Life unworthy of life
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"Life unworthy of life" (in German: "Lebensunwertes Leben") was a Nazi term for those human beings who, by reason of their purported racial or genetic background, the Nazis believed had no right to live and thus should be killed. This concept formed a large component of the Nazi mindset. The phrase first occurs in the title of a 1920 book, Die Freigabe der Vernichtung Lebensunwerten Lebens, (Release for Annihilation of Life Unworthy of Life) by Karl Binding and Alfred Hoche.
People considered to be deviant or a source of social turmoil were put together in this category. The deviant category included the mentally or physically disabled, political dissidents, homosexuals or criminals; the social turmoil category included the clergy, communists, Jews, Roma, Sami, Jehovah's Witnesses, Slavs, and a variety of other groups in society. More than any other of these groups, the Jews soon became the primary focus of this ideology.
This ideology found its purest expression in extermination camps built and operated by the Nazis during the Holocaust in order to systematically kill these and other groups that the Nazis decided were unfit to be permitted to live. It also justified various human experimentation, and eugenics programs, as well as racial policies.
