I was swimming with my son yesterday when we began talking about history. He was asking me questions about Indians and how we came to be in Canada. I was answering his questions while I strained to recall all the social studies that I had taken over the years. At one point I mentioned Europeans and when he asked me what a European was, I listed off nations that had settled in North America.

When I said Germans, he paled significantly, which is quite a feat since he is very pale to begin with, and his eyes grew wide with worry as he said, “There are no Germans in Canada, are there?”

Wondering exactly why he was worried about this, I questioned him and he went on to explain that Germans were the bad guys. Everyone said it and they started those big wars. The question that came tumbling out of his mouth was surprising as he asked, “Are Germans bad?”

This really raised my awareness of how tricky it is to answer a question. We fight wars, have soldiers fighting wars and we present an image of the ultimate good and the ultimate evil. In the World Wars, the Germans were the ultimate evil and that is still taught in history books. If you approach history in this manner, then how can you say, “Well, Germans were bad back then but now they have good people and bad people just like everyone else.”

For some reason, that doesn’t seem to cut it and I had to approach it in a somewhat different manner.

So how do you handle this? For me, I look at it not as a race of people being bad but of making a bad choice. They chose to fight for their country and their country was being led by a bad man. Obviously, I don’t get into the darker points of the war, my son is only 7, after all, but I do not want him to be plagued by discrimination, especially at such a young age.

My first reaction to his question was to say, “Well, your great grandparents were german, are you bad? Am I bad?” He smiled in relief and said, “No.”

I then explained how the country was led by a bad man and because of that many bad things happened in the country and during the war. They fought for the wrong thing but they fought for their country. People make mistakes (of course this is a bit of an understatement when it comes to the World Wars) and it isn’t right to believe that all Germans are bad simply because of the wars.

As I was explaining, he smiled and said, “I know who led the Germans, my friend told me.”

I smiled and asked him who led the Germans during the wars and he said, “A bad man named Hitler and another bad man named Merlin.”

Which brought me to another conclusion, I really needed to keep an eye on what other children were teaching my son. The next half an hour was spent in explaining Arthurian legends and who Merlin was and yes, this whole conversation took place in the pool.  )

Sirena Van Schaik

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