Dozens of books have been written about Nazi Germany—historical accounts, biographies of its leaders, and analyses of what happened—but none better known or of more consequence than The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich by William L. Shirer, a print journalist who covered Germany during the 1930s and then as a radio correspondent for CBS News during the lead-up to World War II.
Published in 1960, it was many years later that I came across a copy in the library and decided to check it out. One of my habits over the years has been to copy passages that I find interesting or feel might be of use for a future article. Sometimes the latter actually happens, but more often I file it away and there it languishes, out of mind, until I stumble across it.
Such was the case with the following passage, taken from The Rise and Fall. Interestingly, it was tucked in a book I’d obtained long ago at a library clearance sale, Inside the Third Reich— a memoir by Albert Speer who started out as Hitler’s personal architect and then became his Armaments Minister. Speer ended up serving 20 years in prison, largely due to being part of the inner circle that waged the war and for using prisoners-of-war in the weapons factories.
I had decided to re-read Speer’s book last year and, thus, found Shirer’s observation which was about how communication (namely newspapers, radio, and film) was used to shape the German people to Hitler’s end.
“I myself was to experience how easily one is taken in by a lying and censored press and radio in a totalitarian state,” Shirer wrote. “Though unlike most Germans I had daily access to foreign newspapers, especially those of London, Paris and Zurich, which arrived the day after publications, and though I listened regularly to the BBC (from Great Britain) and other foreign broadcasts, my job necessitated the spending of many hours a day in combing the German press, checking the German radio, conferring with Nazi officials and going to party meetings.”
Such exposure, Shirer noted, had an unexpected affect. “It was surprising and sometimes consternating to find that notwithstanding the opportunities I had to learn the facts and despite one’s inherent distrust of what one learned from Nazi sources, a steady diet over the years of falsifications and distortions made a certain impression on ones’ mind and often misled it.
“No one who has not lived for years in a totalitarian land can possibly conceive how difficult it is to escape the dread consequences of a regime’s calculated and incessant propaganda,” he continued, adding that “Often in a German home or office or sometimes in a casual conversation with a stranger in a restaurant, a beer hall, and cafe, I would meet with the most outlandish assertions from seemingly educated and intelligent persons. It was obvious that they were parroting some piece of nonsense they had heard on the radio or read in the newspapers.”
But, as he found, attempting to set the record straight was often an exercise in futility.
“Sometimes one was tempted to say as much (regarding the outlandish assertions), but on such occasions one was met with such a stare of incredulity, such a shock of silence, as if one had blasphemed the Almighty, that one realized how useless it was even to try to make contact with a mind which had become warped and for whom the facts of life had become what Hitler and Goebbels, with their cynical disregard for truth, said they were.”
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The effective use of propaganda had, as the record shows, the end result of allowing the Nazi hierarchy to perpetuate its murderous regime and plunge the nation into a war of conquest thanks, in part, to the acquiescence, support, or assistance of many German citizens.
This is illustrated in another passage I had copied, albeit more recently, regarding the ‘Banality of Evil’—a phrase coined by the philosopher Hannah Arendt in her report for The New Yorker magazine and later published in her 1963 book “Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil.
The Nazi henchman had been hiding in Argentina, having escaped there after World War II, when Israeli agents kidnapped him and brought him to Jerusalem to stand trial for his involvement in the mass deportation European Jews and their deaths in the extermination camps. He was put on trial, found guilty, and hung.
Arendt, who was born into a secular-Jewish family in Germany, had fled her homeland in the 1930s due to the threat posed by Nazi authorities and later settled in New York. Her work centered on trying to understand how seemingly ordinary people will participate in or otherwise accept ‘evil’ deeds done by their governments.
In his critique, Maden noted that “Far from the monster she thought he’d be, Eichmann was instead a rather bland, “terrifyingly normal” bureaucrat. He carried out his murderous role with calm efficiency not due to an abhorrent, warped mindset, but because he’d absorbed the principles of the Nazi regime so unquestionably, he simply; wanted to further his career and climb its ladders of power."
“The ‘banality of evil’, as explained by Arendt, “is the idea that evil does not have the Satan-like, villainous appearance we might typically associate it with. Rather, evil is perpetuated when immoral principles become normalized over time by unthinking people. Evil becomes commonplace; it becomes the everyday. Ordinary people—going about their everyday lives—become complicit actors in systems that perpetuate evil.”
And how does this happen?
“ This idea is best understood within the context of 'how Arendt viewed our relationship to the world,” Maden explained. “We live and think not in isolation, but in an interconnected web of social and cultural relations—a framework of shared languages, behaviors, and conventions that we are conditioned by every single day.
“This web of social and cultural relations is so all-encompassing in shaping our thought and behavior we are barely conscious of it,” he continued, adding that “It only becomes noticeable when something or someone doesn’t conform to it.”
Peer pressure, enculturation, and social coherence are among the means of creating and perpetuating this web. Ostracization and threats of violence are among the means of enforcing acceptance or dealing with any dissidents.
Also, as Shirer pointed out, propaganda has its impact; the use of messaging to influence and set the tone for what is politically and socially acceptable and conversely what is judged by many as unacceptable.
“The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exist,” Arendt stated.
Maden pointed out that while Arendt used Nazi Germany as her template, her contention was that “systematic oppression and the gradual normalization of evil can occur anywhere, any time, and at any scale.”
So how do we combat this ‘banality’—not just in others, but as importantly in ourselves.
“An antidote begins in active thinking,” said Maden. “By being sensitive to different viewpoints and scrutinizing everything we might otherwise adopt or conform to unconsciously, we can be guided by reason, rather than mislead by rhetoric or propaganda.
“In other words, it is only through thinking for ourselves that we avoid drowning in the tidal wave of information, custom, and circumstance the world throws at us,” he added. “It’s not easy, but we can weigh things and take responsibility for our judgements and behaviors independently, rather than risk becoming an unthinking enabler of principles we wouldn’t necessarily subscribe to, if only we took the time to think about them.”
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What Shirer talked about and what Arendt examined was (as we know) not invented by or unique to the Nazi regime. Neither did it end with their defeat in the war. The use of information, both in how it is presented, as well as what is withheld or censored, has a long history and remains very much an issue of current concern. Totalitarian states around the world still employ the techniques, aided nowadays be even more effective technology and psychological research.
Here in our nation accusations of ‘fake news’ and ‘misinformation’ are leveled by both sides of the American political divide. But that was true in earlier, contentious times.
Scrutinizing what you read, hear, or see—what you’re told is fact or ‘the truth’ and on the same token what is portrayed as inaccurate or ‘a lie’ —remains the best tool a person has for making sense of what’s going on and coming to an informed decision.
There is certainly good and evil in the world, right and wrong, moral and immoral…however, the lines of demarcation are not necessarily easy to define nor are they always what we’ve been told or taught. Likewise, hard as it is to believe, the opposing or contrary view does not automatically fit into these seemingly absolute categories.
Thinking for ourselves, not jumping to conclusions, marching to your own drummer, and not getting swayed by emotional triggers—taking the philosophical approach if you will—seems the best approach.
Be aware also that sometimes the banal thought comes not from the misguided ‘bum across the street,’ but might well arise from that familiar face in the mirror.
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Steve Horton is a journalist from mid-Michigan and editor-publisher of 'the ‘Fowlerville News & Views’—a weekly newspaper
"Scrutinizing what you read, hear, or see—what you’re told is fact or ‘the truth’ and on the same token what is portrayed as inaccurate or ‘a lie’ —remains the best tool a person has for making sense of what’s going on and coming to an informed decision." - This is basic critical thinking. It helps not only to withstand propaganda but also in everyday life on every corner.
Exceptional and more about the present than at any time I can remember. This is worth the space in the paper for people to think for themselves, not just one sided politics.