Sun, 02.10.22
Hartheim Memorial Lecture
On October 1, 2022 I delivered the Memorial Lecture at Hartheim, the live stream is here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pV4z8fIM1oU, the text of my lecture:

Welcome to you: who have come as experts in your own right, as self-advocates, to commemorate the murder of persons with disabilities.
Welcome to all of you who have lost a relative or loved one to almost immeasurable acts.
To all of you who have come here today to commemorate the victims of Nazi euthanasia and to reinforce the “never again” that must necessarily result from it: welcome.
In all the uncertainties, shocks that surround us at the moment, it is difficult to find a beginning. One is no longer sure whether the speed of events is “only” the distortions of growing inequalities and the climate catastrophe or also, to a certain extent, the momentum attributed to illiberal currents.
It is a lot, often too much, and it seems increasingly difficult to find moments of reflection. In particular, common groundand the unity seem to have currently receive little space.
A few weeks ago, aspiring musicians from Ukraine demonstrated their skills at a concert in Salzburg. While they were playing enchantingly, a few thoughts inevitably ran through my head: “Do the musicians know how their closest relatives and friends are doing? When did they last see their family? Will they ever play in front of them again? When will there be concerts of this kind in Ukraine again …?”
And then my eyes fell on the make of the grand piano: exactly the same that my grandmother once played in Garmisch. And with it – along with so many other things that resonated – also the question of how the light-heartedness of her childhood in the Bavarian mountains could evaporate as it did.
In the omnipresence that memories can develop, it is one thing to know rationally how National Socialism arose and led people to authorise innumerable atrocities, to set them in motion or to make them possible by omission; at the same time, the consequences of National Socialism remain elusive on a personal level.
My grandmother, Annemarie Klein, sold her piano after she fled, having married Ernst Böhm at a very young age. She got on very well with her father-in-law, Adolf Böhm. Together with his son, he ran a cotton factory in Wilhelminenstraße in Vienna. It was a modern company that attached great importance to good working conditions. Adolf Böhm took an interest in – political – Zionism ‘on the side’, as it were. He wrote one of the standard works on Zionism that is still in use today: “The Zionist Movement.” In addition, there are numerous articles and speeches by him.
His involvement as a member of the Jewish Community and his book on Zionism attracted the interest of Adolf Eichmann. Eichmann wanted a list of the “most prominent Jews” from Adolf Böhm and therefore made daily appearances at the factory from 14 March 1938. After several weeks, according to anecdotal evidence, the pressure was once again massively increased and the library sealed. This was too much for a book lover like Adolf Böhm; my great-grandfather had a nervous breakdown and was taken to several psychiatric intermediate stations as part of the T4 actionand murdered here in Hartheim in April 1941.
In the meticulous, systematic murder of prominent people in particular, all traces were covered up and files destroyed. In addition, there was also deliberate misinformation, such as that according to which my great-grandfather died of “pneumonia” in Chelm, Poland. “Fake news“ of the time, which also made it into the Encyclopedia Judaica.
One runs out of words in an effort to capture and express these atrocities and especially the mixture of ruthlessness and meticulousness.
This makes all the more important the answers that the then still young community of states found in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights after the end of National Socialism:
“All human beings are born equal in rights and dignity …”
The reality of life for persons with disabilities globally – and also in Austria – fails daily to meet this claim to guarantee equal opportunities and the implementation of all human rights. Ensuring that persons with disabilities are respected, that their self-determination is strengthened and recognised, and that they can lead an equal life, is far too often still a shadowy sketch of the future instead of factual reality.
The Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, which was finally negotiated in 2006, guarantees all persons with disabilities all rights and the associated dignity in everyday life. To recognise that persons with disabilities are self-determining and have a right to live their self-determination.
Incidentally, the assistance that persons with disabilities sometimes need in shaping their self-determination is not so fundamentally different from assistance that the so-called ‘chronically normal’[1] people use on a daily basis. It is the level of detail of information and methods, but not the act of self-empowerment that goes on between an opinion-forming process in a random board office, the cabinet of a provincial governor or just in supported decision-making. But it is still perfectly acceptable to comprehensively devalue the decision-making of persons with disabilities without putting a stop to the abelism or paternalism encoded therein.
This is also why we are taking massive steps backwards in education: segregation of persons with disabilities is commonplace, the well-meaning references to the importance of inclusion are nothing more than phrases. This is first and foremost a human rights violation vis-à-vis persons with disabilities who have a right to equal participation in a school of their preference and choice. But it is also a symptom of a school system that increasingly fails to do justice to anyone, learners and teachers alike.
The catastrophe that is looming here has been vividly described by the Court of Audit, among others: the regulations in this area are so outdated and impracticable that school trials and pilot projects have been permanently established at more than half of Austria’s federal schools in order to avoid arcane rules. The steadily growing number of functionally illiterate – completely devoid of any ethnic attributions – people across all social strata should have prompted everyone to act for decades.
No less alarming and scandalous is the fact that in 2022 persons with disabilities are again be increasingly dependent on donations. A life of self-determination is still possible for very few persons with disabilities, the mechanisms of exclusion are too strong, the need to “alleviate suffering” with handouts instead of actually making equality possible with rights and de facto empowerment, as the obligations for the federal and state governments in the Convention stipulate, is too deep-seated. The pandemic and inflation are dramatically affecting people in precarious working conditions, but also those who are living on social benefits that are too low to start with.
A third and final example: structural accessibility, where the “neglect of civility” for equal participation, to a truly representative democracy measured against legal and human rights commitments, is currently progressing rapidly. Far too often, structural accessibility is not implemented, or far too often people believe that they know what is required and then wonder about the stairs that have not been considered or the door frames that are far too narrow. The fact is, rooms in which everyone has enough space have been guaranteed in various regulations. And: as soon as rooms are structurally accessible, everyone feels much more comfortable and welcome.
What do the examples of education, the failure to guarantee social security and structural accessibility have in common? The exclusion of persons with disabilities continues to happen primarily at the structural level.
Structural means: it is difficult to attribute exclusion and human rights violations to individual persons. It is the way decisions are made, the processes by which permits are granted, the specifications that serve as the basis for planning that prevent all people from experiencing safety, equality and well-being.
In this structure of non-responsibilities, those who were already partially excluded are more vehemently marginalised. Because prejudice, stigma and other aspects of exclusion are constantly reinforced in this mix. And we all know, which socio-political tendencies and political ideas gain particular momentum as a result.
This is precisely why a commemoration in Hartheim is necessary and also particularly painful: the exclusion of personswith disabilities is an indicator of the basic constitution of a democracy’s claim to equality.
More stigma and prejudice tends to flow into the exclusion of persons with disabilities than into the exclusion of other groups of people, also because the demarcation between “normal” and “not normal” is drawn particularly harsh. And all the more urgent and insistent a “never again!” here in Hartheim, today and every day.
Implementing the anti-fascist basic consensus means in particular respecting and implementing all human rights for all. “All human beings are born equal in rights and dignity” also means a self-critical approach to structural violence, be it in education, in the prevention of inhuman and degrading treatment or in dealing with those who are actively threatened for their opinions, as has happened in a number of cases in recent years and most recently ended fatally for Dr. Lisa-Maria Kellermayr.
We must do more to make human rights a reality, especially where responsibilities seem to get lost and no one seems to be legally accountable. For it is precisely in this supposed space between legal and moral responsibility that the momentum is created for a growing number of human rights violations – also by omission – and thus the impetus for anti-democratic currents.
This makes the commemoration here at Hartheim Castle all the more important. And the daily efforts of the team of the learning and memorial site to convey facts, to point out developments, to classify mechanisms that discriminate and exclude and other aspects that made the emergence and National Socialism itself possible.
The focus of the educational work is on young people, who are made aware of the almost incomprehensible, who are sensitised to mechanisms of exclusion as well as to the consequences of unquestioned norms: legal as well as biological. Another focus of the activities of the learning and memorial site is the inclusion of persons with disabilities. Dealing with the inhumane treatment of impairment requires a high degree of sensitivity and empathy. Other mediation methods are also needed to actually ensure an accessible space. An example of this is the new permanent exhibition, which was designed with a lot of thought and heart and is now rightly acclaimed and brings many visitors to this difficult place.
Ongoing research around the National Socialist euthanasia programme, here and at other sites, complements the work of the learning and memorial site. I would like to thank the board and the team for their enormous commitment, their constant efforts to convey the unimaginable in a factual, inclusive and accessible way and the daily renewal of “never again!” as well as the affirmation of human rights here at Hartheim Castle.
In keeping with a growing tradition of commemoration, I now invite you to a minute of silence and remembrance, and may I conclude by asking you: use your human right to freedom of expression, speak about the importance of ensuringall human rights for all.
[1] Patricia Deegan, Conspiracy of Hope.