Home By Marquel The Washable Sharpie

The Washable Sharpie

Marquel, TPVs NYTimes Work Makes You Free Section correspondent was counting toothpicks in a Chinese restaurant when he read, Czech Republic Criticized After Officers Mark Migrants With Numbers. It’s true.

The Hungarians used Sharpies to number the immigrants, they say so they could keep track of them. It’s true almost by definition these are paperless people, undocumented.

Marquel wondered if they had just made up names for each of them, then recorded the names, whether that could have avoided the claims of, “It’s just like Auschwitz!” Now just a minute, thought Marquel, it’s not just like Auschwitz.

There are no Ukrainian guards. You can’t have a concentration camp without Ukrainian guards. Well a few Poles could produce a second class kind of camp. But not an Auschwitz.

 So Marquel spoke to the critics.
“You really think a Sharpie number is being a Nazi?” Asked Marquel.
“Tell me about it. It’s inhuman!” Said the rather young man complaining about Hungarian Nazis.
 “You really think so? Just a Sharpie number that washes off?” Asked Marquel, a bit shocked.
” Of course. Anybody with an ounce of humanity would know that.” He said, rather aggressively.
 Marquel always thought of himself as a humanist. Not even an ounce? He felt his body here and there for flab, sure that there must be humanity in flab. “Don’t you think that being thrown in the gas chamber without a number is worse?” I asked.
“Not at all. It’s the number that was most feared. It terrorized the Jews.” he insisted.
 “What about the twin experiments? You think they hated that ice water less than the tattoo? Remember that was a tattoo not a Sharpie.” Said I.
“It was the number. Are you making excuses for the Hungarians?” he asked.
 “Well there were a whole lot of undocumented people. Surely it was the Germans and others who refused entry that formed the bottleneck in Hungary.” I said.
“Exactly. And then to put numbers on them…” Said the teen.
 “I think you’re historically uninformed. Are you sure you know what happened at Auschwitz?” I asked.
“Of course. I Wikipediad it. Read the whole entry.” He said.
 “And the numbering is what you remember?” I asked.
“How could anyone with a heart not?” He asked.
 “Well with a heart you might remember the babies ripped from their parents grasp, The husbands helpless as wives were exterminated, children who saw their parents gassed, whole families watching themselves being gassed. But not the numbers.” I said.
“If you forget the numbers, history will repeat itself.” He said in a very low voice.
 “I think you’ve put an unacceptable twist on Santayana.” I said.
“Who?” He asked.
 “A guy without a number.”
 ***
  By MARQUEL: The Washable Sharpie

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