People focus on Hitler and Nazi leaders and the atrocious lethal lies they told to justify the mass murder of Jews.
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William Lindsey :toad:replied to William Lindsey :toad: last edited by
@lolonurse @Burnt_Veggies @lawyersgunsnmoney @Npars01
In his memoir Not I, Joachim Fest, who grew up in a Catholic household in Berlin during the Nazi period, writes,
“What had come out on top in Germany might occur in darkest Russia or the Balkans, but surely not in their law-abiding country. What had happened? That was the question raised on all sides, but no one had an answer”
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William Lindsey :toad:replied to William Lindsey :toad: last edited by
@lolonurse @Burnt_Veggies @lawyersgunsnmoney @Npars01
He also says,
"Until 1932 [my father] had always trusted that this tradition was proof enough, that a primitive gangster like Hitler could never achieve power in Germany. But he hadn’t had a clue. One of the most shocking things for him had been to realize that it was completely unpredictable how a neighbor, colleague, or even a friend might behave when it came to moral decisions”
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William Lindsey :toad:replied to William Lindsey :toad: last edited by
@lolonurse @Burnt_Veggies @lawyersgunsnmoney @Npars01
In her book Learning from the Germans, Susan Neiman quotes German philosopher Bettina Stangneth] who says she's "not convinced that Germans have faced the worst fact about the Nazi period: not the ignorant masses, but the educated elites were the driving forces behind the regime”
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William Lindsey :toad:replied to William Lindsey :toad: last edited by
@lolonurse @Burnt_Veggies @lawyersgunsnmoney @Npars01
Stangneth writes,
“People voted for Hitler as they voted for Putin and Trump, because they didn’t want to give up their own privileges. This isn’t a matter of ignorance. They understand exactly the price of enlightenment: that the equality of humankind means the equality of humankind, and not only after I’ve secured my own comfort."
And see Heidi Siegmund Cuda just today on the question, "Who goes Nazi?"
/5‘Who Goes Nazi?’ — An 83-Year-Old Prediction of JD Vance
Dorothy Thompson, the first American correspondent to be kicked out of Nazi Germany, described the archetypes of ‘who goes Nazi’ more than 80 years ago. It’s time we listen
(www.bettedangerous.com)
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lolonursereplied to William Lindsey :toad: last edited by
@wdlindsy @Burnt_Veggies @lawyersgunsnmoney @Npars01
My grandfather owned a haberdashery/men's shop in Hamburg. Someone warned him that an employee wore a swastika on his lapel. When confronted, the man showed that he had it hidden under his lapel while at work. Grandpa was disappointed at the betrayal, fired him for his dishonesty. But he also read the tea leaves, and began making plans to leave his beloved homeland. -
William Lindsey :toad:replied to lolonurse last edited by
@lolonurse @Burnt_Veggies @lawyersgunsnmoney @Npars01 Your grandfather was prescient. I try to imagine what it would have been like to begin wondering which of your neighbors might put on a swastika, might suddenly turn on you.
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Toxy 🔬🇪🇺🇸🇪🇬🇧🇺🇦replied to William Lindsey :toad: last edited by
@wdlindsy Listening to this book right now which tackles the subject. An excellent read.
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Burnt Veggiesreplied to William Lindsey :toad: last edited by
@wdlindsy @lolonurse @lawyersgunsnmoney @Npars01 That's fascinating. I do think about how many conservatives are educated people. It's not accurate to say education is a cure for conservative viewpoints.
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Nicole Parsonsreplied to William Lindsey :toad: last edited by
@wdlindsy @lolonurse @Burnt_Veggies @lawyersgunsnmoney
Every civil war since time immemorial has seen family torn apart by the cause of a wannabe slave owning elite vs freedom
Factional violence sees neighbors & coworkers collaborate with the enemy.
American Civil War. Yugoslavia. Rwanda. Vichy France. Northern Ireland
One of the often unacknowledged motivations behind elites who defect to fascism is a desire for unpaid & underpaid labor & keeping in place the unfair systems that enforce it
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Nihl L'Amasreplied to William Lindsey :toad: last edited by
@wdlindsy @lolonurse @Burnt_Veggies @lawyersgunsnmoney @Npars01 A significant piece, but you can find lots of people talking about it.
FYI, Heidi Cuda is part of Jim Stewartson's grifty little bullshit group. You won't often hear serious misinfo researchers use the term "BlueAnon," but when they do they are usually talking about these people.
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kmetzreplied to William Lindsey :toad: last edited by
@wdlindsy How do you suggest should people focus on people who believe those lies?
Wat I think is the best we can try to do is never to ostracise them (it would just spin the same wheel), but rather to inform about lies, to listen to their real worries and focus on what unites.
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@wdlindsy @Burnt_Veggies @lawyersgunsnmoney @Npars01 @lolonurse Thank you for this link. It is illuminating.
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@wdlindsy @lolonurse @Burnt_Veggies @Npars01 People need to be thinking about that right this second. The MAGAs are being called to arms and have been training for years. They show their red MAGA hats and engage in intimidation all over the US. IMO no different from the Nazis of the 30s or the Klan from past to present
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@lawyersgunsnmoney @lolonurse @Burnt_Veggies @Npars01 Yes, it's definitely something my spouse and I and friends talk about — have talked about since Trump "won" in 2016. The problem is that we're getting up in years, and making a major life transition is just harder as one gets older. And this makes me think, of course, of all the stories I've heard about Jewish people knowing it was better to leave Germany and Nazi-occupied countries, but unable to do that with ease. And then horrors ensued.
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@3dogcouch @Burnt_Veggies @lawyersgunsnmoney @Npars01 @lolonurse You're welcome!
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William Lindsey :toad:replied to kmetz last edited by
@kmetz I think it's not possible to convince some people that they are being lied to and are succumbing to lies. A certain cultic mentality assures that some people are impervious to truth, fact, reason. They have ostracized themselves by placing themselves in a cultic shell where nothing beyond cultic "truth" reaches them.
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William Lindsey :toad:replied to Nihl L'Amas last edited by
@NIH_LLAMAS @lolonurse @Burnt_Veggies @lawyersgunsnmoney @Npars01
I subscribe to both Cuda's and Stewartson's blogs and have never seen them grifting anyone. They surely have not grifted to me. I think Cuda has valuable insights to offer as an Emmy-winning journalist and author of a number of books.
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William Lindsey :toad:replied to Nicole Parsons last edited by
@Npars01 @lolonurse @Burnt_Veggies @lawyersgunsnmoney Yes — people almost never willingly relinquish power over others and the privileges that dominative power brings.
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William Lindsey :toad:replied to Burnt Veggies last edited by
@Burnt_Veggies @lolonurse @lawyersgunsnmoney @Npars01 I agree. People can have a string of college degrees and be seriously uneducated. And by contrast, they can lack formal education and be educated. I think the ideal, of course, is to have actual education. But possessing a college degree is no guarantee that someone will be wise, humane, insightful — with both heart and head well-educated.
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William Lindsey :toad:replied to Toxy 🔬🇪🇺🇸🇪🇬🇧🇺🇦 last edited by
@toxy Thank you. That looks like a book I must add to my reading list. Two similar books you may find worth reading are Julia Boyd's Travellers in the Third Reich and A Village in the Third Reich.