Having just learned that federal employees were directed to not only support the policies of the administration but also inform management on those who did not, my minds eye took me back many, many years ago, when as a teenager, I worked Thursdays and Fridays after school at the family fish market.

Among my regular customers were what I called the “gray people.” They were soft-spoken with an Eastern European accent, and had numbers tattooed on the inside of their forearms. I wondered how many were sent to concentration camps after being informed on by their neighbors.

In the words of Pastor Martin Niemoller: “First they came for the Communists / And I did not speak out / Because I was not a Communist … Then they came for the Jews / And I did not speak out / Because I was not a Jew / Then they came for me / And there was no one left / To speak out for me.”

John Priolo

Pearl City

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