Hitler was a Leftist Socialist
Politics
| January 30, 2004
| Tim
We are socialists, we are enemies of today's capitalistic economic system for the exploitation of the economically weak, with its unfair salaries, with its unseemly evaluation of a human being according to wealth and property instead of responsibility and performance, and we are all determined to destroy this system under all conditions. Adolph Hitler
As a kid, I was always taught (in school, mind you) that Hitler was some kind of right-winger, a "facist" -- if he was an American, he'd be a Republican. I cannot recall anyone ever explaining why this should be so, but I also remember this not making any sense as far as my tiny mind could reason about it.
I mean, after all, he was from the National Socialist Party, right? How would that make him not a socialist? His religion was an occultic sect which was a lot closer to the New Age movement (which is full of socialists and greens) than something like Christianity. (And, in fact, quite a few clergy went to jail.) He exerted state control over industry. And his eugenics was based on Darwinism and the lastest "science" of the times, also embraced by people who are currently viewed as leftists, like Planned Parenthood founder Margaret Sanger.
I failed to understand how any of this made Hitler anything but a socialist.
John Jay Ray, author of Dissecting Leftism weighs in to the same effect, with his eye-opening paper "Hitler was a Socialist". If the question interests you, it's worth a read or bookmark. It contains countless examples of Hitler's policies which, if one is considering the question as one reads, demonstrate how close Hitler's own views and policies were to those embraced by contemporary leftists.
A few highlights...
General Outlook
Ed Feser:
He had been something of a bohemian in his youth, and always regarded young people and their idealism as the key to progress and the overcoming of outmoded prejudices. And he was widely admired by the young people of his country, many of whom belonged to organizations devoted to practicing and propagating his teachings. He had a lifelong passion for music, art, and architecture, and was even something of a painter. He rejected what he regarded as petty bourgeois moral hang-ups, and he and his girlfriend "lived together" for years. He counted a number of homosexuals as friends and collaborators, and took the view that a man's personal morals were none of his business; some scholars of his life believe that he himself may have been homosexual or bisexual. He was ahead of his time where a number of contemporary progressive causes are concerned: he disliked smoking, regarding it as a serious danger to public health, and took steps to combat it; he was a vegetarian and animal lover; he enacted tough gun control laws; and he advocated euthanasia for the incurably ill.
Economic Redistribution
socialism - any of various economic and political theories advocating collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods Miriam-Webster Dictionary
Policy manifesto written by Adolph Hitler, 1925:
9. All citizens of the State shall be equal as regards rights and duties.
10. The first duty of every citizen must be to work mentally or physically. The activities of the individual may not clash with the interests of the whole, but must proceed within the frame of the community and be for the general good.
Therefore we demand:
11. That all unearned income, and all income that does not arise from work, be abolished.
12. Since every war imposes on the people fearful sacrifices in life and property, all personal profit arising from the war must be regarded as a crime against the people. We therefore demand the total confiscation of all war profits whether in assets or material.
13. We demand the nationalization of businesses which have been organized into cartels.
14. We demand that all the profits from wholesale trade shall be shared out.
15. We demand extensive development of provision for old age.
16. We demand the creation and maintenance of a healthy middle-class, the immediate communalization of department stores which will be rented cheaply to small businessmen, and that preference shall be given to small businessmen for provision of supplies needed by the State, the provinces and municipalities.
17. We demand a land reform in accordance with our national requirements, and the enactment of a law to confiscate from the owners without compensation any land needed for the common purpose. The abolition of ground rents, and the prohibition of all speculation in land.
State Economic Control
Leonard Peikoff:
Contrary to the Marxists, the Nazis did not advocate public ownership of the means of production. They did demand that the government oversee and run the nation's economy. The issue of legal ownership, they explained, is secondary; what counts is the issue of CONTROL. Private citizens, therefore, may continue to hold titles to property -- so long as the state reserves to itself the unqualified right to regulate the use of their property.
Adolph Hitler, 1931:
What matters is to emphasize the fundamental idea in my party's economic program clearly -- the idea of authority. I want the authority; I want everyone to keep the property he has acquired for himself according to the priniciple: benefit to the community precedes benefit to the individual. But the state should retain supervision and each property owner should consider himself appointed by the state. It is his duty not to use his property against the interests of others among his own people. This is the crucial matter. The Third Reich will always retain its right to control the owners of property.
(How is this different than any other non-Marxist socialist government?)
John Ray:
He championed the rights of workers, regarded capitalist society as brutal and unjust, and sought a third way between communism and the free market. In this regard, he and his associates greatly admired the strong steps taken by President Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal to take large-scale economic decision-making out of private hands and put it into those of government planning agencies. His aim was to institute a brand of socialism that avoided the inefficiencies that plagued the Soviet variety, and many former communists found his program highly congenial.
And:
And while Hitler did not nationalize all industry, there was extensive compulsory reorganization of it and tight party control over it. It might be noted that even in the post-war Communist bloc there was never total nationalization of industry. In fact, in Poland, most agriculture always remained in private hands.
And:
This policy is broadly similar to the once much acclaimed Swedish model of socialism in more recent times, so it is amusing that it has often been this policy which has underpinned the common claim that Hitler was Rightist. What is Leftist in Sweden was apparently Rightist in Hitler!
Environmentalism
Andrew Bolt, emphases mine:
Hitler also banned medical experiments on animals, but not, as we know to our grief, on Jewish children. And he created many national parks, particularly for Germany's "sacred" forests.
This isn't a coincidence. The Nazis drew heavily on a romantic, anti-science, nature worshipping, communal and anti-capitalist movement that tied German identity to German forests. In fact, Professor Raymond Dominick notes in his book, The Environmental Movement in Germany, two-thirds of the members of Germany's main nature clubs had joined the Nazi Party by 1939, compared with just 10 per cent of all men.
The Nazis also absorbed the German Youth Movement, the Wandervogel, which talked of our mystical relationship with the earth. Peter Staudenmaier, co-author of Ecofascism: Lessons from the German Experience, says it was for the Wandervogel that the philosopher Ludwig Klages wrote his influential essay Man and Earth in 1913.
In it, Klages warned of the growing extinction of species, the destruction of forests, the genocide of aboriginal peoples, the disruption of the ecosystem and the killing of whales. People were losing their relationship with nature, he warned.
Gun Control
John Ray:
But surely Hitler was at least like US conservatives in being a "gun nut"? Far from it. Weimar (pre-Hitler) Germany did have restrictions on private ownership of firearms but the Nazis introduced even further restrictions when they came to power. The Nazi Weapons Law (or Waffengesetz), which restricted the possession of militarily useful weapons and forbade trade in weapons without a government-issued license, was passed by the Reichstag ("State Assembly" -- i.e. the German Federal Parliament) on March 18, 1938.
Nationalism
Hitler's party was the National Socialist Party -- its aim was to be (unsuprisingly) both national and socialist.
Some claim is that since Hitler was a nationalist (patriot), he couldn't possibly be a socialist. This is amusing, given the recent effort in the US of many of our left-leaning citizens to earnestly assert the opposite: That leftism is not unpatriotic.
Ray:
With the Nazis you could be both a socialist and a full-blooded nationalist. Hitler was thus simply the most effective figure in showing that socialism and nationalism, far from being intrinsically opposed, could be very successfully integrated into an electorally appealing whole.
And:
Although many modern-day US Democrats often seem to be anti-American, the situation is rather different in Australia and Britain. Both the major Leftist parties there (the Australian Labor Party and the British Labour Party) are perfectly patriotic parties which express pride in their national traditions and achievements. Nobody seems to have convinced them that you cannot be both Leftist and nationalist.
Alliances
Ray, on support from German labor unions:
The fact that Hitler appealed to the German voter as basically a rather extreme social democrat is also shown by the fact that the German Social Democrats (orthodox democratic Leftists who controlled the unions as well as a large Reichstag deputation) at all times refused appeals from the German Communist party for co-operation against the Nazis.
On opposition from conservatives:
Both in Germany and Britain he despised them and they despised him. Far from being an ally of Hitler or in any way sympathetic to him, Hitler's most unrelenting foe was the arch-Conservative British politician, Winston Churchill and it was a British Conservative Prime Minister (Neville Chamberlain) who eventually declared war on Hitler's Germany. Hitler found a willing ally in the Communist Stalin as long as he wanted it but at no point could he wring even neutrality out of Churchill.
Update: Further Reading
Since I wrote this six months ago, I've discovered a number of good resources for similar information. There's Dr. John Ray's "Hitler was a Lefist" website, broken down into different areas, and also an interesting book review by Anthony Flew of George Waton's "The Lost Works of Socialism". In particular, Flew writes:
For those of us born before World War II, the most interesting section of the book is that dealing with the intellectual relations between the teachings of Adolf Hitler and those of Marx and his professed followers among Hitler’s contemporaries. In his autobiography, and in recorded conversations with intimates among his own followers, Hitler said such things as, “I have learned a great deal from Marxism, as I do not hesitate to admit,” that “the whole of National Socialism is based on Marx,” and that without racist commitments his own political movement “would really do nothing more than compete with Marxism on its own ground.”
Hitler was not in these statements saying that he either was or ever had been a Marxist. From his first political activity, he had always been opposed to communism, but that was not because it was socialist, but because it was internationalist. Hitler, although born and raised in Austria, had always been a dedicated German nationalist.
Even those who are aware that Hitler’s party was the National Socialist German Workers’ Party have doubted the sincerity of its socialist professions. This is in part because Hitler, upon coming to power, refrained for tactical reasons from launching an immediate and extensive program of state takeovers of private industries, and in part because these skeptics have not enjoyed the benefits of Watson’s re-readings of the lost literature of socialism.
His chapter on “Marx and the Holocaust” begins by telling us that Rudolf Hoess, commandant of the infamous Auschwitz death camp, recalled in his memoirs that even at the height of the Nazi-Soviet war of 1941-45, his colleagues had respected the socialist example of an exterminatory program based on forced labor. Watson then proceeds to deploy further evidence of Soviet influence on the Nazis and to cite other relevant passages from the works of Marx, Engels, Lenin, and other socialist luminaries, all presenting candidates for or possible methods of genocide. The connection between socialism and genocide could hardly be made any clearer.
From all this, Watson concludes that “it is becoming ever more probable that it was not just the idea of genocide that the Nazis owed to Marx and the Marxists, but its detailed practice too, not excluding camps and gas chambers. The shadow of the socialist idea grows longer and longer.”
Also see John Ray's new website "Marx Words" where he posts the translated versions of some of Marx's and Engel's words, demonstrating the eerie similarity between the views of Socialism's founders and those of Adolph Hitler.
Also see another article of mine, "Myth: Hitler was a Leftist", where I decontruct a leftist's argument that Hitler had nothing to do with socialism. (His basic approach is to claim there has never been any such thing as socialism. Sure, but that's because it doesn't work, not because it wasn't tried.)
Thoughtful and well-researched, just the way I like it. Thanks for bringing this article to light!
"We are socialists, we are enemies of today's capitalistic economic system for the exploitation of the economically weak, with its unfair salaries, with its unseemly evaluation of a human being according to wealth and property instead of responsibility and performance, and we are all determined to destroy this system under all conditions." --Adolf Hitler(Speech of May 1, 1927. Quoted by Toland, 1976, p. 306)
[Below is the 25 of the NSDAP Program - This is basically the National Socialist German Workers Party Platform. It included measures that in effect would redistribute income and war profits, profit-sharing with large industries, nationalization of trusts, extensive development of old-age pension (just like FDRs Social Security Program), and free education. Clearly this demonstrates Hitler was indeed a left winger and here is startling proof.] The 25 points of the NSDAP Program were composed by Adolf Hitler and Anton Drexler. They were publically presented on 24 February 1920 "to a crowd of almost two thousand and every single point was accepted amid jubilant approval." (Mein Kampf, Volume II, Chapter I) Hitler explained their purpose in the fifth chapter of the second volume of Mein Kampf: [T]he program of the new movement was summed up in a few guiding principles, twenty-five in all. They were devised to give, primarily to the man of the people, a rough picture of the movement's aims. They are in a sense a political creed, which on the one hand recruits for the movement and on the other is suited to unite and weld together by a commonly recognized obligation those who have been recruited.Hitler was intent on having a community of mutual interest that desired mutual success instead of one that was divided over the control of money or differing values. THE COMMON INTEREST BEFORE SELF-INTEREST -THAT IS THE SPIRIT OF THE PROGRAM. BREAKING OF THE THRALDOM OF INTEREST - THAT IS THE KERNEL OF NATIONAL SOCIALISM. In these straightforward statements of intent, Hitler translated his ideology into a plan of action which would prove its popularity with the German people throughout the coming years. For many, the abruptness of its departure from the tradition of politics as practiced in the western world was as much of a shock as its liberal nature and foresight of the emerging problems of western democracy. The Programme of the German Workers' Party is designed to be of limited duration. The leaders have no intention, once the aims announced in it have been achieved, of establishing fresh ones, merely in order to increase, artificially, the discontent of the masses and so ensure the continued existence of the Party. 1. We demand the union of all Germany in a Greater Germany on the basis of the right of national self-determination. 2. We demand equality of rights for the German people in its dealings with other nations, and the revocation of the peace treaties of Versailles and Saint-Germain. 3. We demand land and territory (colonies) to feed our people and to settle our surplus population. 4. Only members of the nation may be citizens of the State. Only those of German blood, whatever be their creed, may be members of the nation. Accordingly, no Jew may be a member of the nation. 5. Non-citizens may live in Germany only as guests and must be subject to laws for aliens. 6. The right to vote on the State's government and legislation shall be enjoyed by the citizens of the State alone. We demand therefore that all official appointments, of whatever kind, whether in the Reich, in the states or in the smaller localities, shall be held by none but citizens. We oppose the corrupting parliamentary custom of filling posts merely in accordance with party considerations, and without reference to character or abilities. 7. We demand that the State shall make it its primary duty to provide a livelihood for its citizens. If it should prove impossible to feed the entire population, foreign nationals (non-citizens) must be deported from the Reich. 8. All non-German immigration must be prevented. We demand that all non-Germans who entered Germany after 2 August 1914 shall be required to leave the Reich forthwith. 9. All citizens shall have equal rights and duties. 10. It must be the first duty of every citizen to perform physical or mental work. The activities of the individual must not clash with the general interest, but must proceed within the framework of the community and be for the general good. We demand therefore: 11. The abolition of incomes unearned by work. The breaking of the slavery of interest 12. In view of the enormous sacrifices of life and property demanded of a nation by any war, personal enrichment from war must be regarded as a crime against the nation. We demand therefore the ruthless confiscation of all war profits. 13. We demand the nationalization of all businesses which have been formed into corporations (trusts). 14. We demand profit-sharing in large industrial enterprises. 15. We demand the extensive development of insurance for old age. 16. We demand the creation and maintenance of a healthy middle class, the immediate communalizing of big department stores, and their lease at a cheap rate to small traders, and that the utmost consideration shall be shown to all small traders in the placing of State and municiple orders. 17. We demand a land reform suitable to our national requirements, the passing of a law for the expropriation of land for communal purposes without compensation; the abolition of ground rent, and the prohibition of all speculation in land. * 18. We demand the ruthless prosecution of those whose activities are injurious to the common interest. Common criminals, usurers, profiteers, etc., must be punished with death, whatever their creed or race. 19. We demand that Roman Law, which serves a materialistic world order, be replaced by a German common law. 20. The State must consider a thorough reconstruction of our national system of education (with the aim of opening up to every able and hard-working German the possibility of higher education and of thus obtaining advancement). The curricula of all educational establishments must be brought into line with the requirements of practical life. The aim of the school must be to give the pupil, beginning with the first sign of intelligence, a grasp of the nation of the State (through the study of civic affairs). We demand the education of gifted children of poor parents, whatever their class or occupation, at the expense of the State. 21. The State must ensure that the nation's health standards are raised by protecting mothers and infants, by prohibiting child labor, by promoting physical strength through legislation providing for compulsory gymnastics and sports, and by the extensive support of clubs engaged in the physical training of youth. 22. We demand the abolition of the mercenary army and the foundation of a people's army. 23. We demand legal warfare on deliberate political mendacity and its dissemination in the press. To facilitate the creation of a German national press we demand: (a) that all editors of, and contributors to newspapers appearing in the German language must be members of the nation; (b) that no non-German newspapers may appear without the express permission of the State. They must not be printed in the German language; (c) that non-Germans shall be prohibited by law from participating financially in or influencing German newspapers, and that the penalty for contravening such a law shall be the suppression of any such newspaper, and the immediate deportation of the non-Germans involved. The publishing of papers which are not conducive to the national welfare must be forbidden. We demand the legal prosecution of all those tendencies in art and literature which corrupt our national life, and the suppression of cultural events which violate this demand. 24. We demand freedom for all religious denominations in the State, provided they do not threaten its existence not offend the moral feelings of the German race. The Party, as such, stands for positive Christianity, but does not commit itself to any particular denomination. It combats the Jewish-materialistic spirit within and without us, and is convinced that our nation can achieve permanent health only from within on the basis of the principle: The common interest before self-interest. 25. To put the whole of this programme into effect, we demand the creation of a strong central state power for the Reich; the unconditional authority of the political central Parliament over the entire Reich and its organizations; and the formation of Corporations based on estate and occupation for the purpose of carrying out the general legislation passed by the Reich in the various German states. The leaders of the Party promise to work ruthlessly -- if need be to sacrifice their very lives -- to translate this programme into action. Source: Programme of the NSDAP
Hitler also said "the whole of national socialism is based on Marx." This quote can be searched for and verified in many sources on the internet. He made plans for a network of communes based on land taken in the Ukraine, which would be the national socialist utopia.
Hmmm. We could use you at www.jihadwatch.org
to refute a liberal who would have everyone believe exactly the opposite. I always wondered why Robert Borke (sp?) made the statement that the nazis were liberals, and now I have a much better understanding of it. Thanks!
this is such an important message that should be available to more, it is something you don't enough of, thank you
Some quotes from the left would help reinforce the case that there is no qualitive difference between Marxism and Nazism:
eg.
"In January 1849, months before he migrated to London, Karl Marx published an article by Friedrich Engels in Die Neue Rheinische Zeitung announcing that in Central Europe only Germans, Hungarians and Poles counted as bearers of progress. The rest must go. "The chief mission of all other races and peoples, large and small, is to perish in the revolutionary holocaust."
Good quote, John. The current bunch of "liberals" has been kept utterly ignorant of how their movement and party previously supported eugenics, slavery, racism, etc.
Two words: "Social darwinism." Wasn't an idea that came from the bible, that's for sure.
Dr. John Ray is working with someone who is translating many of Marx's letters from German to English, and is showing more of the kinds of quotes you mention here, over at MarxWords. There are all kinds of quotes showing that Marx (and friends) believed in a master race, the supreme role of Germany, and it's need to control the same regions Hitler annexed, his disgust towards blacks and Jews.
For example, here's a recent entry, showing Marx spoiling for a race war between Germany and the rest of Europe, and here's another example where Marx says we need to "emancipate" the world from the "Jewery" -- a belief Hitler obviously shared.
All very appropriate leftist thinking.
The current bunch of "liberals" has been kept utterly ignorant of how their movement and party previously supported eugenics, slavery, racism, etc.
Tim, aren't you the Archie of "All in the family", exposing the 'Meatheads' of the world :)
Meathead: Wait a second, Arch. Are you saying that Nixon rules because of divine right?
Archie Bunker: It's a damn sight better than your divine left.
Meathead: Gee, what other gems did you come up with?
:D
Imran,
Remember how I recently said liberals often skip the step where they address whether something is actually true, and move directly into the name-calling and ad hominem arguments?
Sadly, your comment seems to follow that playbook pretty well. (Or is likening someone to a racist mysogynistic sexist jerk something you normally do as a friendly conversation starter?)
To address the point: I think it's a reasonable statement. I was never told about Hitler's socialist leanings, nor about the American eugenics movement, nor the tight alliance between the Democratic party and the KKK -- and I certainly wasn't atypical of my generation. What I see daily seems to indicate that trend has only worsened.
For example, just recently ABC News wrote:
The filibuster has been used historically by the minority party, which can't win with a vote count. Democrats have opposed the filibuster before — in the 1960s, they accused Republicans of using it to block civil rights legislation.
That's backwards: Democrats opposed and filibustered civil rights legislation, not Republicans. Undoubtedly that reporter believed it, and undoubtedly many or most readers would too.
And here's another recent one, from the Congressional Black Caucus:
Restricting the ability of Democrats to block final votes on several of Bush's most controversial nominees "would be particularly offensive to people of color," members of the Congressional Black Caucus wrote Majority Leader Bill Frist during the day. "All of the major legislation that today bars racial discrimination in voting, employment and housing was passed after filibusters" were broken, it said.
Again, completely backwards: The filibusters referenced here were done (by Democrats) to prevent giving blacks rights, not as an aid to that cause. (For example, the NAACP has traditionally opposed filibusters for this very reason.)
And, again, many people will read such statements and believe them.
(Ironically, this would-be 'unbiased' article is titled, evenhandedly: "Bush, GOP seek to reinvent reality." That's a common liberal trick: accuse your opponents of a crime (rewriting history, in this case) while doing the exact thing you're accusing them of.)
It was these and other such things I'd read, as well as similar statements I'd heard from liberal friends this week that I had in mind when I wrote that statement.
I consider rewriting history despicable, like burning down a library of rare books. I see such statements, like the one you quote, as standing there, pointing at the flames, saying: "Look what they're doing to our collective understanding."
You come across -- being charitable -- as saying: "Gosh, you sound a bit excited. Isn't that allegation a bit extreme?" (In reality, you're comparing me to a racist, but we'll let that go.) Earth to Imran: Democracy depends upon the character and understanding of the voters to work. And if the charge is extreme, then I why do I even have to write articles like the one above?
And why do you think the Nazis created and taught a mythical past, anyway? Were they just fun, imaginative folks? No: by teaching people a historical myth, you cut people off from the actual lessons of history, and provide a framework for justifying bad behavior. A radical reworking of history has preceded some of the worst times of abuses we've witnessed.
You, apparently, just think it's just a bit over the top to complain about it while it's actually happening. Sorry, I have little sense of humor about lies and slander passed off as history. There's not much I can do about it, Imran, except speak out and hope someone thinks about it. Sorry if that seems a bit uncool to you.
Sorry if that seems a bit uncool to you.
No no no. You took a joke too seriously. I had a smiley there. Archie is funny, that's all.
Dude, have you ever even taken a 100-level political science class, or read a basic (i.e. encyclopaedia-article-length) history of the Third Reich? Seriously, now.
Hitler was not a leftist, If you look at the sorts of people who supported him,, you can not sday that, The fact is he was supported by big buisness by milliopns of pounds worth of funds, He was supported in massive ways, the other fact is that Hindenbrurg did not oppose him becoming leaders, this was amazing, as when you cionsider he felt it was omk to cl;ose the prussian socialist government in teh 1930s, you could say well he stood up to what he was agaionst but he did not in teh end to hitler, also Hitler was upported essentially by the middle classes, and Proestatnts, they were the time, also he supported franco, in teh civil war, a man who openly stated as often as possible he hated teh left, also hitler stated he hated blum, the leader sof teh frenmch socialists, that he loved teh british empire, that he hated communism, he ran his election campiagn on hatred of teh Bolsheviks, claioming teh Bolsheviks, were jews, teh only reaosn why he hated capitalism,was as he was so right wing he wanted an even more horrible ruthless system, which unlike socialism, and capitaislm, wdid not give other grousp any chance what so ever as he would kil them, he also supported teh freikrops, a far right group of pro-kaiser people, he also had aristocrats in his cabinet, he also called his nation teh reich, not a republic, but a reichm, like teh secong empire, of germany in 1870, and first empire that was ended in 1806, he also was supported by the aristocrat von papen, he also was [pals,. with edward the eight, he was a lover of the catholic chucrh, for it's ddictatorial tradtions,. the reason stralin made a pact with him in 1940, is as right wingers like you in britaion and france, were syaing yes germany, is moving against outr intrests but we must not ally with the USSR whatever, evenm though they did not mind allying with Tsarist Russia, in world war one, a state that treated it's people far worse than the ussr, the attituide of stalin,. was, if britain and france want the germans, to gobble us up, then we will not help mthem, and insteaqd, of us making a deal with teh societs, the germ,ans, invaded poland, then as of that britain and france, and then invaded teh ussr, in wars i killing around 42million people, there is no doubt that hitlwer was ar ightist, peter hitchen, often makes statem,ents that are word for word likle us, if you say hitler was not a rightist, you can say that of anybody, wanting to chuck out foreign races, is a classic right wing policy in every land, from arnie in california, opposing mexican immigration, too the manifesto of every tory campaign from 1900, onwards, when it opposed jews, too iraqid coming to britain, hitler was a rightist, who opposed equality, teh main priciple of teh left, he opposed equality sio much he wanted to kill everybody not like him, and when leftists said they wanted equality, he then criotised it, as he feklt it would make weverybodty the same, which it woul;d not have done, asleftists want freedom, andn ijn divisdualism
arnold schwarzanigger's "liberal" republican paerty passed an act in 1900s, california, to sterilise certain groups, in california, the lutheran church in norway sterilised gypsies,
far right vriginian rightists also sterilised people in teh 1900s, when they were rightists, and felt the dems, in the North were communists, the finnish far rioght sterilised finns, in teh 1930s
Dude, have you ever even taken a 100-level political science class...
Higher than that. And I grew up in a house with probably the largest collection of books about the third reich that you'd ever seen. (Dad seriously loved reading about history, especially the events that shaped his wartime youth.) Everything I'm saying here is well-documented historically.
But so what? We argue from the evidence before us. I've already admitted my argument goes against the flow. If you're the kind of person who mindlessly follows it, then contradictory evidence isn't going to have any traction on your brain. So fine: believe that everything you're told in a University is true, and don't bother looking at the evidence yourself. That's your right. It's not just not an approach I'd recommend.
Man, this was the funniest thing I have read in a long time. By the same token, the People's Republic of China must be a republic and the former East Germany a democracy.
"All things are subject to interpretation whichever interpretation prevails at a given time is a function of power and not truth."
I really shouldn't have to point this out, Mr. Nietzsche, but Tim's argument doesn't rest solely on the fact that the S in NSDAP stands for Socialist. Do try to read the entire entry next time, OK?
By the way, for anyone who disputes Tim on this: Take one step back historically and investigate the background and ideas of the Italian Fascists, who were after all the original architects of the ideology. You'll find that they were largely former Communists who developed Fascism after concluding that the Leninist approach to socialism was flawed, and that their new syndicalist approach was the way to make it viable.
Wow the comments you got on this piece sure had a lot of spelling errors. I'm thinking maybe ignorant foreigners from mostly leftist European countries suffering from a symptom of third or fourth hand Marxism, namely the delusion that all big business is right of center at the least or, even more laughably, laissez faire in economics
... the delusion that all big business is right of center at the least or, even more laughably, laissez faire in economics
Great point Chase. Many businesses love welfare, when they can get it, every bit as much as most individuals. What better than to have government shut down competition for you, or mandate that everyone buys your service?
After chancing on this website whilst pursueing A certain chain of thought, as you do, I was rather alarmed by the comparison with Hitlers views to Socialism! From what I remember when I read Shirer's book 'The Rise And Fall Of The Third-Reich' the 'Socialist' wing of the party was represented by individuals like Gregor Strasser, (who was one of those murdered in the 'night of the long knives'),and the so called left basis was only about SOME macro-economic idea's that resembled Keynes rather than Marx, ie stimulating demand with public sector projects.
The Autobahn was advised to Hitler by A clever economist/banker (I believe),as Hitler wasnt all that intreasted in economics, and Hitler was much more of a free-economy type who would let large businesses who were supporters such as the Steiner family hang on to vertaully everything financial whether gained by fair or foul means!
Hitler was much more of a free-economy type
I remember reading in Ruth Lewin Sime's biography of Lise Meitner how Chemist Fritz Strassman was virtually unable to legally find work since he refused to join the Nazi labor union. That doesn't sound very free-market to me.
"basically National Socialism and Marxism are the same." -- Hitler, Feb. 1941
Hitler was a national socialist and was vehemently opposed to left-wing marxian socialism and communism. Considering weimar germany's experiences with capitalism, the german people were fed up however they still maintained a strong national identity, thus national socialism was spawned. Nationalist in terms of advancing, promoting and protecting german national culture no matter what the cost and socialist in terms of dictating how enterprise would be used to advance the reich. He was a right wing dictator diametrically opposed to left-wing international socialism and emphasized national socialism.
Hi Max,
It's not clear at all how your conclusions follow from your evidence. Would you say that because the Soviets condemned Trotsky and Trotsky was a leftist that the Soviets were therefore right wing?
Would you say that because the Chinese communists broke with the Soviets that they were therefore Right Wing (or vice versa?)
Hopefully we can agree that simply opposing some Left Wing group or individual doesn't have any bearing on whether an institution is Right Wing.
Now I'll agree that the taxonomy that everyone is taught in school is that the Nazis were hard right wing. But is this a valid taxonomy? Pre-Linnaen taxonomies grouped plants together based on the number of petals in their flowers. So it would then be true to say that roses and certain cacti were "in the same group." But such a taxonomy was not the most useful since it didn't correspond well with the material world. Neither is such a taxonomy the most consistent with the historical origin of 'right wing' in the French Revolution.
With the exception of opposition to homosexuality (I know people have argued that the Nazis were not anti-homosexual but I've so far found their arguments unconvincing) the Nazis ripped off Marx and leftist ideology far more than they borrowed from the Church or Christian doctrine. The fact that their self described 'middle way' was between the Social Democrats and the Communists should be a tipoff. ( Allegiance with the Church was the original definition of Right Wing, confused somewhat by the fact that the Church was, at the time of the French Revolution, married to the French state.)
Hitler may have been more conservative than the Communists, looking to ground his practices in historical institutions like Spartan eugenics programs and other historical institutions rather than desiring a complete break with history. But he was less conservative than the Social Democrats who supported equal treatment of people before the law.
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moron
Posted by: on June 6, 2004 04:53 PM