Friday, November 24, 2023

Why were Iowa school officials quoting the well-known Nazi, Heinrich Himmler?

 

Before using a quote you need to check who said it, and both when and where. Yesterday and today there were articles about a notorious quote. One by Samantha Hernandez and Thao Nguyen at USA Today on November 23, 2023 is titled Iowa school officials apologize after quoting World War II Nazi in morning announcements. Another by Matthew Loh at Business Insider on November 23, 2023 is titled Iowa school officials said they didn’t realize their ‘Respect Quote of the Day’ emailed to parents was a Nazi Germany slogan. A third by Jaron Steinbuch at the New York Post on November 24, 2023 is titled Iowa school apologizes for using Nazi leader Heinrich Himmler’s words for ‘Respect Quote of the Day.’

 

That quote was from Heinrich Himmler: “My honor is my loyalty.” And you can easily find it in Google searches at sites like AZQUOTES, Brainy Quote, QuoteCatalog, GoodReads, and even Forbes. QuoteCatalog says:

 

“Himmler formulated this as the watchword of the Schultzstaffel [SS], an organization that eventually became an enormous organization ranging from the staff of the concentration camps to the Gestapo and SD, to the Waffen-SS, Hitler's personal soldiers. Above all else, Himmler and the rest of the Nazi leadership stressed the importance of loyalty to the Reich and the Fuehrer. As translated in The Origins of Totalitarianism (1951), by Hannah Arendt Ch. 10.”

 

The German original, which can be found at Wikipedia, is Meine Ehre heißt Treue.

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