Who Goes Nazi?

Harper's Magazine ^ | August, 1941 | Dorothy Thompson

[Bratch]

It is an interesting and somewhat macabre parlor game to play at a large gathering of one’s acquaintances: to speculate who in a showdown would go Nazi. By now, I think I know. I have gone through the experience many times—in Germany, in Austria, and in France. I have come to know the types: the born Nazis, the Nazis whom democracy itself has created, the certain-to-be fellow-travelers. And I also know those who never, under any conceivable circumstances, would become Nazis.

It is preposterous to think that they are divided by any racial characteristics. Germans may be more susceptible to Nazism than most people, but I doubt it. Jews are barred out, but it is an arbitrary ruling. I know lots of Jews who are born Nazis and many others who would heil Hitler tomorrow morning if given a chance. There are Jews who have repudiated their own ancestors in order to become “Honorary Aryans and Nazis”; there are full-blooded Jews who have enthusiastically entered Hitler’s secret service. Nazism has nothing to do with race and nationality. It appeals to a certain type of mind.

It is also, to an immense extent, the disease of a generation—the generation which was either young or unborn at the end of the last war. This is as true of Englishmen, Frenchmen, and Americans as of Germans. It is the disease of the so-called “lost generation.”

[Jack Hammer]

Oh, those Nazis - the very emblem of nasty guys.

How convenient it is to forget that Nazi murderers were school-boys compared to their communist peers.

I wonder if this character ever plays, “Who would become a communist?”

Or better yet, “Who in the group is already a communist?”

[Scooter100]

Yep. It's a Harper's piece, for sure. And Dottie is a real Harper's girl dontcha know. Leftist pap at its finest, by a true progressive.

Note the lack of blacks and minorities in this little morality play. Note the northeast anti-Southern and anti-Semitic tones in the characterizations.

Garbage.

[Bratch]

Ya’ll realize this article is from August 1941, right?

[Scooter100]

Absolutely. You'll note that nothing has changed in the leftist attitudes.

By the way, I assume your use of the "Ya'll" was to address everyone as a group, and not the incorrect singular form. Northern wannabe's never get that right.

[Bratch]

Yes sir.

[Telepathic Intruder]

"Noble in the individual and wretched in the collective"

A bit late of a reply, but one of the aspects of socialism that some find appealing is the transfer of personal responsibility to the collective. People will do in groups what they would never do by themselves, thinking their conscious is clear.

[jmacusa]

Indeed. Being part of a collective is like being in a firing squad. You never know who has the blank cartridge so you have some sort of plausible denial.