Thinking back to everything I had ever previously learned about WW2, it was all based around the Holocaust and war, and that was it. The suddenly there are documents like number 12 which shows a completely different side of the war; I could never understand how people could support the Nazi’s, but with programs such as the KdF, it has begun to make sense of how people accepted this new form of government. The document states how, “KdF events have become very popular...Everyone can take part...We felt at home,” (Reports on the Sources of Working-Class Support for the Nazis and the Limits to Opposition 55); to have unity within such a big movement and a sense of importance will make any political party flourish, since the individual will feel
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It had seemed at the time that the people were not interested in political affairs and the Nazi’s were aware and kept it on the down low, which in the end benefited them greatly. Therefore, the KdF helped the Nazi party rise by appealing to the general citizens. Now that I have this newfound knowledge of what the German citizens were going through, I can somewhat grasp how they admired Hitler, at the time being. The way Hitler was portrayed to the citizens compared to who he actually was, was vastly different; our current day media is certainly guilty of doing this as well. In the end, yes, they were deceived, but there was a point when they realized the gravity of the situation and they could have tried harder, granted if they didn’t get shot trying. The major key lesson to take away from this is that at the time the German citizens did not expect this “great” leader to turn around and be an evil, cruel person. They came out of a war, crippled and looking for help, and Hitler offered …show more content…
Truly, I had believed that the camps were the end all be all way of killing the Jews; I did not know that there was actually more systems going on to wipe them out. What disturbs me most is that, “Jewish police officials, like Jewish council members, served at the whim of the German authorities,” and “This included facilitating deportations to killing centers,”(Ghettos). To learn that the Jew’s own people were working for the people who were mass murdering their kind, per say, is eye-opening. In a sense, these police officials are doing their jobs and in return are keeping themselves alive, however, at the same time killing tons of others. Simply put, these people are just carrying out the most basic evolutionary theory about mankind's, survival of the fittest. However, this helps answer the question as to if future genocides could be stopped, which I believe is not possible. I truly believe people have this mindset that self survival triumphs all, which could perhaps be intertwined with Darwin’s theory. Also, I believe that over the years, people have gained more motivation to be reasonable and live (i.e families and such) and will obey in order to protect their loved ones; if that means keeping quiet while a bloodthirsty dictator takes over and is killing people, who just so happen to be a different race than you, then so be
It had seemed at the time that the people were not interested in political affairs and the Nazi’s were aware and kept it on the down low, which in the end benefited them greatly. Therefore, the KdF helped the Nazi party rise by appealing to the general citizens. Now that I have this newfound knowledge of what the German citizens were going through, I can somewhat grasp how they admired Hitler, at the time being. The way Hitler was portrayed to the citizens compared to who he actually was, was vastly different; our current day media is certainly guilty of doing this as well. In the end, yes, they were deceived, but there was a point when they realized the gravity of the situation and they could have tried harder, granted if they didn’t get shot trying. The major key lesson to take away from this is that at the time the German citizens did not expect this “great” leader to turn around and be an evil, cruel person. They came out of a war, crippled and looking for help, and Hitler offered …show more content…
Truly, I had believed that the camps were the end all be all way of killing the Jews; I did not know that there was actually more systems going on to wipe them out. What disturbs me most is that, “Jewish police officials, like Jewish council members, served at the whim of the German authorities,” and “This included facilitating deportations to killing centers,”(Ghettos). To learn that the Jew’s own people were working for the people who were mass murdering their kind, per say, is eye-opening. In a sense, these police officials are doing their jobs and in return are keeping themselves alive, however, at the same time killing tons of others. Simply put, these people are just carrying out the most basic evolutionary theory about mankind's, survival of the fittest. However, this helps answer the question as to if future genocides could be stopped, which I believe is not possible. I truly believe people have this mindset that self survival triumphs all, which could perhaps be intertwined with Darwin’s theory. Also, I believe that over the years, people have gained more motivation to be reasonable and live (i.e families and such) and will obey in order to protect their loved ones; if that means keeping quiet while a bloodthirsty dictator takes over and is killing people, who just so happen to be a different race than you, then so be