ABSTRACT
The nature of the disappearances, the fact that the abuses went on for years, and the generally passive response of most Argentineans to state agents seizing innocent people and refusing to reveal their fates, reminded me of my own family’s history and the unanswered questions it inspired. My mother was a child in Hitler’s Germany. Her family survived Nazi repression by behaving as most other Christian families did: not speaking out against the regime, even as Jewish, Roma and other purported “state enemies” were rounded up and sent to death camps. While my grandparents took risks to help one victim, they did not risk taking a public stance against the Nazi policies. Knowing that critics of the Nazis could also be apprehended, should they have done more? Would I have acted differently?
