Sandy McLaughlin: Readers should speak out more often and not be complicit

To The Daily Sun, 

The following poem is credited to and based on the 1946 poem by Lutheran pastor, Martin Niemollier, who was sent to a Nazi concentration camp for speaking up for human rights. He survived and spent the rest of his life speaking out against the Nazis and the importance of speaking up for others and caring for our fellow human beings.

"First they came for the illegals

And I did not speak out

Because I was not an illegal

Then they came for immigrants

And I did not speak out

Because I was not an immigrant

Then they came for the LGBQTs

And I did not speak out

Because I was not LGBQT

Then they came for non-whites

And I did not speak out

Because i was not non-white

Then they came for the protesters and I did not speak out

Because I was not a protestor

Then they came for me

And there was no one left

To speak out for me."

Silence equals complicity. Each of us must speak out now before it’s too late for all of us. Our very humanity depends on it.

Sandy McLaughlin

Gilford