The White Rose
0
Once during a tour, a school student asked a question. He raised his hand and said, "Do you know which country the Nazis took first? It was Germany, the Nazis took Germany first." In the lead-up to World War II, Germany was subjected to large amounts of propaganda, and freedom of speech was stifled. A group of students from Munich tried to awaken the German population to spiritual resistance. They wrote leaflets that they distributed around German cities, urging the population to think for themselves and distance themselves from Nazism. The group became known as "The White Rose," a non-violent group that fought with words against the Nazi regime. They urged each individual to take responsibility for humanistic values – and thus to distance themselves from any totalitarian ideology. This became a dangerous threat to the Nazis, and they expended considerable resources to find out who was behind it. Eventually, the members were exposed and brought to trial. Their activities were called "the most serious attack on the Reich since the outbreak of the war." They were sentenced to death for high treason and executed by guillotine only three hours after the verdict was delivered. The Nazis considered them such a significant threat that they were executed immediately. See the portrait of Traute Lafrenz, Vebjørn Sand met her in 2004, a meeting that left a strong impression. She was one of the few key members of "The White Rose" who survived the war. She died on March 6, 2023, at the age of 103. The Rose Castle is named after these youths who used their words and freedom of speech as weapons against Nazism.