Unite Against The State

While blogging, yet again, about the police state my mind wandered to Pastor Martin Niemoller and his famous poem. Niemoller was a pastor in the German Confessing Church and spent eight years in a Nazi concentration camp. I almost included it in my earlier post today but thought it deserved to stand alone, so here it is:

First they came for the Jews
and I did not speak out--because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for the communists
and I did not speak out--because I was not a communist.
Then they came for the trade unionists
and I did not speak out--because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for me--
and there was no one left to speak out for me.

He also addressed the US Congress in 1968. Below is the text of what he said, taken from the Congressional Record,October 14, 1968, page 31636:

"When Hitler attacked the Jews
I was not a Jew, therefore I was not concerned.
And when Hitler attacked the Catholics,
I was not a Catholic, and therefore, I was not concerned.
And when Hitler attacked the unions and the industrialists,
I was not a member of the unions and I was not concerned.
Then Hitler attacked me and the Protestant church --
and there was nobody left to be concerned."

Thinking about this, and how Labour have destroyed our freedoms and liberties while claiming to have built some kind of utopian paradise of equality and diversity, I also found the following quote from the great Ayn Rand:

"The smallest minority on earth is the individual.
Those who deny individual rights cannot
claim to be defenders of minorities."

To find out more about Ayn Rand and Objectivism visit the Ayn Rand Institute.