Hitler's Way of Solving Problems- pernicious, borrowed, and Aryan

Hitler was able to rise to power in Germany because during this time Germany was suffering greatly and he offered both a solution and a scapegoat for the problems they had been facing; his ideals can be described with three adjectives, pernicious, Aryan, and borrowed. After WWI, the Germans had been forced to accept full responsibility for the war as well as to pay for all the war’s expenses. Germans had also been appointed a government by the group at the Paris Peace Treaty (to which they were not invited). Hitler’s ideals were non-democratic, and non-communist and he gave Germany someone to blame and a way to fix the problem.  

                                It’s important to understand that Hitler’s ideals were mostly Fascist, but with a racist twist. Fascism was originally a bunch of borrowed ideas that were mashed together by Mussolini, who Hitler borrowed Fascism from. So in this way, Hitler’s ideas were double borrowed.  Hitler also took many of his ideas from Frederick Nietzsche- going so far as to appoint him the philosopher of the Reich.

                The ideals of the Nazi party revolve around creating an “Aryan” society which in Hitler’s mind was the perfect society that would bring Germany back into power. In this case Aryan meaning of Nordic decent, white, and not Jewish.   Because it is one of the main goals of the Nazi party it’s important to have it in the list.

                Lastly, Hitler’s ideals were very pernicious. Fascism is already very willingly violent, and on top of that Hitler had a goal of killing as many Jewish people as possible, hoping to rid Europe of them.

“I do not want even to speak of the Jews. They are simply our old enemies, their plans have suffered shipwreck through us, and they rightly hate us, just as we hate them. We realize that this war can end only either in the Wiping out of the Germanic nations, or by the disappearance of Jewry from Europe. On September 3rd I spoke in the Reichstag--and I dislike premature prophecies--and I said that this war would not end the way the Jews imagine, that is, in the extinction of the European Aryan nations, but that the result of this war would be the destruction of Jewry. For the first time, it will not be the others who will bleed to death, but for the first time the genuine ancient Jewish law, "an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth," is being applied. “ – Adolf Hitler

As well, Hitler wanted not to coexist or become more powerful than the other forms of government but simply wanted to destroy them all. The Nazi party’s way of dealing with their problems involved causing everyone who didn’t agree with them harm, destroying them, but because dealing with their problems and getting back on top was their ultimate goal it made their ideals pernicious and generally violent.

“For fourteen or fifteen years I have continually proclaimed to the German nation that I regard it as my task before posterity to destroy Marxism, and that is no empty phrase but a solemn oath which I shall follow as long as I live. I have made this confession of faith, the confession of faith of a single man, that of a mighty organization. I know now that even if fate were to remove me, the fight would be fought to the end; this movement is the guarantee for that. This for us is not a fight which can be finished by compromise. We see in Marxism the enemy of our people which we will root out and destroy without mercy.... We must then fight to the very end those tendencies which have eaten into the soul of the German nation in the last seventeen years, which have done us such incalculable damage and which, if they had not been vanquished, would have destroyed Germany. Bismarck told us that liberalism was the pace-maker of Social Democracy. I need not say here that Social Democracy is the pace-maker of Communism. And Communism is the forerunner of death, of national destruction, and extinction. We have joined battle with it and will fight it to the death.”- Adolf HitlerJHi

Strong Leadership, a New Government, and No More Class Wars: A Recipe to Make the Trains Run On Time

Mussolini had three points that were the most important in creating his idea of the perfect society. Mussolini decided that Italy needed to have strong leadership, to stop the class wars, and to destroy parliamentary government.

Mussolini said Italy needed strong, charismatic leadership that could bring Italy up from its past shames it had suffered. This charismatic, strong leader was in Mussolini’s mind, Mussolini. He said that they needed to stop class conflict. His thinking was that by organizing the economy in a way where everyone was producer that Italy would have great economic growth and that the country would thrive.

Finally Mussolini’s biggest point was that he wanted to destroy parliamentary democracy. How? By replacing it with a more elite government.  In Mussolini’s mind this elite government happened to be Fascism (with Mussolini, of course). If you haven’t figured it out already Mussolini was not a very humble man, and despite his theatrics and his charisma the only thing he really managed to accomplish was making the trains run on time.

Fascism and Nazism- the Solutions

Benito Mussolini

After WWI many people thought that the old governments (Socialism, Communism, and democracy) were the cause of the war so they did everything to reject the ideals of old governments and supported anything that wasn’t even if they didn’t truly believe it was a good idea. George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950) believed that democracy substituted the rule of the incompetent many for that of the corrupt. Two of the most influential people of this time were dictators Benito Mussolini and Adolf Hitler.

Benito Mussolini was the leader of Italian Fascism. Italian Fascism was not a consistent doctrine but a fusion of ideas. It was successful in Italy because at the time Italian society was neat collapse. Fascism’s aim was to end class conflict. Fascism was a large anti-liberal, anti-communist movement that was willing to apply force whenever necessary and held all high-class values in contempt.

Adolf Hitler- the leader of Nazism

Adolf Hitler borrowed Fascism from Mussolini but took it one step forward- turning it into Nazism. Nazism was fascism but with an added racist twist. This movement was very successful in Germany because it gave people someone to blame for their issues:  capitalism, communism, the Jews, the pacifists and liberals, the weak and the insane- except they rolled it all into one thing and called it ‘the Jewish conspiracy’. Nazism said that by purging anyone who was part of the ‘Jewish conspiracy’ that Germany could take its place back in the sun.

Challenging the Status Quo- Pablo Picasso, Jazz, Frank Lloyd Wright, and Ernest Hemingway

After WWI a lot of things changed. Overall, society was in a ‘challenge the status quo’ mind set. Movies and sports became popular because of new philosophies brought back from the war, which said that there was no purpose in life than to live.

Still Life with a Bottle of Rum
Cubist artwork from Pablo Picasso

          In Art a new style called Cubism came out. It was a style of art that wasn’t pretty, something expected of art before WWI, which fits with the previously mentioned ‘challenge the status quo’ ideals. The artists who founded this movement were Pablo Picasso and George Braque who took images and broke them into pieces, rearranging them into an abstract work.

In music Jazz became a popular style. Before WWI music was supposed to be composed and then performed back exactly as the composer had written it.  Jazz was basically the exact opposite, you came up with it on the spot, and it was never exactly the same. Jazz tended to be fast paced and a lot more fun, which makes sense if you believe there is no meaning to life.

Falling Water- a home designed by Frank Lloyd Wright

In architecture Frank Lloyd Wright pioneered the idea of natural architecture. He challenged the status quo with his buildings that mimicked and incorporated nature in their design. He had been refining his style long before WWI but his architecture would not have been popular had it not been for WWI.

Ernest Hemingway in Milian (1918)

In literature before WWI writing had been romantic and flowery. After WWI writers such as Ernest Hemingway had begun to shine with their realistic writing that portrayed the horrors of the world.

Nietzsche- A Worthless Man Without WWI

Frederick Nietzsche

Frederick Nietzsche is known for being one of the first men to question the meaning of life. Nietzsche attacks morality because of its commitment to standards that humans don’t have the means to maintain and he attacks the foundation of religion by saying that there is no meaning to life. He’s often associated with Nihilism (the idea that life is meaningless) because he was one of the first people who wrote about it.

However, had WWI not happened Nietzsche’s ideas never would have become popular. Nietzsche died about 20 years before the war ended but because of the horrors of WWI, the soldiers who were thinking about life after the war, and life in the trenches, it became a popular idea. Nietzsche’s philosophy didn’t come from WWI but without it his philosophy would have simply been ignored.

Dadaism- a Protest Against WWI Society

Fountain- a Dada sculpture by Marcel Duchamp

Dadaism was an art style that sprung up as a reaction to the brutality of WWI. The artwork was designed to be displeasing and ugly, and to alter the ideas of normal. Dada artists ridiculed their culture with absurd drawings, performances, and sculptures. German Dadaists created the first substantial body of Dada artwork in the form of photo collages, reacting the suffering their country was suffering after the war.

 The idea behind Dadaism was to make society aware of themselves and what they were doing. Their artwork mirrored the world they were living, in the ugly world that was after World War One.  Dada artwork condemned the nationalist and capitalist ideals that started the war in the first place, and attacked government and society for the way they behaved.

When Nothing is Everything Anxiety Occurs

The 1920's, now known as the Roaring Twenties was once known as the Age of Anxiety. And for good reason. As mentioned in the previous post the world changed forever after the World War One. Everything that was once regarded as a fact was changed, and even the greatest accomplishments were scary because of this.
 New philosphies introduced that there was no purpose to life- which introduced a new kind of anxiety, known as the Anxiety of Meaninglessness. This is essentially the fear of there being nothing to life other than life. In science, it was decided that the only true constant in the universe was the speed of light, which is not a very comforting thought. Even art, literature, and architecture were changed drastically, leaving really nothing but unknowns. The word was suffering from the anxiety of uncertainty.