Asperger's Children Quotes

“Rather than inhabiting a world of black and white, most individuals in the Reich operated in shades of gray. People confronted countless decisions each day. One might walk by a "Jews unwanted" sign at a local store and not say anything - only to shop at a Jewish-owned store on the next block for its favorable prices. One might help a neighbor threatened by the regime - only to look away as another neighbor disappeared. People navigated daily choices as they presented themselves, extemporizing in their personal and professional spheres. Caught in the swirl of life, one might conform, resist, and even commit harm all in the same afternoon. The cruelty of the Nazi world was inescapable.”
― Edith Sheffer, Asperger's Children: The Origins of Autism in Nazi Vienna

“Asperger was neither a zealous supporter nor an opponent of the regime. He was an exemplar of this drift into complicity, part of the muddled majority of the populace who alternately conformed, concurred, feared, normalized, minimized, repressed, and reconciled themselves to Nazi rule.”
― Edith Sheffer, Asperger's Children: The Origins of Autism in Nazi Vienna

“Asperger's actions are perhaps more reflective of the nature of perpetration in the Third Reich than those of more prominent figures. The Reich's systems of extermination depended upon people like Asperger, who maneuvered themselves, perhaps uncritically, within their positions. Individuals such as Asperger were neither committed killers nor even directly involved in the moment of death. Yet, in the absence of murderous convictions, they made the Reich's killing systems possible.”
― Edith Sheffer, Asperger's Children: The Origins of Autism in Nazi Vienna

“Asperger was reportedly socially awkward, cool, and distanced. Today, people debate whether Asperger had Asperger’s—if he had traits of the syndrome that later bore his name.”
― Edith Sheffer, Asperger's Children: The Origins of Autism in Nazi Vienna

“In 1959, Asperger praised the Hitler Youth, too, as “widely fruitful, formative.”5”
― Edith Sheffer, Asperger's Children: The Origins of Autism in Nazi Vienna

“Nazis, forbidden from wearing their brown shirt uniform on the streets, simply strutted around Vienna without shirts at all, donning silk hats.”
― Edith Sheffer, Asperger's Children: The Origins of Autism in Nazi Vienna

“While medicine and psychiatry elsewhere in the world in this era shared characteristics, the Reich’s diagnosis regime operated under the shadow of death, and it included death as a treatment option.”
― Edith Sheffer, Asperger's Children: The Origins of Autism in Nazi Vienna