Godwin’s Law: “As an online discussion grows longer (regardless of topic or scope), the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Adolf Hitler approaches 1.”
A Nazi allusion is a confession by the speaker that they have not done much thinking on their subject — although the subject horrifies them. By now, it has lost all power to accentuate the point the sophist was trying to make. When politicians compare vaccine mandates to the Nazis rounding up the Jews for genocide, they have lost all reason. They might as well write “I am a moron” on a piece of paper and tape it to their forehead. If you need a visual, imagine M.T. Greene and ask yourself what her IQ likely is.
Kentucky State Rep. Danny Bentley added his dismal offering to the collection when he claimed that an abortion-inducing pill was derived from the same poison gas the Nazis used to kill millions of Jews. This goober offered this fantastical revision of chemical history during a KY House floor debate on a bill to further restrict abortion in Kentucky. Proving once again that conservatives, eager to strip half the population of their rights, will offer any hyperbolic fiction they think will advance their sadistic bigotry.
Bentley started on a positive note
“There have been a few misconceptions spoken on this floor today. And I would like to give people more information so they can make a better decision.”
He said that the abortion pill, RU-486, was not available by prescription, but instead must be given to the patient by a doctor. So far so good. Then he went off the rails with a history lesson,
“In fact, RU 486 was developed from the Germans during the war. It was a cyanide, and it was call Xy … Xyglam B ... X.Y.K.L.A.M-B.”
Let’s start with the name - ‘Xyglam-B’? We know he meant it because he took the trouble to spell it out. But the cyanide gas brand used by the Germans was ‘Zyklon-B’. And a google search for Xyglam B produces nothing but one Russian site and an inquiry as to whether I meant ‘Zyklon-B’.
Oh well. What’s in a name? Then things started getting truly wacky, as Bentley gave us a history lesson mixed in with some approving remarks on Jewish women’s supposed limited range of sexual partners. He then stuck the landing by claiming he knew what Jewish people approve of.
“In fact, the person who invented it was a Jew since we brought up the Hebrew family today.”
He added, “Do you know that a Jewish woman has less cancer of the cervix than any other race in this country or this world. Why is that? Because Jewish women only have one sex partner.”
And, “To say that the Jewish people approve of this drug now is wrong.”
The first question is, “has Bentley lost his mind?”. The second is, “how is any of this relevant?”. And once you get over the absurdity of his remarks the critical reader will ask if any of this is correct. Some of it is.
Yes, Zyklon-B was invented by a Jew — but he was making a pesticide, not an agent of mass murder.
Yes, cervical cancer rates are, and have long been known, to be lower among Jewish women. But the reason is not that Jewish women have fewer sexual partners but rather that, genetically, Jewish women — especially Sephardic and Ashkenazi women — have low rates of “homozygous arginine polymorphism at codon 72 of p53”. I don’t know what that is, but studies show that it represents a significant risk factor in the development of HPV-associated cervical carcinoma. Lacking it leads to low cancer rates.
If Bentley had bothered to look it up, he would have seen that Israel is in the middle of the pack, and above the global average, when it comes to the number of sex partners. And it is far higher than in India which has a relatively high rate of cervical cancer.
Lastly. as Jews tend to be more liberal than the population as a whole I suspect that their support for RU-486 is higher than average.
But Bentley was just getting warmed up. He added,
“Any good farmer in here knows that you don’t cut down a cherry tree and feed it to your cattle. How come? It’s full of cyanide.
Do cows eat trees? Of course not. Not even bad farmers are going to cut down trees to feed cattle. And while there is cyanide in the pits of cherries, there is none in the edible fruit or the rest of the tree. What a farmer should avoid is feeding cows cassava root, raw butter and lime beans, and wild almonds (anyone who reads detective fiction knows that cyanide smells like almonds)
But let’s get back on board Bentley’s crazy train. He went on,
“That’s the same thing this cyanide gas was used for … which killed millions of Jews during the Holocaust. That’s where RU-486 started. Then the same company, today, at this very time, has got chemist, chemistry, and chemists trying to develop a more effective product like RU-46. Why would they do that? Because they are making money on it.”
Again Bentley — who is a pharmacist — should have done some research instead of just making stuff up. RU-486 and Zyklon-B have no relationship — either chemically or corporately.
Zyklon-B is a mixture of a hydrogen cyanide-producing compound, an eye-irritant (as a safety measure), and an adsorbent such as diatomaceous earth. When exposed to water and heat it emits hydrogen cyanide. It was originally used as a pesticide, and still is. It was invented, in 1919 in Germany, by Fritz Harber (a German Jew and Nobel prize-winning chemist). And was first marketed by Degesch, a German government-owned entity. Degesch was bought by Degussa in 1922. Degussa was bought by RAM in 2006. And renamed Evonik-Degussa GmbH in 2007.
Zyklon-B’s is lethal because it inhibits cellular respiration.
RU-486 (mifepristone) was first synthesized in 1980 by George Teutsch (a French Jew) for the company Roussel-Uclaf (RU). RU was acquired by the German company Hoechst AG in 1997 and is now part of the French pharmaceutical concern Sanofi. Note. Hoesch AG has no relationship with any German company that produced Zyklon-B.
RU-486 works by blocking the body’s progesterone, a hormone that allows fetal development. Without progesterone, the pregnancy does not develop. It is taken in conjunction with misoprostol, which causes uterine contractions, emptying the womb. Note: RU-486 contains no cyanide.
I’m no biochemist, but it seems to me that a chemical that kills cells by suffocating them and another that inhibits hormones are not related.
Bentley’s hypocrisy is evident in his claim that RU-486 exists only because there is money in it. Are not conservatives pathologically pro-profit? Is the right-wing not pro-business and anti-regulation? Making things that people want is the engine of the American economy. With Big Pharma, Republicans are particularly egregious. They put their thumb on the scale by refusing to allow Medicare to negotiate lower drug prices. Again, the right proves that it is only pro-business as long as businesses stick to poisoning people and the planet or gouging their customers. Conservatives cannot tolerate any corporate liberty that allows corporations to do the right thing.
Bentley has since apologized for his remarks by saying, “I meant absolutely no harm in my comments today and sincerely apologize for any they caused” Really? Danny is no spring chicken. And as long as he has lived, he still thinks Holocaust references are ever reasonable? And saying ‘any’ implies the listener may be overly sensitive. Replace it with ‘the’.
I guess "a rose by any other name'' what a bozo, thanks Pitt