laws like the 70 00:04:44.120 --> 00:04:48.240 Indian Removal Act of eighteen thirty. Indigenous people were officially 71 00:04:48.319 --> 00:04:52.079 labeled as wards of the state that put them outside 72 00:04:52.079 --> 00:04:56.839 the legal protections of citizenship and sovereignty. The US classified 73 00:04:56.839 --> 00:05:00.920 their land as federal property and designated tribes as obstacles 74 00:05:00.920 --> 00:05:06.360 to settlement. The Cherokee, Choctaw, Creek, Chickasaw, and the Seminole 75 00:05:06.399 --> 00:05:09.959 were forcedly marched from their ancestral lands during what became 76 00:05:10.000 --> 00:05:14.079 known as the Trail of Tears. Thousands died along the way. 77 00:05:15.120 --> 00:05:17.399 And what's common in each of these stories is the 78 00:05:17.439 --> 00:05:20.199 way that governments or societies first find a way to 79 00:05:20.279 --> 00:05:24.360 divide people and then formalize that division, to track it, 80 00:05:24.680 --> 00:05:28.879 to say you belong and you don't. And it's all 81 00:05:29.040 --> 00:05:33.680 very organized, very procedural, just names at first, but once 82 00:05:33.759 --> 00:05:37.160 those names are on paper, they can be used, and 83 00:05:37.279 --> 00:05:43.399 history shows they usually are number two. Say bad things 84 00:05:43.399 --> 00:05:47.680 about them. Words don't kill, but they prepare the ground 85 00:05:47.759 --> 00:05:51.439 for those who will. And before they're pushed out, locked up, 86 00:05:51.600 --> 00:05:56.519 or buried, they're spoken about in a certain way, loudly, publicly, 87 00:05:56.839 --> 00:06:00.879 and over and over until the language stops sounding strange. 88 00:06:02.079 --> 00:06:05.920 In Rwanda, for example, the airwaves were filled with poison. 89 00:06:06.560 --> 00:06:11.839 Broadcasters joked about extermination, warned of conspiracies, and encouraged the 90 00:06:11.920 --> 00:06:16.000 majority to defend themselves. And when the genocide began in 91 00:06:16.040 --> 00:06:19.560 April of nineteen ninety four, people had already been shaped 92 00:06:19.600 --> 00:06:24.319 by years of propaganda. This happened in Nazi Germany too. 93 00:06:24.800 --> 00:06:30.839 Joseph Goebel's Ministry of Propaganda spent years portraying Jews as parasites, corruptors, 94 00:06:31.079 --> 00:06:34.600 and a threat. Cartoons would show them with hooked noses 95 00:06:34.639 --> 00:06:38.240 and greedy hands, and school books warned children to beware. 96 00:06:39.000 --> 00:06:43.040 If people believed their neighbors were dangerous in subhuman, then 97 00:06:43.240 --> 00:06:47.279 they could be removed without guilt. In me and Mar, 98 00:06:47.439 --> 00:06:50.639 the Rahinda were labeled as Bengalis, implying that they were 99 00:06:50.720 --> 00:06:54.439 foreign invaders from Bangladesh, even though their families had lived 100 00:06:54.439 --> 00:06:58.680 in Rakhine State for generations. When the attacks began in 101 00:06:58.759 --> 00:07:03.879 twenty seventeen, soldiers and militias buried entire villages, They raped women, 102 00:07:04.279 --> 00:07:07.480 and forced hundreds of thousands into refugee camps across the 103 00:07:07.519 --> 00:07:13.160 border and throughout the government insisted it was merely handling 104 00:07:13.240 --> 00:07:18.279 illegal immigration. This is twenty seventeen, not even that long ago. 105 00:07:19.800 --> 00:07:23.199 But the most chilling examples are often the quietest ones, 106 00:07:23.959 --> 00:07:27.319 the one I mentioned at the start. In Cambodia, under 107 00:07:27.360 --> 00:07:32.480 the Khmer Rouge, people were linguistically erased. Intellectuals, professionals, and 108 00:07:32.519 --> 00:07:36.360 religious leaders were called new people, the phrase that stripped 109 00:07:36.360 --> 00:07:39.120 them of history and reduced them to a thread against 110 00:07:39.120 --> 00:07:44.639 a revolution. Anyone even wearing glasses or speaking French, maybe 111 00:07:44.639 --> 00:07:48.959 owning a book, could be marked for death. Now the 112 00:07:48.959 --> 00:07:53.040 pattern shows up over and over again. The labels get 113 00:07:53.079 --> 00:07:56.920 more violent, the speech becomes more casual, and leaders say 114 00:07:57.000 --> 00:08:01.199 things like they're different from us or they're taking over, 115 00:08:02.319 --> 00:08:08.720 And eventually entire populations are spoken of in metaphors as floods, infestations, diseases. 116 00:08:09.240 --> 00:08:12.720 And once people become a problem, the solution comes. Next, 117 00:08:13.920 --> 00:08:16.160 the way leaders in the media talk about a group 118 00:08:16.199 --> 00:08:20.439 becomes colder and rougher, allowed to be said without consequences. 119 00:08:21.279 --> 00:08:24.319 Hate becomes part of the public conversation and when no 120 00:08:24.360 --> 00:08:29.600 one pushes back, becomes normal. And once that happens, once 121 00:08:29.639 --> 00:08:33.080 is acceptable to mock, insult, or threatn whole groups of 122 00:08:33.120 --> 00:08:37.480 people in public. The damage is done. The people who 123 00:08:37.559 --> 00:08:41.000 hold the power know they can go further, and history 124 00:08:41.120 --> 00:08:49.159 shows they usually do. Three start the work. Once people 125 00:08:49.200 --> 00:08:51.759 are labeled and talked about as a threat, The next 126 00:08:51.759 --> 00:08:58.799 step is only paperwork. Violence comes from systems, boureocracies, forms, checklists, laws. 127 00:08:59.279 --> 00:09:02.519 With the groundwork has been laid, the system takes over, 128 00:09:02.960 --> 00:09:06.759 and it moves pretty quietly. In nineteen seventy five, the 129 00:09:06.840 --> 00:09:10.639 Khmer Rouge rolled into Panampen and declared that Cambodia would 130 00:09:10.679 --> 00:09:14.840 be rebuilt from zero, and within days the government emptied 131 00:09:15.080 --> 00:09:20.200 entire cities everyone, teachers, doctors, children, the elderly. They were 132 00:09:20.240 --> 00:09:24.240 forced to march into the countryside. Hospitals were cleared out, 133 00:09:24.440 --> 00:09:28.879 schools were closed, property was confiscated. There were no trials, 134 00:09:29.000 --> 00:09:32.440 no public explanations. It was all done under the logic 135 00:09:32.519 --> 00:09:36.399 of the revolution. The city dwellers were labeled as impure, 136 00:09:36.759 --> 00:09:42.679 or bourgeois or capitalist enemies. The killing came later, but 137 00:09:42.759 --> 00:09:47.960 first came the machinery of control, lists, orders, and silence. 138 00:09:49.559 --> 00:09:53.360 During Stalin's role in the Soviet Union, entire populations were 139 00:09:53.399 --> 00:09:59.200 displaced or eliminated by administrative decree. In the early nineteen thirties, Kulaks, 140 00:09:59.320 --> 00:10:03.919 which were wealthy peasants, were declared class enemies. Local officials 141 00:10:03.919 --> 00:10:08.120 compiled blacklists or families trains were organized to deport them 142 00:10:08.120 --> 00:10:11.639 to Siberia. There was no need for protests or mobs, 143 00:10:11.840 --> 00:10:15.879 just a chain of commands, signatures, and silence. Millions were 144 00:10:15.919 --> 00:10:20.279 caught in the net and Guatemala during the nineteen eighties, 145 00:10:20.279 --> 00:10:24.399 the military government launched a campaign called Bland Campagna Vittoria 146 00:10:24.440 --> 00:10:28.399 centaidos aimed at defeating the guerrilla insurgents, but the so 147 00:10:28.559 --> 00:10:34.480 called insurgents were often entire Mayan villages. Soldiers and paramilitary 148 00:10:34.600 --> 00:10:38.600 units used detailed maps and village registries to target communities 149 00:10:38.639 --> 00:10:42.840 for destruction. Thousands were killed. It was done under the 150 00:10:42.919 --> 00:10:48.039 language of counter insurgency, but the logic was clear. Remove 151 00:10:48.120 --> 00:10:53.639 the identity, erased the resistance. In every case, these systems 152 00:10:53.679 --> 00:10:56.799 were dressed in the language of order and policy. They 153 00:10:56.799 --> 00:11:01.000 claimed to be protecting the nation, securing peace, managing risk. 154 00:11:02.039 --> 00:11:07.440 Behind those words were the spreadsheets and blueprints built for displacement, 155 00:11:08.759 --> 00:11:12.360 even the tools meant for safety, which were birth certificates, 156 00:11:12.600 --> 00:11:17.879 senses records, ID cards that were repurposed in Nazi Germany. 157 00:11:17.960 --> 00:11:21.279 The government had already been tracking racial backgrounds for years, 158 00:11:21.559 --> 00:11:24.200 so when it came time to deport Jews, Roma and 159 00:11:24.279 --> 00:11:27.759 the other targeted groups, the records were already in place. 160 00:11:28.360 --> 00:11:33.679 The trains ran on schedule. The scariest part is in 161 00:11:33.759 --> 00:11:37.799 that these systems existed. It's how ordinary they looked while 162 00:11:37.840 --> 00:11:43.919 doing extraordinary harm. Clerks at desks, inspectors with clipboards, local 163 00:11:43.960 --> 00:11:47.679 officials just following the rules, and by the time the 164 00:11:47.720 --> 00:11:51.240 system is fully in place, it no longer feels like violence. 165 00:11:52.200 --> 00:11:59.159 It's just process four pick aside. Once the system is 166 00:11:59.159 --> 00:12:02.080 in place, something else has to be cleared before mass 167 00:12:02.200 --> 00:12:07.039 violence can begin, and that's doubt. That means silencing anyone 168 00:12:07.039 --> 00:12:12.919 who might raise questions, whether that be journalists, judges, teachers, neighbors, clergy, 169 00:12:13.200 --> 00:12:17.519 or even former allies. People who might ask is this right? 170 00:12:18.679 --> 00:12:22.440 They're dangerous to a regimed that's decided, it's already knows 171 00:12:22.480 --> 00:12:27.799 the answer. In April nineteen fifteen, before the full scale 172 00:12:27.879 --> 00:12:31.960 Armnian genocide began, the Ottoman government carried out a quiet 173 00:12:32.000 --> 00:12:38.120 purge hundreds of Armenian intellectuals, writers, priests, politicians that were 174 00:12:38.200 --> 00:12:42.519 arrested and instanbul and deported to remote provinces. Most were 175 00:12:42.600 --> 00:12:45.840 never seen again. They were the people most likely to 176 00:12:45.919 --> 00:12:49.559 speak out. Their removal created a silence that made the 177 00:12:49.639 --> 00:12:52.799 mass deportations and killings easier to carry out in the 178 00:12:52.840 --> 00:12:57.320 months that followed. In Germany, the Nazis targeted ascent from 179 00:12:57.360 --> 00:13:02.200 the start political opponents, especially communists and social democrats. They 180 00:13:02.200 --> 00:13:04.159 were the first to be arrested and sent to early 181 00:13:04.200 --> 00:13:09.200 concentration camps. As the regime grew stronger, even internal critics, 182 00:13:09.399 --> 00:13:15.600 Catholic bishops, Protestant pastors, conservative politicians, they were all threatened, sidelined, 183 00:13:15.799 --> 00:13:20.720 or killed. Books were burned, newspapers were shut down, Teachers 184 00:13:20.759 --> 00:13:25.159 were forced to swear loyalty oaths. Resistance didn't end overnight, 185 00:13:25.320 --> 00:13:30.360 but it did get quieter. In Yugoslavia during the nineteen nineties, 186 00:13:30.519 --> 00:13:35.679 nationalist leaders pushed hard to eliminate multi ethnic cooperation. Political 187 00:13:35.720 --> 00:13:39.840 moderates who promoted coexistence between Serbs, Croats and the Bosniacs 188 00:13:39.919 --> 00:13:43.879 that were called traders. Some were assassinated and others fled. 189 00:13:44.799 --> 00:13:47.759 The media was used to stoke division and paranoia, and 190 00:13:47.799 --> 00:13:51.399 by the time ethnic cleansing campaigns began, there were fewer 191 00:13:51.480 --> 00:13:56.320 voices left willing or able to object. I found that 192 00:13:56.320 --> 00:13:58.720 the same thing happened in Cambodia with the Khmara rouge, 193 00:13:58.759 --> 00:14:02.399 who was targeting anyone whom I question it. People with education, 194 00:14:02.759 --> 00:14:06.720 foreign language skills, or even soft hands were marked for elimination. 195 00:14:07.639 --> 00:14:12.360 Family members of suspected enemies were killed. Two. The idea 196 00:14:12.440 --> 00:14:15.440 was simple, no one should be left who could challenge 197 00:14:15.480 --> 00:14:18.960 the truth. As a regime to find it. This is 198 00:14:19.000 --> 00:14:22.679 the turning point, because once the people who would normally 199 00:14:22.720 --> 00:14:26.600 speak out are gone were too scared to try, there's 200 00:14:26.759 --> 00:14:30.320 nothing left to slow things down. The road ahead is 201 00:14:30.360 --> 00:14:38.120 open legally speaking, of course, five displacing people. Now what 202 00:14:38.240 --> 00:14:41.759 follows looks normal. People don't always disappear in the middle 203 00:14:41.799 --> 00:14:44.559 of the night. Sometimes they are told to pack a bag, 204 00:14:45.279 --> 00:14:48.279 like in nineteen forty two, the Japanese Americans were sent 205 00:14:48.320 --> 00:14:52.480 to camps surrounded by Barb's wire in remote deserts and mountains. 206 00:14:53.200 --> 00:14:56.960 The government called it evacuation, and later we called it 207 00:14:57.000 --> 00:15:01.519 what it actually meant. In tournament. Through the Armenian genocide, 208 00:15:01.559 --> 00:15:05.639 what began as deportations who became death marches. Armenians were 209 00:15:05.759 --> 00:15:09.600 ordered to leave their towns for relocation, but the routes 210 00:15:09.600 --> 00:15:13.879 had no food, no shelter, and no end. Thousands died 211 00:15:13.919 --> 00:15:16.240 along the roads and others were killed along the way. 212 00:15:17.039 --> 00:15:20.679 Women were abducted, children were taken from their parents. The 213 00:15:20.720 --> 00:15:25.000 promise of relocation was a lie. In Bosnia during the 214 00:15:25.080 --> 00:15:29.600 nineteen nineties, civilians were rounded up. Muslims and Croat families 215 00:15:29.639 --> 00:15:32.159 were forced to leave with whatever they could carry or 216 00:15:32.320 --> 00:15:36.759 face execution. In some cases, men and boys were separated 217 00:15:36.759 --> 00:15:41.440 and later killed. Now, in even more recent examples, the 218 00:15:41.480 --> 00:15:44.879 pattern repeats and me and Mar the Rahenga were pushed 219 00:15:44.879 --> 00:15:48.240 out of their homes by soldiers and armed mobs. Villages 220 00:15:48.279 --> 00:15:52.320 were burned, families fled across a border into Bangladesh, and 221 00:15:52.320 --> 00:15:56.399 those who didn't were killed or captured. The government insisted 222 00:15:56.440 --> 00:16:00.240 it was a security operation, but the scale and targeting 223 00:16:00.440 --> 00:16:03.960 told a different story. By the end of twenty seventeen, 224 00:16:04.240 --> 00:16:09.440 over seven hundred thousand Rahinia had fled. The language around 225 00:16:09.480 --> 00:16:15.200 these displacements is always careful. Governments speak of relocation or processing, 226 00:16:15.759 --> 00:16:21.279 clearance or protection. The victims are framed as threats, intruders, 227 00:16:21.360 --> 00:16:25.679 or burdens. The violence is disguised as policy, and by 228 00:16:25.720 --> 00:16:28.720 the time the photos and videos of camps and caravans 229 00:16:28.720 --> 00:16:33.799 show up, it's already well underway. What ties these moments 230 00:16:33.799 --> 00:16:36.840 together is not just a movement of people, but the 231 00:16:36.840 --> 00:16:42.799 message behind it. You don't belong here, not anymore, not 232 00:16:42.960 --> 00:16:46.840 with us. That message doesn't need to be shouted. It's 233 00:16:46.879 --> 00:16:50.080 printed on official letterhead, it's signed by an officer, and 234 00:16:50.120 --> 00:16:57.840 it arrives at the door. Backed by Law six, create Chaos, 235 00:16:58.559 --> 00:17:04.000 displacement clears the which strips people of protection, identity, and connection. 236 00:17:04.839 --> 00:17:08.000 Once they've been moved out of site into ghettos, camps, 237 00:17:08.200 --> 00:17:14.319 detention centers, forests, what happens next can happen quietly. This 238 00:17:14.400 --> 00:17:18.799 is the point where persecution becomes extermination. And Rwanda, the 239 00:17:18.920 --> 00:17:22.480 killing started fast after the assassination of the president in 240 00:17:22.519 --> 00:17:26.799 April of nineteen ninety four, roadblocks went up overnight. Of 241 00:17:26.880 --> 00:17:29.680 the course of one hundred days, more than eight hundred 242 00:17:29.759 --> 00:17:34.839 thousand Tutsis and moderate Hutus were slaughtered. Entire communities were 243 00:17:34.839 --> 00:17:38.640 wiped out, and the infrastructure that once tracked people by 244 00:17:38.680 --> 00:17:42.359 decards addresses they all made it easier to find them. 245 00:17:42.480 --> 00:17:46.279 In Cambodia, the population was sent into rural labor camps. 246 00:17:46.440 --> 00:17:50.480 The killing began slowly, though people who complained disappeared little 247 00:17:50.480 --> 00:17:55.519 by little. Execution sites were called killing fields. Victims were 248 00:17:55.559 --> 00:17:58.839 often told they were being relocated again, but instead they 249 00:17:58.880 --> 00:18:03.920 were being led to Maps decimated that nearly two million 250 00:18:04.000 --> 00:18:10.319 people died, almost a quarter of the population. In Bosnia, 251 00:18:10.440 --> 00:18:13.359 the violence was fast. In July of nineteen ninety five, 252 00:18:13.480 --> 00:18:16.960 more than eight thousand Bosniak Muslim men and boys were 253 00:18:17.000 --> 00:18:20.880 separated from their families under the watch of peacekeepers. They 254 00:18:20.880 --> 00:18:25.519 were loaded into buses, driven into forests and fields and shot. 255 00:18:26.720 --> 00:18:29.839 Their bodies were dumped into mass graves, and later, to 256 00:18:29.880 --> 00:18:33.240 cover up the crime, the graves were dug up and scattered. 257 00:18:34.079 --> 00:18:38.039 Survivors of the towns evacuation never saw their loved ones again. 258 00:18:39.440 --> 00:18:43.079 In the forests of eastern Poland and Ukraine during the Holocaust, 259 00:18:43.519 --> 00:18:46.920 entire Jewish communities were taken outside of town and shot. 260 00:18:48.000 --> 00:18:51.480 Men with lists walked door to door, collected families and 261 00:18:51.559 --> 00:18:54.400 marched them to the edge of the woods. Children were 262 00:18:54.440 --> 00:18:58.599 killed two Though these weren't hidden massacres, they happened near farms, 263 00:18:59.000 --> 00:19:04.119 roads and villages. Ordinary people saw them and most stayed silent. 264 00:19:05.640 --> 00:19:09.200 It often starts with the idea of removal, but eventually 265 00:19:09.240 --> 00:19:13.559 the question becomes why keep feeding, guarding, or transporting people 266 00:19:13.640 --> 00:19:17.359 as they're just not welcome here anymore. Now, the logic titans, 267 00:19:17.640 --> 00:19:22.200 the solution shifts, it becomes final, and by this point 268 00:19:22.279 --> 00:19:24.920 most of the outside world is either looking away or 269 00:19:25.000 --> 00:19:29.519 struggling to believe it. Governments speak in vague terms. The 270 00:19:29.599 --> 00:19:33.400 bodies are hidden or denied. There are no images from 271 00:19:33.440 --> 00:19:38.519 inside the worst places, only rumors, fragments, testimonies that sound 272 00:19:38.559 --> 00:19:43.319 too awful to be real. The killing stage is about 273 00:19:43.359 --> 00:19:47.680 the system accepting that people marked as them have no future. 274 00:19:48.680 --> 00:19:56.200 It's about society turning away or worse, participating. Seven change 275 00:19:56.279 --> 00:19:59.960 the story now. In the years after the Armenian genessid, 276 00:20:00.240 --> 00:20:04.599 the Ottoman government fell, but the denial remained to this day. 277 00:20:04.839 --> 00:20:10.079 Turkey refuses to recognize what happened in nineteen fifteen as genocide. Instead, 278 00:20:10.079 --> 00:20:15.359 it's called a tragedy of war or mutual suffering. After 279 00:20:15.400 --> 00:20:19.039 the Holocaust, much of the world said never again, and 280 00:20:19.079 --> 00:20:24.359 Germany built monuments, changed school curriculums, prosecuted many of the perpetrators, 281 00:20:24.920 --> 00:20:29.079 but even there, denial crept in Neo Nazi groups were 282 00:20:29.119 --> 00:20:34.359 emerged and conspiracy theory started circulating. In Cambodia, the Khmer 283 00:20:34.480 --> 00:20:38.079 Rouge trials took decades to begin. Many of the regime's 284 00:20:38.160 --> 00:20:41.839 leaders lived long, quiet lives before ever seeing a courtroom. 285 00:20:42.720 --> 00:20:47.160 For years, the genocide was barely taught in schools. Survivors 286 00:20:47.200 --> 00:20:51.359 often kept silent, unsure who to trust. It wasn't until 287 00:20:51.400 --> 00:20:55.319 a new generation pushed for truth that museums, memorials, and 288 00:20:55.400 --> 00:21:00.480 textbooks began to fill the gap. In Bosnia, workrooms were 289 00:21:00.480 --> 00:21:04.039 convicted at the Hague, but back home, many were honored. 290 00:21:04.359 --> 00:21:08.640 Streets were named after them, murals were painted. Some schools 291 00:21:08.680 --> 00:21:12.519 teach at the Surrey bernitza of massacre never happened in 292 00:21:12.519 --> 00:21:15.839 the United States. The government eventually apologized for the internment 293 00:21:15.880 --> 00:21:20.279 of Japanese Americans. Survivors were given reparations, but most of 294 00:21:20.279 --> 00:21:23.000 the camps are gone now. Many people don't know that 295 00:21:23.039 --> 00:21:27.000 they even existed. And this is what bothers me, even 296 00:21:27.039 --> 00:21:29.640 as I tell you about it. With so much killing 297 00:21:29.680 --> 00:21:33.000 and tragedy, all these stories begin to sound like just 298 00:21:33.160 --> 00:21:36.920 numbers and facts. It's the same reason why we react 299 00:21:37.000 --> 00:21:38.960 the way we do when we hear about a mass 300 00:21:38.960 --> 00:21:43.079 shooting on the news. As time passes, the clarity fades, 301 00:21:43.599 --> 00:21:47.680 the photos seem too old, or the stories just too distant. 302 00:21:47.960 --> 00:21:51.599 Becomes easier to think that it couldn't happen again, that 303 00:21:51.680 --> 00:21:56.799 maybe now we actually value lives. The same is true 304 00:21:56.839 --> 00:21:59.839 for the force removal of Native American tribes. The trail 305 00:21:59.880 --> 00:22:02.319 of tears is taught in schools, but often without the 306 00:22:02.319 --> 00:22:05.680 weight that it deserves. There are few monuments marking the 307 00:22:05.799 --> 00:22:10.960 thousands who died, few preserved homes or gravestones. The people 308 00:22:11.039 --> 00:22:13.799 are still here, but the history is usually told in 309 00:22:13.920 --> 00:22:19.440 past tense, as if it belongs to another country. If 310 00:22:19.440 --> 00:22:21.920 you take something away from this episode, please let it 311 00:22:21.960 --> 00:22:25.680 be this. The constant pattern of a fascist movement follows 312 00:22:25.759 --> 00:22:29.079 these steps, and it's based on works by Jason Stanley, 313 00:22:29.400 --> 00:22:35.599 Madeline Albright, Umberto Eeko, and Hannah Arendt. Create an enemy class, 314 00:22:36.279 --> 00:22:42.960 cultivate a mythic national identity, undermine truth and expertise, glorify 315 00:22:43.119 --> 00:22:51.359 law and order, militarize politics, euro democratic institutions control education 316 00:22:51.559 --> 00:22:59.200 and culture, suppress dissent, promote rigid gender roles, normalize cruelty. 317 00:23:01.279 --> 00:23:05.720 Doesn't this sound familiar? Now? From all this I've told 318 00:23:05.759 --> 00:23:09.559 you so far, none happen in the same place, different ideologies, 319 00:23:09.599 --> 00:23:14.359 different enemies, different borders. But the steps, they're familiar, and 320 00:23:14.400 --> 00:23:17.799 they repeat most of the time. The people inside these 321 00:23:17.799 --> 00:23:20.839 stories didn't believe it would go that far. They told 322 00:23:20.839 --> 00:23:24.200 themselves that it was just a phase politics or just talk. 323 00:23:25.079 --> 00:23:28.480 They believe their institutions would stop it, that the neighbors 324 00:23:28.480 --> 00:23:32.960 wouldn't allow it, that their country wasn't like that. And 325 00:23:33.039 --> 00:23:36.640 they were wrong, not all of them, though some helped 326 00:23:36.640 --> 00:23:41.279 people escape, some resisted until the end, but many, most 327 00:23:41.599 --> 00:23:44.960 watched it unfold and waited for someone else to act. 328 00:23:45.559 --> 00:23:48.200 That's why these stories are remembered, because of how many 329 00:23:48.279 --> 00:23:54.079 people let it happen. History whispers and repeats itself. What 330 00:23:54.160 --> 00:23:57.160 looks like bureaucracy today might be the bones of something 331 00:23:57.319 --> 00:24:02.480 far worse tomorrow. No country is immune, no society is 332 00:24:02.519 --> 00:24:06.519 too advanced. The truth is, any place can build the 333 00:24:06.559 --> 00:24:10.400 wrong system if the wrong story is told long enough, 334 00:24:11.400 --> 00:24:15.559 and if enough people choose to look away. So remember 335 00:24:15.599 --> 00:24:18.920 the steps, Remember how normal they looked as they began, 336 00:24:20.119 --> 00:24:23.960 and remember how hard it was to stop once they started. 337 00:24:28.279 --> 00:24:30.440 I was born in California and now lived in the 338 00:24:30.559 --> 00:24:33.480 US for most of my life. I remember being in 339 00:24:33.559 --> 00:24:37.000 second grade during the racist Pete Wilson's policies in the state. 340 00:24:37.559 --> 00:24:39.960 I understood them much later, but I remember the fear 341 00:24:40.480 --> 00:24:44.960 on banning bilingual education, saying that undocumented immigrants should be 342 00:24:45.000 --> 00:24:48.519 excluded from schools in public services. Instead of focusing on 343 00:24:48.559 --> 00:24:52.920 the efforts on legalization, ICE feels more like a machine 344 00:24:52.920 --> 00:24:56.160 built to show us that we don't belong. The patrols 345 00:24:56.200 --> 00:25:00.559 like an occupying force. Its job is to intimidate, to divide, 346 00:25:00.960 --> 00:25:04.359 and to disappear people. Parents drop off their kids at 347 00:25:04.359 --> 00:25:08.000 school and never come home. Children left and after school 348 00:25:08.039 --> 00:25:12.359 programs crying for someone who wasn't coming back, and somehow 349 00:25:12.359 --> 00:25:16.960 it's legal. When Trump said they're not sending their best, 350 00:25:17.839 --> 00:25:22.000 he was talking about my parents. When he said animals 351 00:25:22.279 --> 00:25:27.599 infestation and they're invading our country, he gave permission to eyes, 352 00:25:28.000 --> 00:25:31.640 to customs and border patrol, to racist communities that refuse 353 00:25:31.759 --> 00:25:35.519 to read, to travel, or explore ideas outside of their 354 00:25:35.559 --> 00:25:40.599 own echo chambers. That kind of language was chosen. That's 355 00:25:40.640 --> 00:25:44.799 the language of fascism. And let's not excuse previous presidents too. 356 00:25:45.039 --> 00:25:47.039 No one has come up with a solution that also 357 00:25:47.079 --> 00:25:51.839 gets accepted by the majority. In fascist regimes, the first 358 00:25:51.880 --> 00:25:55.480 step is to dehumanize a group, usually one that's racially, 359 00:25:55.599 --> 00:26:00.000 religiously or culturally different. The second step is to remove them, 360 00:26:00.279 --> 00:26:03.359 or to control them so fully that they can't resist. 361 00:26:04.559 --> 00:26:10.920 Ice rates, family separation, border camps, militarized checkpoints, and politicians 362 00:26:11.000 --> 00:26:15.720 telling us to go back to where we came from. 363 00:26:15.799 --> 00:26:20.759 That's not immigration policy. That's literally ethnic cleansing by paper work. 364 00:26:20.799 --> 00:26:24.240 I've shown you examples, and yes, I understand the points 365 00:26:24.240 --> 00:26:26.559 of not wanting people to keep coming into the country 366 00:26:26.799 --> 00:26:29.599 for safety. Reasons or whatever. But some of the very 367 00:26:29.720 --> 00:26:33.480 problems they're escaping from were created by the US foreign 368 00:26:33.559 --> 00:26:36.960 policy to begin with. And I've heard the arguments and 369 00:26:37.000 --> 00:26:40.039 I understand them, I really do. Some people say if 370 00:26:40.079 --> 00:26:43.839 they came to illegally, they should face the consequences. But 371 00:26:43.920 --> 00:26:47.480 what's the same energy for corporations that employment documented labor 372 00:26:48.039 --> 00:26:52.880 laws are adjusted for them white only for them? What's 373 00:26:52.880 --> 00:26:56.759 the outrage for the white Europeans who overstay visas. They're 374 00:26:56.799 --> 00:27:01.680 not putting cages, their kids aren't taken. Others might say, 375 00:27:01.920 --> 00:27:06.920 my grandparents came here legally. Why can't they please understand 376 00:27:06.960 --> 00:27:10.119 that your grandparents weren't blocked by laws designed to keep 377 00:27:10.200 --> 00:27:14.200 out people who look like mine. Before nineteen sixty five, 378 00:27:14.400 --> 00:27:19.079 US immigration law gave massive preference to white Europeans. Records 379 00:27:19.119 --> 00:27:23.079 show this. The National Origins quota system from nineteen twenty 380 00:27:23.119 --> 00:27:27.200 four to nineteen sixty five was designed to preserve a white, 381 00:27:27.680 --> 00:27:33.720 Northern or Western European demographic majority. Meanwhile, quotas on Mexicans 382 00:27:33.720 --> 00:27:37.599 and Central Americans were harsh and arbitrary, even though US 383 00:27:37.680 --> 00:27:42.119 companies recruited US for labor. They say, you should have 384 00:27:42.200 --> 00:27:45.240 come the right way. The thing is there is no 385 00:27:45.480 --> 00:27:48.799 right way for most of us. Please please ask a 386 00:27:48.839 --> 00:27:51.319 friend who's from a Latin American country what it's like 387 00:27:51.359 --> 00:27:54.359 for them to travel. It's the simple question, and not 388 00:27:54.480 --> 00:27:57.519 just to the US, but to other places. Ask them 389 00:27:57.599 --> 00:28:00.400 about the paperwork and sufficient proof they must show the 390 00:28:00.440 --> 00:28:04.960 agents while crossing borders. Plus, there's no visa for fleeing 391 00:28:05.000 --> 00:28:08.480 gang threats, no green card for working fourteen hour shifts 392 00:28:08.559 --> 00:28:12.319 under the table the meat packing plants. Then they say, 393 00:28:12.680 --> 00:28:15.079 why should we be paying for them to have benefits? 394 00:28:15.920 --> 00:28:20.759 Undocumented immigrants cannot receive food stamps, Medicaid, or welfare. They 395 00:28:20.799 --> 00:28:25.279 are eligible. And yes, undocumented immigrants pay taxes through individual 396 00:28:25.359 --> 00:28:28.839 tax payer ID numbers. That's how they file returns, and 397 00:28:28.920 --> 00:28:32.680 they pay into Social Security and Medicare but cannot access it. 398 00:28:34.000 --> 00:28:39.559 Survival cannot be a crime. Our presence challenges a myth 399 00:28:39.599 --> 00:28:42.039 of what the United States is supposed to be. There's 400 00:28:42.079 --> 00:28:44.759 this imaginary vision that the US is supposed to look 401 00:28:44.799 --> 00:28:47.759