Stand Up for What You Believe In

Even if you are standing alone ~ The Story of Sophie Scholl

Somebody, after all, had to make a start. What we wrote and said is also believed by many others. They just don’t dare express themselves as we did. ~ Sophie Scholl’s last letter to her parents.

The White Rose Movement: I knew it was a campaign against Hitler, the Nazi Regime. I knew Sophie Scholl was an icon of the movement. That was about it. Then I read a short biography about her. What can I say? What can’t I say about this young woman, this girl? She truly had the heart of a lion and the courage of a warrior. Taught by her parents to think critically and independently. And the question arises: what would I have done? Would I have been as brave and steadfast in my beliefs? Would I have done what she did? Standing up against the majority of popular opinion and political beliefs? Going up against a regime that had spies everywhere? Who disappeared people in the middle of the night? Knocked on the doors of fellow citizens, in this case, as we all know, the Jewish population, and said: We’re taking everything away from you. Your house is no longer yours and all your valuables belong to us. “Enteignung” they called it. Dispossession. Stealing would be the term used today. Just because you were Jewish.