"Britons have British sufferings, and Britons have British solutions. They are driven by profit, while we Germans are driven by honor and sacrifice.
Just as we have no need to import British goods, we also have no need to import British ways. We Germans will walk our own path."
This was the trick of seizing the moral high ground by calling a stag a horse, though it still began by dividing people into camps; as for who was right and who was wrong, they did not care.
Only this time, Franz had become the traitor who worshipped foreign things, while they were the ones representing the German Nation.
What had originally been a discussion about the Labor Protection Act had, in the blink of an eye, turned into a pledge of identity and allegiance.
Franz felt somewhat helpless, and somewhat sorrowful. He understood their aim: nothing more than to turn a question of right and wrong into one of identity and allegiance.
Once this sort of thing got underway, right and wrong ceased to matter. Morality, reason, even facts no longer mattered. The only thing that mattered was whose side you were on.
As long as we were on the same side, then even if we cheated and swindled, murdered and set fires, raped and plundered, we would still be the fine brothers, the blood brothers of Water Margin.
But as long as he was not on our side, then even if he was upright and aboveboard, helped the needy and rescued those in peril, and acted with complete selflessness, he would still be a treacherous villain, an evil villain, a traitor who sold out his country.
This was also why some people read Water Margin and found it utterly baffling, while others savored it with relish, even crying out