Family portrait set outside among the trees. The photograph features two rows of people with light skin tones. The back row includes nine people, five men in suits and four women in ankle-length dresses. The bottom row includes four children sitting on the ground, two young boys and two young girls all in light colored garb. The boy, third from the left, holds a small dog, possibly a dachshund.

"Enemies of the State"

The Nazis aimed to reshape German society according to ideas about race and the nation. They labeled some racial and social groups as "outsiders" or "enemies." Many members of these groups were targeted for persecution.

Although Jews were the main target of Nazi hatred, they were not the only group persecuted. Other individuals and groups were considered "undesirable" and "enemies of the state." Communists, Social Democrats, and trade unionists were among the first groups persecuted by the Nazis. Once the voices of political opponents were silenced, the Nazis stepped up their terror against other "outsiders."

Like Jews, Roma (Gypsies) were targeted by the Nazis as "non-Aryans" and racial "inferiors." Roma had been in Germany since the 1400s and had faced prejudice there for centuries. They had also been victims of official discrimination long before 1933. Under the Nazis, Romani (Gypsy) families in major cities were rounded up, fingerprinted and photographed, and forced to live in special camps under police guard.

Jehovah's Witnesses, members of a small Christian group, were victimized not for reasons of race but because of their beliefs. Witnesses' beliefs prohibited them from entering the army or showing obedience to any government by saluting the flag or, in Nazi Germany, raising their arms in the "Heil Hitler" salute. Soon after Hitler took power, Witnesses were sent to concentration camps. Those who remained at large lost their jobs, unemployment and social welfare benefits, and all civil rights. The Witnesses, nevertheless, continued to meet, to preach, and to distribute religious pamphlets.

The Nazis persecuted gay men between 1933 and 1945. They closed gay bars and meeting places. They also dissolved gay associations and shuttered gay presses. The Nazi regime also arrested and tried tens of thousands of gay men. They arrested them for violating Paragraph 175. This was a statute of the German criminal code that banned sexual relations between men. During the Nazi era, between 5,000 and 15,000 men were imprisoned in concentration camps as “homosexual” (“homosexuell”) offenders. This group of prisoners was typically required to wear a pink triangle on their camp uniforms.

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Glossary