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5. Conformity and Obedience
When you think of the long and gloomy history of man, you find more hideous crimes have been committed in the name of obedience than have ever been committed in the name of rebellion. C. P. SNOW
OVERVIEW
C hapter 4 considered how Germany became a totalitarian state. This chapter looks at
why the German people allowed it to happen. Chapters 1 and 2 offered insights into the importance we, as individuals, place on our membership in various groups. This chapter shows how the Nazis took advantage of that yearning to belong. It describes, in Fritz Stern’s words, how they used the “twin instruments of propaganda and terror” to coerce and cajole a people into giving up their freedom. A character in George Orwell’s 1984 , a novel that details life in a state much like Nazi Germany, offers another view of the process.
Already we are breaking down the habits of thought which have survived from before the Revolution. We have cut the links between child and parent, and between man and man, and between man and woman. No one dares trust a wife or a child or a friend any longer... There will be no loyalty, except loyalty toward the Party. There will be no love, except the love of Big Brother. There will be no laughter, except the laugh of triumph over a defeated enemy. There will be no art, no literature, no science. When we are omnipotent we shall have no more need of science. There will be no distinction between beauty and ugliness. There will be no curiosity, no employment of the process of life. All competing pleasures will be destroyed. But always... there will be the intoxication of power, constantly increasing and constantly growing subtler. Always, at every moment, there will be the thrill of victory, the sensation of trampling on an enemy who is helpless. If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face – forever.
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Others argue that the process of transforming a democratic society into a totalitarian one was not quite so simple. They note that “life is almost always more complicated than we think. Behind the gleaming ranks of those who seem totalitarian robots stand men and women, various and diverse, complex and complicated, some brave, some cowardly, some brainwashed, some violently idiosyncratic, and all of them very human.” 1
READING 1
A Matter of Obedience?
I n her study of totalitarian regimes, Hannah Arendt wondered, “How do average, even admirable, people become dehumanized by the critical circumstances pressing in on them?” In the 1960s, Stanley Milgram, a professor at Yale University, decided to find out by recruiting college students to take part in what he called “a study of the effects of punishment on learning.” In Milgram’s words, “The point of the experiment is to see how far a person will proceed in a concrete and measurable situation in which he is ordered to inflict increasing pain on a protesting victim... At what point will the subject refuse to obey the experimenter?”^2 Working with pairs, Milgram designated one volunteer as “teacher” and the other as “learner.” As the “teacher” watched, the “learner” was strapped into a chair with an electrode attached to each wrist. The “learner” was then told to memorize word pairs for a test and warned that wrong answers would result in electric shocks. The “learner” was, in fact, a member of Milgram’s team. The real focus of the experiment was the “teacher.” Each was taken to a separate room and seated before a “shock generator” with switches ranging from 15 volts labeled “slight shock” to 450 volts labeled “danger – severe shock.” Each “teacher” was told to administer a “shock” for each wrong answer. The shock was to increase by fifteen volts every time the “learner” responded incorrectly. The volunteer received a practice shock before the test began to get an idea of the pain involved. Before the experiment began, Milgram hypothesized that most volunteers would refuse to give electric shocks of more than 150 volts. A group of psychologists and psychiatrists predicted that less than one-tenth of 1 percent of the volunteers would administer all 450 volts. To everyone’s amazement, 65 percent gave the full 450 volts! Later Milgram tried to isolate the factors that encouraged obedience by varying parts of the experiment. In one variation, he repeated the test in a less academic setting. Obedience dropped to nearly 48 percent, still a very high number. In another variation, the volunteers received instructions by telephone rather than in person. Without an authority figure in the room, only 21 percent continued to the end. Milgram also noted that when no one
This reading introduces the concepts that are key to this chapter. Those concepts will be expanded in later readings.
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side of human nature surfaced. We were horrified because we saw some boys (guards) treat others as if they were despicable animals, taking pleasure in cruelty, while other boys (prisoners) became servile, dehumanized robots who thought only of escape, of their own individual survival and of their mounting hatred for the guards.^4
CONNECTIONS
Milgram has defined obedience as “the psychological mechanism that links individual action to political purpose.” How do you define the word? What is blind obedience? How does it differ from other forms of obedience? What is the difference between obedience and conformity?
What encourages obedience? Is it fear of punishment? A desire to please? A need to go along with the group? A belief in authority? Record your ideas in your journal so that you can refer to them later.
Æ Obedience, a documentary describing the Milgram experiment, is available from the
Facing History Resource Center. After watching the film, discuss the following questions.
As students watch the film, some laugh. How do you account for that laughter? Is it because something was funny or was there another reason? Those who study human behavior say that laughter can be a way of relieving tension, showing embarrassment, or expressing relief that someone else is “on the spot.” Which explanation is most appropriate in this case? How did the volunteers act as they administered the shocks? What did they say? What pressures were placed on them as the experiment continued? How did they decide whether to stop? Did you identify with any of the volunteers you observed in Obedience?
Zimbardo said that he “called off the [prison] experiment not because of the horror I saw out there in the prison yard, but because of the horror of realizing that I could have easily traded places with the most brutal guard or become the weakest prisoner full of hatred at being so powerless that I could not eat, sleep or go to the toilet without permission of the authorities.”^5 How would you like to think you would react?
A student who took part in an experiment set up by Zimbardo on deafness-induced paranoia expressed a dilemma posed by experiments like those of Milgram and Zimbardo. “I agree with the people who say it’s not right to deceive human beings; it’s not right to treat people as if they were mice. But I agree with Professor Zimbardo that he couldn’t do his work on deafness and paranoia without deceiving his subjects, because if they knew what was going on, they wouldn’t react the same as if they didn’t. I can see
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both sides. That’s my dilemma, and I don’t think there’s any simple answer to it, only complicated ones.”^6 What is your position on “research through deception?” Should scientists be allowed to carry out such experiments?
Sociologists Herbert Kelman and V. Lee Hamilton related Milgram’s experiments to events during the Vietnam War. They characterized incidents like the My Lai massacre in which an American armed forces unit destroyed a hamlet and killed hundreds of women and children as a “crime of obedience.” What does that phrase mean to you? Can obedience be a crime? If so, give an example you have seen or read about. If not, explain why obedience can never be a crime.
Æ The Wave , an award-winning film, re-creates Ron Jones’s classroom “experiment,” the Third Wave. It raises important questions about conformity, peer pressure, and loyalty. Both the video and a transcript are available from the Facing History Resource Center. A teacher said of her students’ responses, “They were spellbound. Most felt they would have joined the Third Wave; they used phrases like ‘the power of belonging’ and we discussed the vulnerability in us that makes us want to be part of a group, especially if it’s elite.” As you watch the film or read the transcript, think about the way you responded.
What did it teach you about yourself? About why many people are attracted to a particular leader or want desperately to be part of a particular group? How might you have felt if you had been a student in Jones’ class? Did he have a right to manipulate students to “teach them a lesson?” Would your answer be different if students had known in advance they were taking part in an “experiment”?
Some teachers use simulations to engage students “emotionally” or simulate affective experiences and learning. Unless a simulation includes a cognitive component, however, it has little or no learning value. It may even leave some students with the impression that they now “know what it was like” to have been a victim of the Nazis. That is just not true. Keep in mind that simulations also tend to oversimplify events and leave students with an inaccurate picture of the past. In addition, a number of simulations reinforce stereotypes; build on students’ fears or insecurities; encourage ridicule; or violate the trust between student and teacher.
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buildings were to bedeck themselves with swastika flags. After dark came a torchlight parade which wound through the whole of Thalburg. Participating were the various Nazi and Nationalist paramilitary units, all the sports clubs in Thalburg, all the various veterans’ and patriotic societies, all the schools, and such miscellaneous groups as the Artisans’ Training Club, the clerks and mail carriers from the post office, and the Volunteer Fire Department. Led by the town band, the SA band, and the SA fife-and-drum corps, the parade finally came to a halt in the city park, where [the local leader of the Nazi party] gave a speech in which he praised the new unity of Germany: “The individual is nothing; the Volk is everything. Once we unite internally, then we shall defeat the external foe. Then it will be ‘Germany above all in the world.’” Upon this cue the crowd sang Deutchland ueber Alles and then dispersed. 7
The rally itself took place in the evening, in keeping with Hitler’s warning to party officials: “Never try to convert a crowd to your point of view in the morning sun. Instead dim lights are useful – especially the evening when people are tired, their powers of resistance are low, and their ‘complete emotional capitulation’ is easy to achieve.” To heighten those emotions, the Nazis often played the music of Richard Wagner, a nineteenth-century composer who was both an antisemite and a strong German nationalist. His operas, which are based on German legends and myths, show the German people as Hitler wanted them shown – as mighty, inspiring, energetic, and patriotic. In 1934, William Shirer, then a young reporter, saw Adolf Hitler for the first time at the largest of the annual rallies. He wrote in his diary:
Like a Roman emperor Hitler rode into this medieval town [Nurembergl at sundown, past solid phalanxes of wildly cheering Germans who packed the narrow streets... Tens of thousands of Swastika flags blot out the Gothic beauties of the place, the facades of the old houses, the gabled roofs. The streets, hardly wider than alleys, are a sea of brown and black uniforms... About ten o’clock tonight I got caught in a mob of ten thousand hysterics who jammed the moat in front of Hitler’s hotel, shouting: “We want our Fuehrer.” I was a little shocked at the faces, especially those of the women , when Hitler finally appeared on the balcony for a moment... They looked up at him as if he were a Messiah, their faces transformed into something positively inhuman.^8
The next day, Shirer wrote:
I’m beginning to comprehend, I think, some of the reasons for Hitler’s astounding success. Borrowing a chapter from the Roman Church, he is restoring pageantry and colour and mysticism to the drab lives of twentieth-century Germans. The morning’s opening meeting in the huge Luitpold Hall on the outskirts of Nuremberg was more than a
No trick was overlooked: the advantage of oratory over written argument; the effects of lighting, atmosphere, symbols, and the crowd; the advantage of meetings held at night when the power to resist suggestions is low. Leadership works by skillful use of suggestion, of collective hypnosis, of subconscious motivation.
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colorful show; it had something of the mysticism and religious fervor of an Easter or a Christmas Mass in a great Gothic cathedral. The hall was a sea of brightly colored flags. Even Hitler’s arrival was made dramatic. The band stopped playing. There was a hush over the thirty thousand people packed in the hall. Then the band struck up the “Badenweiler March,” a very catchy tune and used only, I’m told, when Hitler makes his big entries. Hitler appeared in the back of the auditorium and followed by his aides, [Hermann] Goering, [Joseph] Goebbels, [Rudolf] Hess and [Heinrich] Himmler, and the others, he strode slowly down the wide center aisle while thirty thousand hands raised in salute. It is a ritual, the old-times say, which is always followed. 9
At another rally – one for party officials – an observer wrote:
As Adolf Hitler is entering the Zeppelin Field, 150 floodlights of the Air Force blaze up. They are distributed around the entire square, and cut into the night, erecting a canopy of light in the midst of darkness. For a moment, all is deathly quiet. The surprise still is too great. Nothing like it has ever been seen before. The wide field resembles a powerful Gothic cathedral made of light. Bluish-violet shine the floodlights, and between their cone of light hangs the dark cloth of night. One hundred and forty thousand people – for it must be that many who are assembled here
- cannot tear their eyes away from the sight. Are we dreaming, or is it real? Is it possible to imagine a thing like that? A cathedral of light? They do not have much time to pursue such thoughts, for a new spectacle is awaiting them. It is perhaps even more beautiful and compelling for those whose senses can embrace it ...Twenty-five thousand flags, that means 25,000 local, district, and factory groups from all over the nation... Every one of these flag bearers is ready to give his life in the defense of every one of these pieces of cloth. There is not one among them to whom this flag is not the final command and the highest obligation.^10
Even those who did not attend the rallies were caught up in the spirit they evoked. Horst Kruger lived in Eichkamp, a Berlin suburb. People there were skeptical of Hitler at first, but many quickly changed their minds.
Suddenly over this tiny green oasis of the nonpolitical, the storm of the wide world had broken, not a storm of politics, but a springtime storm, a storm of German rejuvenation. Who wouldn’t want to trim his sails for it? The black, white, and red flags of Imperial Germany, which the citizens of Eichkamp had always displayed in preference to the black-red-gold ones of the republic, were now joined by Nazi flags, many small and some large, often homemade, with a black swastika on a white ground; in their hurry, some people had sewn the swastika on backwards, but their good intentions were evident just the same.
Suddenly one was a somebody, part of a better class of people, on a higher level – a German.
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dence can you find in this reading to support Sabine’s conclusion? How does his analysis help explain why Bergmann experienced shame and humiliation when he recalled his attraction to the Nazis?
ÆTwo videotapes document Nazi rallies. Swastika is a compilation of Nazi film footage put together by the British after World War II. The Triumph of the Will, a documentary of the 1934 Nuremberg rally, is the work of Leni Riefenstahl, a Nazi filmmaker. Both are available from the Facing History Resource Center. Riefenstahl once said, “The object of propaganda has little to do with truth. Its object is to make people lose their judgment.” In watching either film, it is important not to get caught up in the feelings it is designed to evoke. Begin by describing exactly what you observed without interpretation or judgment. Then analyze the film. What message does it convey? Who is sending that message? Who is it for? How did the director make the film attractive to that group? What emotions does he or she try to evoke? How are symbols and visual images used to arouse those emotions?
ÆEven Jews living in Germany were sometimes caught up in the excitement of National Socialism. In the novel Friedrich, a young Jewish boy accompanies a non-Jewish friend to a meeting of Hitler Youth. He tells the friend, “You know, I saw you all marching through town with your flag and singing. I think it’s really great. I’d love to take part, but Father won’t let me join the Jungvolk.” For a similar incident, see the story of Janet B. in Elements of Time, pages 157-160. Her testimony can also be seen in the video montage Friedrich, available from the Facing History Resource Center.
Hans and Sophie Scholl were among those who became enamored with the Nazi movement in 1933. Their older sister, Inge, recalled, “For the first time politics entered our lives. Hans at the time was fifteen years old; Sophie was twelve. We heard a great deal of talk about Fatherland, comradeship, community of the Volk, and love of homeland.” For more, see Elements of Time, pages 158-159.
READING 3
Propaganda
T he Nazis used propaganda to sway the people of Eichkamp and other cities and towns. As Minister of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda, Joseph Goebbels was responsible for creating it. His job was to make sure that every form of expression – from music to textbooks and even sermons – trumpeted the same message. In his diary, Goebbels wrote, “That propaganda is good which leads to success, and that is bad which fails to achieve the desired result, however
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intelligent it is, for it is not propaganda’s task to be intelligent; its task is to lead to success. Therefore, no one can say your propaganda is too rough, too mean; these are not criteria by which it may be characterized. It ought not be decent nor ought it be gentle or soft or humble; it ought to lead to success... Never mind whether propaganda is at a well- bred level; what matters is that it achieves its purpose.” To achieve that purpose, Hitler insisted that “it must be limited to a very few points and must harp on these in slogans until the last member of the public understands what you want him to understand by your slogan. As soon as you sacrifice this slogan and try to be many-sided, the effect will piddle away.” Hitler and Goebbels did not invent propaganda. The word itself was coined by the Catholic Church to describe its efforts to counter Protestant teachings in the 1600s. Over the years, almost every nation has used propaganda to unite its people in wartime. Both sides spread propaganda during World War I, for example. Hitler and Goebbels employed it in very similar ways. They, too, wanted to counter the teachings of their opponents, shape public opinion, and build loyalty. But in doing so, they took the idea to new extremes. Goebbels left nothing to chance. He controlled every word heard over the radio or read in a newspaper or magazine. And that control went well beyond censorship. He issued daily instructions on what to say and how to say it. Max von der Gruen said of those changes:
All the activities of everyday life were given a military orientation. This military aura extended even into the realm of language. Henceforth one heard only: instead of “employment office” – “labor mobilization”… instead of “worker” – “soldier of labor” instead of “work” – “service to Fuehrer and folk”... instead of “factory meeting” – “factory roll call”... instead of “production” – “the production battle.” It is easy to understand that if, for whatever reasons, these words are hammered into a person’s brain every day, they soon become a part of his language, and he does not necessarily stop and think about where they came from and why they were coined in the first place.^13
The power to label ideas, events, groups, and individuals was central to Nazi efforts. Such labels made it clear who were the heroes and who were the enemies. In the process, the Nazis defined themselves as the guardians of the “true” Germany and the custodians of the nation’s glorious past.
CONNECTIONS
Give an example of propaganda. Then compare your example with others in your class. What do they have in common? Use your answer to define propaganda. How do dictionaries define the word? What is the difference between persuasion in advertising and propaganda?
The power to label ideas, events, groups, and individuals was central to Nazi efforts. Such labels made it clear who were the heroes and who were the enemies.
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apply to the Nazi state? To nations today? Moyers’ ideas about propaganda and its effects on memory are taken from an interview conducted by Margot Stern Strom. The complete interview is available on video from the Facing History Resource Center. A summary of his presentation also appears in Elements of Time, pages 367-368.
Sybil Milton, senior historian and chief researcher at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, discusses the power of both positive and negative images in Nazi propaganda in a presentation summarized in Elements of Time , pages 368-370.
READING 4
Propaganda and Sports
I n 1936, the Olympics took place in Germany. The international event gave the Nazis a chance to show the world the power of the “new Germany.” In the past, Germany was not considered a strong contender in the Olympics. Now German athletes won medal after medal, as German newspapers boasted that the nation was breeding a superior race. Yet the most outstanding athlete at the Olympics that year was not a German but an American. Max von der Gruen, who was ten years old that summer, later recalled,
Although it was drummed into our heads every day that anything or anyone non- German was completely worthless, a black man became our idol: the American Jesse Owens, winner of four Olympic medals. In the playing field we used to play at being Jesse Owens; whoever could jump the farthest or run the fastest or throw some object the greatest distance became Jesse Owens. When our teachers heard us, they forbade us to play such games, but they never replied to our question of how a black man, a member of an “inferior” race, could manage to be such a consummate athlete.^15
Marion Freyer Wolff was also ten years old that summer. As a Jew living in Berlin, her memories are bittersweet:
In August 1936, the free world honored Hitler by allowing the Olympic Games to be held in Berlin. Hitler was so eager to have them in Germany that he was willing to make some minor compromises: stores and restaurants removed their We Don’t Serve Jews signs for the duration of the event, and Jewish athletes participated in the games. Three Jewish women, representing Hungary, Germany, and Austria, won medals in fencing and received them from the hand of Hitler himself!...
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The success of the Jewish athletes received no notice in the German press, but nobody could hide the fact that Jesse Owens, the black American sprinter, had earned four gold medals. I wondered how Hitler, who fancied himself a member of the super race, must have felt when he met this “inferior” non-Aryan again and again in the winner’s circle. To the Jewish kids of Berlin, Jesse Owens became an instant idol and morale booster.^16
How did Hitler respond? When urged to congratulate Owens in the interest of good sportsmanship, the Fuehrer shouted. “Do you really think that I will allow myself to be photographed shaking hands with a Negro?” Most visitors paid no attention to the slur. They focused instead on what Von der Gruen called “the sugar-coated facade of the Third Reich.” Among those visitors was David Lloyd George, a former British prime minister who had negotiated the Treaty of Versailles. After meeting with Hitler, he wrote:
Whatever one may think of his methods – and they are certainly not those of a parliamentary country – there can be no doubt that he has achieved a marvellous transformation in the spirit of the people, in their attitude towards each other, and in their social and economic outlook… It is true that public criticism of the Government is forbidden in every form. That does not mean that criticism is absent. I have heard the speeches of prominent Nazi orators freely condemned. But not a word of criticism or disapproval have I heard of Hitler. He is as immune from criticism as a king in a monarchical country. He is something more. He is the George Washington of Germany – the man who won for his country independence from her oppressors.^17
A monument to Jesse Owens created by a Facing History student.
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The Nazis also exhibited “degenerate art.” That show was held in Munich too. To create the exhibit, a commission selected the 650 most “depraved” works of art from 16,000 paintings, drawings, prints, and sculptures confiscated from 32 German museums. Among the artists they singled out were George Grosz, Kaethe Kollwitz, and Wassily Kandinsky. The Nazis then grouped the art into such categories as “Insults to German Womanhood” and “Nature as Seen by Sick Minds.” Next to each work, they hung a caption complaining about the price of the painting, its “Jewish-Bolshevik” leanings (actually only six of the 112 artists featured were Jewish), or its depiction of “cretins,” “idiots,” and “cripples.” Over a four-year period, about three million people saw the exhibit in thirteen cities. When the show was over, about half of the art was destroyed. The rest was hidden in vaults. The third exhibit, called Der Ewige Jude (The Eternal Jew), featured art that showed Jews as communists, swindlers, and sex-fiends. The Nazis used it to “teach” antisemitism. It, too, was well- attended. Over 150,000 people saw the exhibit in just three days. The art included in the show later found its way into a variety of publications, including children’s books.
CONNECTIONS
Is “a picture worth a thousand words”? What can pictures do that words cannot do? Which makes a stronger impression on you?
The word degenerate means “evil” or “corrupt”; the word decadent, “decaying” or “rotting.” Why do you think Hitler used these adjectives to describe art he considered “unGerman”?
ÆAn important lesson on propaganda is available from the Facing History Resource Center. In examining the propaganda piece included in that lesson or the one on this page:
Look at the image and describe it exactly as you see it. Reserve judgment. Notice how the artist uses color, shape, space, and perspective to communicate a message. Look, too, for the way the artist uses symbols. What emotion is the artist trying to evoke? What is the message? To whom is it directed? Is it a single message? Or do others in your class interpret the work in other ways? Finally, make your own judgment about the poster.
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Keep in mind that art is never objective: art is always subjective. It forces a viewer to adjust his or her perception in order to make a decision about the value and meaning of a particular work of art.
After World War II, the nations that defeated Germany had to decide what to do with art that glorified the Nazis. What would you have done?
Why did the Nazis find the works of art they considered “degenerate” so threatening? How were their attempts to destroy that art similar to the book burnings of 1933? What differences seem most striking? For a more detailed discussion of “degenerate” art, see the articles by Sybil Milton and David Joselit in Elements of Time, pages 368-372.
In 1991, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art displayed 175 works of art that were a part of Hitler’s original exhibit of “degenerate art.” The catalog for that exhibit is available from the Facing History Resource Center. Since then, other museums have shown the exhibit as well.
READING 6
Using Film as Propaganda
T he Nazis were quick to see a potential for propaganda in a new form of art: film. It allowed them to combine visuals and words in ways that would have been impossible a few years earlier. Every movie made in Nazi Germany had a political function, even comedies. In each, Jews were always portrayed as villains or fools. The most inflammatory antisemitic films were The Rothschilds, Jud Suess, and Der Ewige Jude (The Eternal Jew). Goebbels even issued special instructions on how these movies were to be described. The Rothschilds and Jud Suess, for example, were to be treated as “faithful reenactments” of historical events. Therefore one publication referred to The Rothschilds as an historical account of the way Jews profited from England’s victory over Napoleon “while nations are bleeding on the battlefield.” Napoleon’s defeat was a “victory won by gold, a Rothschild victory, a victory for the Star of David.” A brochure sent out by the information office stated, “Clean-shaven and dressed like a gentleman, the Jew Suess Oppenheimer contrives to be appointed Finance Minister to the Duke of Wuerttemberg... Matching one another in treachery, the court Jew and Minister Suess Oppenheimer and his secretary outbid one another in tricks and intrigue to bleed the people of Wuerttemberg... The Jew Suess Oppenheimer violates the beautiful Dorothea Sturm, an outrageous act which confirms the extent of his guilt... Jew, hands off German women!”
In the beginning we create the enemy. We think others to death and then invent the battle-axe or the ballistic missiles with which to actually kill them. Propaganda precedes technology.
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examples can you find in current events? Sam Keen’s book, Faces of the Enemy, and the video by the same name, explore both questions in great detail and demonstrate that images of the enemy are remarkably similar in cultures around the world. Both the book and the video are available from the Facing History Resource Center.
ÆBill Moyers interviewed Fritz Hippler, the producer of Der Ewige Jude, fifty years after he made the film. Moyers later said that he was “struck by the cold realization that [Hippler] thought the only mistake Hitler had made was to lose the war. Here he was in 1981, sitting there in the reconstructed Germany of our times, regretting only that he, Hippler, and Adolf Hitler had been on the losing side.” The Propaganda Battle, a video that contains the complete interview with Hippler, is available from the Facing History Resource Center. The video also includes an interview with Frank Capra who made propaganda films for the United States during World War II.
Bohdan Wytwycky writes, “One of the effects of prejudice directed at whole categories of people is that it robs these people of their humanity. Made stereotypes of evil, stupidity and social disease, the victims are forced to travel the first leg of the journey to subhuman status. Made a depository of inferior or socially pathological traits, they receive a rude shove down the slippery slope to total dehumanization.”^21 How was that process evident in the way the Nazis used films to stereotype Jews?
ÆHow does the media shape our views of ourselves and others? African Americans make up about twelve percent of the population of the United States but represent only about three percent of the positive images projected by advertising. The images not only affect how they are seen but also how they view themselves. The video Color Adjustments documents the way African Americans are portrayed on television. You may wish to collect news stories, advertisements, and editorials that refer to African Americans or to another minority group – Arab Americans, Japanese Americans, Native Americans, or Puerto Ricans. How often was the group portrayed in a positive manner? In a negative way? After reporting your findings to the class, discuss how the media shapes our views of ourselves and others.
ÆA video, The World Is a Dangerous Place: Images of the Enemy on Children’s Television, is available from the Facing History Resource Center. What does it suggest about the power of images today? What can we do to protect ourselves from being manipulated by propaganda? What techniques would you recommend?
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READING 7
School for Barbarians
H itler believed he was on side of the history. He claimed that “When an opponent declares, ‘I will not come over to your side,’ I calmly say, ‘Your child belongs to us already. You will pass on. Your descendants, however, now stand in the new camp. In a short time they will know nothing else but this new community.’” In Hitler’s mind, young Germans were the key. In speech after speech, he declared:
We older ones are used up. Yes, we are old already... We are cowardly and sentimental... But my magnificent youngsters? Are there finer ones anywhere in the world? Look at these young men and boys? What material! With them I can make a new world... A violently active, dominating, intrepid, brutal youth – that is what I am after. Youth must be all those things. It must be indifferent to pain. There must be no weakness or tenderness in it. 1 want to see once more in its eyes the gleam of pride and independence of the beast of prey... I intend to have an athletic youth – that is the first and the chief thing... I will have no intellectual training. Knowledge is ruin to my young men.
By 1939, about 90 percent of the “Aryan” children in Germany belonged to Nazi youth groups. They started at the age of six. At ten, boys were initiated into the Jungvolk and at fourteen promoted to the Hitler Youth or HJ (for Hitler Jugend). Girls belonged to the Jungmaedel and then the BDM (the Bund Deutscher Maedel or the League of German Girls). In such groups, said Hitler, “These young people will learn nothing else but how to think German and act German... And they will never be free again, not in their whole lives.” Erika Mann, a German who opposed the Nazis, wrote a book called School for Barbarians. It explained to Americans how the Nazis tried to carry out Hitler’s ideas.
Every child says “Heil Hitler!” from 50 to 150 times a day, immeasurably more often than the old neutral greetings. The formula is required by law; if you meet a friend on the way to school, you say it; study periods are opened and closed with “Heil Hitler!”; “Heil Hitler!” says the postman, the street-car conductor, the girl who sells you notebooks at the stationery store; and if your parents’ first words when you come home to lunch are not “Heil Hitler!” they have been guilty of a punishable offense, and can be denounced. “Heil Hitler!” they shout, in the Jungvolk and Hitler Youth. “Heil Hitler!” cry the girls in the League of German Girls. Your evening prayers must close with “Heil Hitler!” if you take your devotions seriously.
When an opponent declares, “I will not come over to your side,” I calmly say, “Your child belongs to us already... You will pass on. Your descendants, however, now stand in the new camp. In a short time they will know nothing else but this new community.”
