General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Pelosi blows off AOC 'concentration camp' remarks [View all]delisen
(6,044 posts)separated from their families and from services needed for their support,and being housed in inhumane conditions. This 21st century total institution and fits many of the definitions of concentration camps, as listed in modern dictionaries It is not at present a "killing center" as defined by the Holocaust Museum.
The following is from the Holocaust Museum in the United States and it distinguishes concentration camps from forced labor/transit camps, forced labor camps, and killing centers.
https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/nazi-camps
Quote:
Types of Camps
Many people refer to all of the Nazi incarceration sites during the Holocaust as concentration camps. The term concentration camp is used very loosely to describe places of incarceration and murder under the Nazi regime, however, not all sites established by the Nazis were concentration camps. Nazi-established sites include:
Concentration camps: For the detention of civilians whom the regime perceived to be a security risk of some sort. There were 938 camps and subcamps.
Forced-labor camps and transit camps: In forced-labor camps, the Nazi regime brutally exploited the labor of prisoners for economic gain and to meet labor shortages. Prisoners lacked proper equipment, clothing, nourishment, or rest. Transit camps functioned as temporary holding facilities for Jews awaiting deportation. These camps were usually the last stop before deportations to a killing center. There were 1,830 forced-labor and transit camps.
Prisoner-of-war camps: For Allied and Soviet prisoners of war. There were 559 POW camps, but this figure does not include the tens of thousands of POW subcamps that existed.
Killing centers: Established primarily or exclusively for the assembly-line style murder of large numbers of people immediately upon arrival to the site. There were 5 killing centers.
Unquote ____________________________________________________________________________________________
Some Total Institutions in the US:
Andersonville Prison which housed Union prisoners of war during the US civil war was a total institution where 1/3 of those held died mainly from brutal conditions, exposure and disease.
Willowbrook State "School" in New York City was a total institution where children and adults deemed mentally deficient and unfit to live in the community were separated from their families, locked up , provided with only grossly substandard and over-crowed living conditions, denied typical medical care, and other services such as education, and even experimented upon. At its height in the second half of the 20th century it housed over 6000 children and adults.