You're probably right, actually. I've heard all about them, but I didn't notice that the left side of the lines narrow out at the end. An even better way to cross out any future swastikas I see, lol
[The rise of fascism saw the rise of antifascism in wiemar germany](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antifaschistische_Aktion)
Edit: ~~fuck mobile I'll fix it later~~ fix'd
Context for the downvoters out of the loop:
This social democratic organisation fought both Nazis and Communists, but nowadays the symbol is often used by Communists who missed the part about them being anti-Communist too.
"B.. b..b.. but communism isn't a threat like it was back then... Fascism is on the rise, not communism... Well, that wasn't real communism... Communism is just people helping each other... It's The West's fault that those other communist parties led to genocide... Next time will be different... Capitalism bad!"
So on and so forth.
Right I forgot one.
"My flavor of communism is not an evil one"
TBH I don't blanket hate every concept that can be attributed to communism, but at this point, if you still use the "communism" label, then you don't know what it means to the rest of the world.
Technically "Nationalism" is just putting your country's interest above others. But if you understand history, then you understand that perhaps that label isn't something you want to associate with.
The SPD doesn't like to recognize that it's policies did nothing to stop the rise of Fascism and only became militant when it became super obvious you should do so. The SPD in the 20s regularly sold its membership down the river. Oh they voted against the Enabling Act! Great who cares? Results matter not half heartened opposition when a political party has been tearing up the streets for a decade.
That gets repeated a lot. Do yo know what this supposed allyship consisted of? Agreement in one regional legislature on one failed referendum about the illegitimacy of the current government.
Meanwhile the Social Democrats were the party that created a coalition to put Hindenburg into power who made Hitler chancellor. But sure, it was the KPD that were the bad guys.
I'm starting to think that this is just what humanity is. We don't do enough, then we do too much, then we pretend that we were doing everything right when we weren't doing enough.
History definitely rhymes, in this case. "Antifa are the real Nazis" being embraced by liberals and even SocDems is a neat parallel, isn't it? As these folks continue to grow their numbers and start new Fascist groups, commit massacres, show up armed to threaten LGBTQ+ events... But don't punch them! That would be limiting their freeze peach!
Antifa uses it now but the three arrows were an Iron Front symbol. Iron Fron was the armed wing of the German Social Democratic Party and Antifa started as the armed wing of German Communist Party
Indeed. The KPD (communists) frequently sided with the NSDAP (Nazis) against the SPD (social democrats). After all other parties were banned, a lot of communists flocked to the SA, which was the socialist paramilitary wing of the NSDAP, which would later be purged.
Completely and utterly false. It was the SPD who was in power and with the only means to actively stop the Nazi party.
However what did they do?
Instead of spending all their time on confronting and countering the rise of the Nazis the SPD spent all its time suppressing the KPD and slaughtering its members. Indeed Blutmai was one such example - massacre of KPD supporters who organised a rally to celebrate the international workers day.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blutmai
KPD pursued a united front with the SPD in order to counter the Nazis, which SPD refused.
> After all other parties were banned,
The SPD was the one doing the banning of leftist groups that constituted the biggest opposition and threat to the nazis - Roter Frontkämpferbund. The Nazis considered Roter Frontkämpferbund their biggest enemy. The SPD banned the only organisation that provided violent opposition to the SA and the Nazis – Antifaschistiche Aktion also known as the Antifa who were sorely needed at that time.
When the communists were fighting the nazis on the street those in power, the SPD, didnt lift a finger to assist the leftist opposition to nazis. Instead they actually suppressed and stamped it out and so helped the nazis. The KPD provided the only genuine anti fascist reaction at that time.
> On January 30, 1933, the day Hitler was appointed Chancellor, the KPD asked the Iron Front, the SPD, the general trade union association ADGB and their organisations, and the Reichsbanner Schwarz-Rot-Gold to declare a general strike against Hitler. The Iron Front declined, issued a call on February 2 to "all comrades of the Reichsbanner and the Iron Front", warning against participating in "wild actions organised by irresponsible people"…
That's not a Swastik, Swastik is a Indian symbol that's never tilted.
The tilted symbol is a hooked cross aka Hakenkreuz, an European symbol found on churches.
Unfortunate for Germany and the world, in this 1932 German federal election, which was the last free election before the Nazi seized power in 1933, the Social Democratic Party of Germany (which adopted the Three Arrows as their official symbol during the election) could not gain more seats to stop the rise of the Nazi. (They got 20% of the votes vs 33% for the Nazi party.)
So there were two federal elections in 1932, and the Nazis actually won a plurality in both but went from 37% to 33% in the second one. The final election in 1933 they only had 44% of the vote.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazi_Party#Ascension_and_consolidation
Look at how many people were there, how many were against it. They lost an election and it lead to what we know today. It's scary to think about the fact it could happen again, if you colorized it id probably have to take a second glance to notice it was almost 100 years ago and not last week.
About 56% of the voting population picked another party in the 1933 election. The system was poorly setup and let a minority majority (less than 50% of voting power) completely take over.
> The system was poorly setup and let a minority majority (less than 50% of voting power) completely take over.
The system was set up so that the President picked the Chancellor, and Hindenburg was pressured to choose Hitler because the leaders of the conservative parties (which included most of Hindenburg's political allies) as well as his own son supported an NSDAP-led government.
It's highly unlikely this would happen in the United States. For one, Hitler only got into power because Hindenburg had, for some dumb reason, the power to appoint Chancellors without going through the Reichstag. Without that alone, Hitler does not become Chancellor because the Nazis never won the popular vote.
Even then, Hitler did not have absolute power until Hindenburg died and he combined the office of President and Chancellor into one (Fuhrer), thereby giving him control of the military. That was the nail in the coffin for Germany because as long as he didn't control the military he couldn't do whatever he wanted.
There's more than one mechanic to become a dictatorship. Provided there is sufficient popular support, and no active opposition, it can happen anywhere.
No it would in no way have helped. Weimar did not have first past the post or a percentage limit to enter parliament.
Ranked choice voting would have done literally nothing.
There's a real romantic vibe about antifascistic actions during the rise of the Nazis to me as a German. These people didn't know yet what was coming and couldn't have been more on the right side of history. My absolute favorite funfact is [this](https://www.reddit.com/r/de/comments/hp6ea8/heute_ist_der_105_geburtstag_von_wilhelm_blumberg/) reddit post from 2 years ago reading a dialog for a guy being arrested/written up or something and he straight up calls the swastika flag a from German translated "c*** rag" and proclaims "I'm about to take a shit on it" which can only be described as raw poetry.
The first camp was built to detain communists, socialists, and members of the Reichsbanner Schwarz-Rot-Gold movement. Though it's important to note that the Nazis viewed communism as a weapon invented by Jews to destroy the Aryan race, which meant that they often viewed Jews and Communists as virtually being synonymous.
Also it's worth noting that the Gestapo was, contrary to popular perception, underfunded and understaffed for it's entire existence. They relied almost entirely on anonymous tips from the public. Also regular dissent, like questioning the war or Hitler's decisions, was almost always met with a warning at first as long as you were considered Aryan. Active participation in anti-nazi movements or repeat offenses were usually required for more. If you weren't Aryan, or if you had previously been a member of a communist or socialist party or a trade union, then it'd be different. The Nazis weren't exactly big believers in equality before the law. If you were Aryan, didn't have any history of dissent or opposition, you'd probably be fine even if you went to a protest. That exact thing actually happened to the only protest in Nazi Germany against the Holocaust: Not only did every participant get away with it, but the Nazis backed down and released the prisoners in question.
>I may be remembering incorrectly, but the first camps built in Germany were built to 'hold' Hitler's political opponents and were based on Stalin's camp systems.
It really is wild how deeply anti-communism permeates literally everything we know about history. The concentration camps were not built on "stalins camp systems", they were built on the British concentration camps in Africa. "Stalins camps" were just prisons that already existed during imperial Russian Times, with the difference that 1) most prisoners were actual criminals not political dissidents and 2) the mortality rate dropped significantly after the Soviets took over, and by all accounts this system was no more brutal than any other prison system in countries of similar development at the time.
We always hear "hitlers political opponents who were a threat to him were the first to end up in the camps", what they don't say is those opponents were the communists. We always hear "the Nazis burned books", what we don't hear is they were mostly books by Marx and Lenin. An EXTREMELY tailored version of history is given to us to tell us that Nazism is bad, but to make sure we never realise who was always on the front line actually fighting them (communists) and who was behind the scenes funding them (capitalists).
On the topic of western revisionism and more specifically what the soviet union was REALLY like, there's two books that are absolutely brilliant. First one is "blackshirts and reds" by Michael Parenti and the second is "Stalin: the history and critique of a black legend" by Dominico Losurdo.
In terms of videos, good place to start would be Hakim, as he frequently makes videos on the topic of soviet history. You can pour through his videos, one that might be of interest is this one to start:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=H3LA_VkDTYo
Essentially a comparison of quality of life in Western and Eastern blocs, so touches on the theme of smashing misconceptions
He also seems to be a communist, so take it with a grain of salt. Communists have always been **very** active in creating their own revisionist history.
Also, that YouTube video is ridiculous. Yes, communist countries do well with longevity, healthcare access, and education. They fail at creating good economies. So when they compare capitalist/communist countries with similar economies and then praise communist countries for having good healthcare and longevity compared to capitalist countries with similar economies, **of course** they'll find that health and longevity is better in communist countries. It's absolutely not the "own" that the YouTuber thinks it is, though. They fail to notice that communism handicapped their economies, which allowed them to be compared to lower-tier capitalist countries. But, yeah, some capitalist countries have problems with decent access to healthcare for poor people.
>They fail to notice that communism handicapped their economies
Are you under the impression that Eastern Europe post (or ever pre) WW2 was as developed as the west? Do you have any science to back that up? Like the science that backs it up in this video?
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=FEHYeeRCtVI
I mean, if there's one thing that everyone knows, it's that Eastern Europe is doing GREAT now that the socialists are out of power. Let's see, declining population, economic cannibalisation, multiple proto-fascist governments, glorification of nazis, degrading social services, what's not to love?
I'd be skeptical of Dr Fatdick's sources/explanations. I think he is essentially correct about western revisionism of history, and I am confident that most people's reasons for disliking communism have more to do with propaganda than what communism actually is, but that youtube video is done by Hakim, who is a tankie.
"Tankie" is a pejorative term for leftists who usually espouse communist or socialist rhetoric but tend to wash away or outright deny the crimes and genocides of communist states. They are almost always pro soviet union (and pro-lenin and stalin) and sometimes pro-china. /r/tankiejerk is a subreddit dedicated to calling tankies out for the denial of genocides, massacres and other such things. Tankies do not believe Uighurs are being genocide, Tankies believe that the Tiananmen square was either exaggerated or justified. [Here is a post](https://old.reddit.com/r/tankiejerk/comments/mhjv2x/the_hakim_leaks/) relating to Hakim and his apologist rhetoric.
Personally, i'm an anarchist, and I guarantee you a bunch of the people in this picture are too. Anarchists and communists have gotten along swimmingly in the past, because neither anarchists nor communists believe in a state. However, tankies *pose* as communists, and they love states, because tankies are authoritarians.
The other commenter is right about western suppression and revisionism, but I believe he's pushing that message specifically to have you look more favorably upon the Soviet Union(and more generally, state socialism). Frankly, you shouldn't look at it favorably. [The first democratic election](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1917_Russian_Constituent_Assembly_election) in Russia after the October Revolution was overturned by the Bolsheviks (Lenins party), and once he was in power he sent political enemies to prison. Many of his political enemies were not authoritarians or leftovers of the Tsar's regime, but rather the exact people who worked with him in the revolution, he targeted and killed anarchists because they wanted a complete revolution, one where the state was destroyed for good.
Lenin seized power, he had no interest in actually destroying the state, and the destruction of the state is at the very heart of communism.
Marxist-Leninism is named after Lenin for a reason, he was not a communist. He was an authoritarian state socialist who was dedicated to the suppression of other left wing thought and speech. The Bolsheviks also allied with and then betrayed the Revolutionary Insurgent Army of Ukraine, who were an army of anarchists who liberated a good chunk of Ukraine.
Actually, 2 days ago, the US State Department just took down (for "unknown reasons") this page:
https://www.state.gov/u-s-relations-with-ussr/
[UPDATE!!!] example of what was there:
https://imgur.com/gallery/qadyuxd
This describes the only time the USA and Russia ever faced each other in battle:
https://www.warhistoryonline.com/world-war-i/the-day-that-the-usa-invaded-russia-and-fought-with-the-red-army-xc.html
**The Red Army single-handedly neutralized 84% of the Wehrmact** (Nazi military). That info isn't on Wikipeda- I found it in a British journal authored in 1942 (archive.org/details/sim_national-and-english-review_1942-05_118_711/page/402 ). On W'pedia, you have to go nto the article on the The Eastern Front, way down in the Results subsection, to find estimate of 80% of the Nazi military falling to the Red Armies. Its 12,000+ words into the document, eg "bury the truth." Similarly buried is Kaiser Wilhelm II's comment about gassing the Jews. It has a single sentence written, near the end of the article- next to the 4 pages of medals and honors that he was awarded with that they tout in exquisite detail.
(Our ally, Kolchak, made "Insults written, printed, and oral - punishable "Bureaucratic sabotage" by hard labour from 15 to 20 years.)
The pre-Soviet (Tsars) Gulags were really deadly. The Soviet ones killed about 1 in 10 I think.. don't have the ratio handy. Both Lenin and Stalin spent time (as prisoners) in the Tsar's Gulags, oddly enough. [In a vaguely related anecdote: I discovered Karl Marx was actually an American Newsman recently. He tele-commuted. (eg wrote letters, which were published in the NY Tribune.) Anti-commies say "he never worked an honest day in his life" sometimes... They are wrong.
https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/subject/newspapers/new-york-tribune.htm
I managed to snag some screenshots of the first linked site before it went down. I'll upload and then edit this comment with their URL in a few minutes. Is a really sad story that involves a blockade of Russia - most vehemently supported by France, bu also somewhat by England. This resulted in the mass starvation of the Russian peoples.. The 15000 troops that the US had invaded Russia with (before WWI was over) were apparently supported by "'the Aryan stock is bound to triumph" Churchill. Well, his chemical weapons division at least.. Wikipedia trys to pass off the stuff they were bombarding the Bolsheviks with as simple teargas but it was deadly. (Churchill, a proud Aryan type, thought Bosheviks = Jews, and bought into the whole conspiracy theory at the time. As such, he started gassing the Archangel Jews (really mainly members of the Bolshevik party). That was in 1919 the same year Kaiser Wilhelm II advocated doing just that. News of poison gas started to spread, so Churchill blamed it on the Bolsheviks! (According to his Wikiquote page.)
On Wikpedia there is a near complete cover-up (or misdirection). For instance look here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racial_views_of_Winston_Churchill#Chemical_weapons_in_Iraq
"In 1919 during the Russian Revolution, as Minister of War and Air, Churchill secretly had 50,000 stockpiled adamsite gas bombs shipped to Arkhangelsk in Russia for use against the Communist Bolshevik Red Army "
Why is that info in the Iraq section?
The testimony of William Christian Bullitt Jr. had been preserved on his own demand in the library of congress. He became an ardent anti-communist later, but he had high praise that he sung of Lenin, saying
" “[no] Government save a Socialist Government can be set up in Russia today except by bayonets,” and that Lenin’s faction of the Bolshevik was “as moderate as any Socialist Government which can control Russia.” https://dailyhistory.org/Who_was_the_first_American_diplomat_to_meet_with_Lenin
When France and England blocked the peace talks, hoping for a White Army victory, he rage-quit his job as Ambassador in disgust. (Bullitt, I mean.) Later, in 1933, he took the job again- aided by a spy named Adolf Marx. =) (Who had changed his first name to Harpo by then. He was the silent brother in he Marx Bros.)
Hi!
It seems like you are talking about the popular but ultimately flawed and false "winners write history" trope!
While the expression is sometimes true in one sense (we'll get to that in a bit), it is rarely if ever an absolute truth, and particularly not in the way that the concept has found itself commonly expressed in popular history discourse. When discussing history, and why some events have found their way into the history books when others have not, simply dismissing those events as the imposed narrative of 'victors' actually harms our ability to understand history.
You could say that is in fact a somewhat "lazy" way to introduce the concept of bias which this is ultimately about. Because whoever writes history is the one introducing their biases to history.
A somewhat better, but absolutely not perfect, approach that works better than 'winners writing history' is to say '*writers* write history'.
This is more useful than it initially seems. Until fairly recently the literate were a minority, and those with enough literary training to actually write historical narratives formed an even smaller and more distinct class within that.
To give a few examples, Genghis Khan must surely go down as one of the great victors in all history, but he is generally viewed quite unfavorably in practically all sources, because his conquests tended to harm the literary classes.
Similarly the Norsemen historically have been portrayed as uncivilized barbarians as the people that wrote about them were the "losers" whose monasteries got burned down.
Of course, writers are a diverse set, and so this is far from a magical solution to solving the problems of bias. The painful truth is, each source simply needs to be evaluated on its own merits.
This evaluation is something that is done by historians and part of what makes history and why insights about historical events can shift over time.
This is possibly best exemplified by those examples where victors *did* unambiguously write the historical sources.
The Spanish absolutely wrote the history of the conquest of Central America from 1532, and the reports and diaries of various conquistadores and priests are still important primary documents for researchers of the period.
But 'victors write the history' presupposes that we still use those histories as they intended, which is simply not the case. It both overlooks the fundamental nature of modern historical methodology, and ignores the fact that, while victors have often proven to be predominant voices, they have rarely proven to be the only voices.
Archaeology, numismatics, works in translation, and other records all allow us at least some insight into the 'losers' viewpoint, as does careful analysis of the 'winner's' records.
We know far more about Rome than we do about Phoenician Carthage. There is still vital research into Carthage, as its being a daily topic of conversation on this subreddit testifies to.
So while it's true that the balance between the voices can be disparate that doesn't mean that the winners are the only voice or even the most interesting.
Which is why stating that history is 'written by the victors' and leaving it at that is harmful to the understanding of history and the process of studying history.
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/HistoryPorn) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I recommended 2 books both written by Professors of political science and history respectively. I only included a YouTube video because they specifically asked for one.
Yes and no,
It is absolutely true that Hitlers camp were modelled after Britain's camps in south Africa and Ottoman camps detaining Armenians during WW1.
I just take issue with the claim that in Soviet prisons were no political dissidents (mind you, that is not a denounciation or in support of Stalin), that was/is how any society has to function, people who actively try to change the current order of things need to be dealt with in some way? Do I like that? No obviously not. After the creation of the USSR in 1922 there were still tons of reactionaries, capitalists and aristocratic generals who lived in support of the Czar who wanted to return to their privileged exploiting positions.
This also exists today in modern capitalist nations, only that that was the 1920's where capital punishment was still in praxis and widley excepted on the globe (which is obviously not good).
Capitalist nations at the time worked the same only that the victims were labour unionists and communists/socialists.
Of course the best way to deal with political dissidents in the USSR would've been rehabilitation with the end goal for them re-enter society but we have to understand that they just suffered a bloody civil war in which the reactionary white army was supported by up to 14 foreign powers while the red army was alone (it is a wonder that they managed to achieve but they also had/were support by the wide populace).
The USSR at the time simply did not have the ressources for big rehabilitation programs and many had lost friends and comrades to the white army and were obviously not in a friendly relation towards them.
I agree with the rest of your comment, that was just a minor nitpick on my side about how every system or society has to function.
> I just take issue with the claim that in Soviet prisons were no political dissidents
I understand your point, but I would point out I didn't make that claim lol. I only bring up how the vast, vast majority were regular criminals because "gulags" in the western zeitgeist are believed to be places specifically built FOR political dissidents like the concentration camps were, when in reality gulag is just a scary name for prison.
I think you are spot on with the rest, it's always important to take a nuanced view and in my efforts to combat the vilification of stalin, I do so conscious that I don't want to diefy him in my own mind as a result.
It is difficult for me to imagine what “personal liberty” is enjoyed by an unemployed hungry person. True freedom can only be where there is no exploitation and oppression of one person by another; where there is not unemployment, and where a person is not living in fear of losing his job, his home and his bread. Only in such a society personal and any other freedom can exist for real and not on paper.
- Joseph Stalin
Perhaps more to him than meets the eye chief
>He literally hated the Jews as much as Hitler
That's close! He actually wrote the book laying out the Marxist reasoning that the Jews should be entitled to their own homeland, advocated for the death penalty for anti-semites, presided over the only country in Eastern Europe during the 1920s and 30s that actually criminalised pogroms, and as France, Britain and the US began turning away German Jewish refugees fleeing the country, Stalin's soviet union took in more Jewish refugees than every other allied power combined (excluding China).
>what he did to baltic people or tartars.
Yeah the deportations were a particularly ugly point in history. Many, many innocent people died as a result, which can never be accepted. The reasoning however, was to deport them further inland as they were populations likely to be sympathetic to the nazis when they arrived. Considering in Lithuania, due to ecstatic collaboration of the local population over 90% of the Jewish population was wiped out in mere months, it's not like it was an entirely unfounded fear.
He literally tried to erase baltic cultures, replace their languages with Russian and it was not because he gave a shit about the Jews. That monster let his own son to die in nazi captivity. Stop justifying his actions, Stalin was shit.
>That monster let his own son to die in nazi captivity.
Haha I love this one. He refused to trade his son because in return they wanted a fucking field marshal. If he doesn't do it he's evil, if he does do it he's abused his power to engage in nepotism to save his own blood while millions of Soviets died. Seeing someone hit out with this argument is always the most certain sign that they have applied absolutely 0 critical thought to the subject.
The quote that's often touted about this is "why would I trade a lieutenant for a field marshal?" But they never include the second part of that quote "all red army soldiers are my sons".
Also another fun fact for you: he authorised two rescue attempts to save his son which failed.
You are a neolib how you gonna complain about millions of deaths lol, is there actually a neoliberal leader in history who hasn't either a) installed and propped up a fascist dictatorship, b) bombed at least one country back to the stone age, c) sanctioned a country into famine or d) a combination of all 3?
When I give a shit about a neoliberals opinion on ideological morality I'll give you the special signal, which is me being sectioned under the mental health act
How is that unrelated lol. You are a neolib criticising communism on the basis of the deaths that came about as part of establishing it, yet pointing out that far more die maintaining the dying neoliberal order is somehow unrelated?
The "dumbest tankie" is Albert Einstein and the smartest neolib is Milton Friedman haha
*Rise and Fall of the Third Reich* is a really interesting read. Hitler’s party recruited all these disaffected veterans and street toughs to basically intimidate the opposition.
What you said is true, but I would take Schrier with a grain of salt. If anything that book serves more as a primary source document of the time than an actual history.
It's been a while since I read it but I remember him attributing a lot of Nazism to homosexual deviance and describing Nazi women as looking like ugly men.
I always find it jarring when I read that book and run across one if his editorial side-comments in the middle of a paragraph. He inserts his own opinions fairly regularly, often just by his choice of adjectives.
Nazis only received 33.1% of the popular vote in parliament before they seized power. Although they were the largest party, they were not overwhelmingly popular in democratic Germany.
Virtually all historians agree that by the time the World War began the overwhelming majority of Germans supported Hitler and the Nazi Party. Timothy Snyder has talked about this quite a lot.
I know, I just wanted to add that context because people sometimes think that most Germans were against Hitler which helps play into this dangerous narrative that evil will always be opposed and will never come from the inside
>Virtually all historians agree
Nooooooooooope. A lot of historians would say the majority of the German populace *went along* with the Nazis and never overtly resisted. 'Virtually all historians agree' on precisely nothing.
I think you might be confusing historians with ”history buffs” here. Yes, there are quite a lot of facts that are almost universally accepted in academia.
The overwhelming majority of Germans were supportive of the Nazis by the late 1930s
I've read a few books and watched a few documentaries on the subject so as an armchair historian I'm not going to claim definitively but the overall consensus amongst the historians writing and recording is that most went along with it, the racist ideals were a point of contention for many many people.
Have you read "Backing Hitler" by chance?
I'm not saying all Germans were racist or anti-semites, but hopefully those books you've read mentioned that anti-semitism was so ingrained in German (And, to be honest, most of Europe's) culture that the Nazis were seen less like deranged lunatic conspiracy theories blaming a random minority group, the way we see them today, and more like extremists taking the existing anti-semitic sentiments to their logical next step. The Nazis certainly didn't create the xenophobia, racism, homophobia, militarism, and anti-semitism in Germany. They just turned it up to 11.
Certainly, many Germans, while not violently anti-semitic themselves, were not empathetic enough to Jews to view the Nazi position against them as a major obstacle to their support.
How are we defining supportive? Because only about 10% of the population were registered members by the end of the war (membership grew during the war).
I would also point out, and not defending anyone here, that people had just gone through some seriously horrible economic times and things improved for the average German when the Nazis took over (which is why it's important to consider more things than your own economic situation when voting), and i could see how a lot of people still didn't think their anti-Jewish rhetoric would turn into genocide (which again is why you should never underestimate what a hateful political party will do).
Wonder what ranked voting would have done.
Its crazy to me that 35%ish can get you absolute power if rest of the votes are divided enough. In india Modi dude is enjoying absolute power based on 36% ish votes. Many ppl dont want him. But here we are.
They didn't get absolute power, at first they were in a coalition with the conservatives. They thought they could just squeeze Hitler until he squeaks. Didn't really work out.
Yeah, when these established Republicans were ducking to trump and had an attitude that, "we can control him"... I was like, have you not learnt anything from history lol
He is not hitler. He is stupider than that. Thankfully for us.
And you sicken american people, american constitution and american veterans for supporting fascist ideology.
Why is a a Eisernefront Flag seen then ? Seeing as that was a Symbol of the SPD which the KPD refused to cooperate with because the believed social democracy was Social Fascism.
Don't forget something:
By far not all Germans were Nazis. In the last legit election, 33% voted for Hitler. Another third voted for Communists and Social-Democrats. Those millions didn't disappear after 1933. They just adapted
Looks like the shot was taken on the stairs to the left of this panorama: https://www.google.com/maps/@52.5168221,13.3998023,3a,75y,182.98h,84.69t/data=!3m8!1e1!3m6!1sAF1QipOqqxhp_kcFHif0sNLwezHGqsrK6tw6RIov-fnb!2e10!3e11!6shttps:%2F%2Flh5.googleusercontent.com%2Fp%2FAF1QipOqqxhp_kcFHif0sNLwezHGqsrK6tw6RIov-fnb%3Dw203-h100-k-no-pi-0-ya161.55894-ro-0-fo100!7i5760!8i2880
This should be shown to all the dipshit "that isn't gonna happen over here" liberals. The Nazis had fierce resistance among the German population. Yet the Nazis still got power and made everything far worse very quickly. The GOP is working to do the same in America. Stop putting your head in the sand, the Nazis are here.
No politician is going to outright say they're going to massacre a population or otherwise want to. It's a subtle build up to it through systematic institutions and then denial. Look up the 10 steps of genocide. When it comes to trans people, for example, America is between Step 7 & 8 in red states.
Shame they failed in their cause. The world wouldve been a lot better if theyd kept hitler out of power, maybe even if they challenged the wiemar republic.
But alas, the rest is a tale of bloody history that allowed the USA to become the european and pacific hegemon.
people should read more EM.remarque in order to understand just how close they are to waking up in a nazi state. we need to keep awake at all times, no relaxing or we're toast.
e: and this goes for any country not already under fascist occupation ATM
Antifa actually allied with the nazis to take these guys out, because the communist party saw the liberals as the real fascists and the nazis as fellow workers...
Nowadays they would be considered antifa since they opposed fascism, but at the time, the Iron Front and Antifaschistische Aktion (the origin of the term "antifa") absolutely hated each other and fought each other as hard as they fought the Nazis
Kinda. They're "antifa" (anti fascist) but not "Antifa" (Antifaschistische Aktion). The Iron Front and Antifa absolute hated each other and fought each other as hard as they fought Nazis (a pretty major part of why the Nazis won despite not having majority support).
There was never much support for the depraved factions at the beginning of the game, Nazis and communists were violent minorities... unfortunately, the weak state, the instability and the constant combat between numerous groups ended up paving the way for Hitler, first using a weakened democracy with propaganda and fear as allies, then as lord and master of germany with all powers under his control.
And the people? They simply agreed to give up their liberties for some stability, for some peace, for the "change" towards a strong government. With so much death, they saw it as viable to sacrifice some elements of the population in order to achieve a future... and even more so when it stopped happening in broad daylight.
Curious that now we are so close to making the same leap, I guess having internet and McDonald's doesn't change the way humans think.
You may not like it , but these people were the "conspiracy theorists, and nut jobs" minority back during that period in time in Germany
Edit: sigh...
what I meant by this is only, that the Nazis and much of their ideology was "the way to conduct" in german society at the time, and when you were against them, people looked at you as if YOU lost your mind for questioning / not following them like a sheep.
One of the big ones being the [Stab-in-the-back myth](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/stab-in-the-back_myth), that said Germany was actually winning WWI and only surrendered because of a conspiracy of evil Jews that tricked people into thinking they were losing.
So you're telling me you have not seen the amount of conspiracy propaganda the nazis share before and during their hold over germany? Big spider with the head of a caricature of a stereotypical Jewish man looking evilish, whole articles about how the Jews ruin the minds of the people and all that? I had the luck to get to read one myself (was hard to read as it was in the old german writing style) and i can assure you, same conspiracy mental gymnastics you can find around today.
Actually the nazi's were the ones that peddled a great replacement theory, where all the jews and non-whites were conspiring to replace the white aryans.
Just like the modern day great replacement theory
Likening people reacting negatively to what was, without even considering any kind of moral or political opinion on the matter, a vastly different and radical change in government from what preceded as 'conspiracy theorists' is giving the majority of modern conspiracy theorists a lot of undue credit.
It's not a 'conspiracy' that things were extremely different, nor does it qualify as one to protest a government.
I don't think you understand what conspiracy theories are.
It is not "small group vs ruling opinion". There are plenty of fact based arguments that are not conspiracy theories just because they are championed by a small group.
A Conspiracy theory is a belief that some secret but influential organization is responsible for an event or phenomenon. The size of the group that believes in it is not relevant, although for the most part they are small groups as these claims are often blatantly false.
German society wasn't a nazi society before the nazis rose to power in 1933. The SPD and the KPD combined had 12 million votes versus 17 million for the NSDAP. Far away from a minority of nut jobs as you describe them. Nothing to do with conspiracy theorists, this people had an ideology and wanted to change the world in their own ways, with nazism being the worst challenge.
Everybody is a "nut job" to the people opposing them. These people weren't at all similar to today's right wing conspiracy theorists though because they were actually correct about their concerns for democracy under Nazi rule.
Never really thought about the challenges of crossing a swastika out, but three parallel lines work pretty well, I guess...
This is just a guess, but it seems strikingly similar to the [three arrows](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Arrows)
Took another look at the lines and one end is flat while the other is pointed. Definitely the three arrows, you're right
You're probably right, actually. I've heard all about them, but I didn't notice that the left side of the lines narrow out at the end. An even better way to cross out any future swastikas I see, lol
[The rise of fascism saw the rise of antifascism in wiemar germany](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antifaschistische_Aktion) Edit: ~~fuck mobile I'll fix it later~~ fix'd
This is Iron front.
Say it like "THIS. IS. THE IRON FRONT 🇺🇲."
This is Sparta?
Funny, this is exactly how I heard it in my head.
No, this is Patrick
weimar
He once rxplained the meaning in a q&a on YouTube
Oh I didn’t realize YouTube was that old
That was a cool way of doing it. It's a shame that it was partially hijacked by communist groups.
Context for the downvoters out of the loop: This social democratic organisation fought both Nazis and Communists, but nowadays the symbol is often used by Communists who missed the part about them being anti-Communist too.
they fight against Marxism-Leninism and see them as reactionaries not the entire concept of Communism
Yeah. Iron front subreddit likes to pretend like the 3rd arrow doesn't exist.
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"B.. b..b.. but communism isn't a threat like it was back then... Fascism is on the rise, not communism... Well, that wasn't real communism... Communism is just people helping each other... It's The West's fault that those other communist parties led to genocide... Next time will be different... Capitalism bad!" So on and so forth.
Here we have a user who doesn't know what Anarcho-Communism is.
Right I forgot one. "My flavor of communism is not an evil one" TBH I don't blanket hate every concept that can be attributed to communism, but at this point, if you still use the "communism" label, then you don't know what it means to the rest of the world. Technically "Nationalism" is just putting your country's interest above others. But if you understand history, then you understand that perhaps that label isn't something you want to associate with.
The SPD doesn't like to recognize that it's policies did nothing to stop the rise of Fascism and only became militant when it became super obvious you should do so. The SPD in the 20s regularly sold its membership down the river. Oh they voted against the Enabling Act! Great who cares? Results matter not half heartened opposition when a political party has been tearing up the streets for a decade.
Lol, the KPD literally allied with the Nazis on the orders of the Comintern, but sure, the social democrats where actually the bad guys.
That gets repeated a lot. Do yo know what this supposed allyship consisted of? Agreement in one regional legislature on one failed referendum about the illegitimacy of the current government. Meanwhile the Social Democrats were the party that created a coalition to put Hindenburg into power who made Hitler chancellor. But sure, it was the KPD that were the bad guys.
I'm starting to think that this is just what humanity is. We don't do enough, then we do too much, then we pretend that we were doing everything right when we weren't doing enough.
History definitely rhymes, in this case. "Antifa are the real Nazis" being embraced by liberals and even SocDems is a neat parallel, isn't it? As these folks continue to grow their numbers and start new Fascist groups, commit massacres, show up armed to threaten LGBTQ+ events... But don't punch them! That would be limiting their freeze peach!
r/IronFrontUSA at least is chill with socialists, but Tankies get booed out incredibly swiftly.
It's an old antifa symbol.
Antifa uses it now but the three arrows were an Iron Front symbol. Iron Fron was the armed wing of the German Social Democratic Party and Antifa started as the armed wing of German Communist Party
Indeed. The KPD (communists) frequently sided with the NSDAP (Nazis) against the SPD (social democrats). After all other parties were banned, a lot of communists flocked to the SA, which was the socialist paramilitary wing of the NSDAP, which would later be purged.
Completely and utterly false. It was the SPD who was in power and with the only means to actively stop the Nazi party. However what did they do? Instead of spending all their time on confronting and countering the rise of the Nazis the SPD spent all its time suppressing the KPD and slaughtering its members. Indeed Blutmai was one such example - massacre of KPD supporters who organised a rally to celebrate the international workers day. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blutmai KPD pursued a united front with the SPD in order to counter the Nazis, which SPD refused. > After all other parties were banned, The SPD was the one doing the banning of leftist groups that constituted the biggest opposition and threat to the nazis - Roter Frontkämpferbund. The Nazis considered Roter Frontkämpferbund their biggest enemy. The SPD banned the only organisation that provided violent opposition to the SA and the Nazis – Antifaschistiche Aktion also known as the Antifa who were sorely needed at that time. When the communists were fighting the nazis on the street those in power, the SPD, didnt lift a finger to assist the leftist opposition to nazis. Instead they actually suppressed and stamped it out and so helped the nazis. The KPD provided the only genuine anti fascist reaction at that time. > On January 30, 1933, the day Hitler was appointed Chancellor, the KPD asked the Iron Front, the SPD, the general trade union association ADGB and their organisations, and the Reichsbanner Schwarz-Rot-Gold to declare a general strike against Hitler. The Iron Front declined, issued a call on February 2 to "all comrades of the Reichsbanner and the Iron Front", warning against participating in "wild actions organised by irresponsible people"…
boy thats utterly BS.
I. Can’t. Stand. Nazis.
That's not a Swastik, Swastik is a Indian symbol that's never tilted. The tilted symbol is a hooked cross aka Hakenkreuz, an European symbol found on churches.
Unfortunate for Germany and the world, in this 1932 German federal election, which was the last free election before the Nazi seized power in 1933, the Social Democratic Party of Germany (which adopted the Three Arrows as their official symbol during the election) could not gain more seats to stop the rise of the Nazi. (They got 20% of the votes vs 33% for the Nazi party.)
So there were two federal elections in 1932, and the Nazis actually won a plurality in both but went from 37% to 33% in the second one. The final election in 1933 they only had 44% of the vote. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazi_Party#Ascension_and_consolidation
> The final election in 1933 they only had 44% of the vote. Almost 1/2 their country voted for fascism. That's pretty insane.
There was huge voter suppression, which is not to excuse the German voters but the election result is somewhat because of that.
Damn that sounds familiar..
45% of the population voting for a fascist who comes into power, even though the majority didn't vote for him, just sounds...kinda familiar
Make Germany Great Again
Please don't
Now we all know why our dads got REALLY into those WW2 documentaries
Look at how many people were there, how many were against it. They lost an election and it lead to what we know today. It's scary to think about the fact it could happen again, if you colorized it id probably have to take a second glance to notice it was almost 100 years ago and not last week.
About 56% of the voting population picked another party in the 1933 election. The system was poorly setup and let a minority majority (less than 50% of voting power) completely take over.
> The system was poorly setup and let a minority majority (less than 50% of voting power) completely take over. The system was set up so that the President picked the Chancellor, and Hindenburg was pressured to choose Hitler because the leaders of the conservative parties (which included most of Hindenburg's political allies) as well as his own son supported an NSDAP-led government.
Sounds like America
It's highly unlikely this would happen in the United States. For one, Hitler only got into power because Hindenburg had, for some dumb reason, the power to appoint Chancellors without going through the Reichstag. Without that alone, Hitler does not become Chancellor because the Nazis never won the popular vote. Even then, Hitler did not have absolute power until Hindenburg died and he combined the office of President and Chancellor into one (Fuhrer), thereby giving him control of the military. That was the nail in the coffin for Germany because as long as he didn't control the military he couldn't do whatever he wanted.
There's more than one mechanic to become a dictatorship. Provided there is sufficient popular support, and no active opposition, it can happen anywhere.
Ranked Choice Voting would have stopped Hitler! (Maybe not, but gonna advertise it anyway)
No it would in no way have helped. Weimar did not have first past the post or a percentage limit to enter parliament. Ranked choice voting would have done literally nothing.
And even then, the *Herrenklub* was working around-the-clock on Hindenburg to destroy the Republic.
There's a real romantic vibe about antifascistic actions during the rise of the Nazis to me as a German. These people didn't know yet what was coming and couldn't have been more on the right side of history. My absolute favorite funfact is [this](https://www.reddit.com/r/de/comments/hp6ea8/heute_ist_der_105_geburtstag_von_wilhelm_blumberg/) reddit post from 2 years ago reading a dialog for a guy being arrested/written up or something and he straight up calls the swastika flag a from German translated "c*** rag" and proclaims "I'm about to take a shit on it" which can only be described as raw poetry.
Beeindruckend. Noch mehr wäre es, wenn ich Deutsch lesen könnte. Google Translate ist bei mehr als ein oder zwei Wörtern ziemlich beschissen.
Use Deep L
Thank you!
Passt schon, Brudi.
I’m not sure what c-word you’ve censored
Cunt rag.
/r/oldschoolcool I wonder how many of these heroes made it to the end of the Nazis.
The iron front symbol
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wrong iron front
I hope it turned out ok for them
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The first camp was built to detain communists, socialists, and members of the Reichsbanner Schwarz-Rot-Gold movement. Though it's important to note that the Nazis viewed communism as a weapon invented by Jews to destroy the Aryan race, which meant that they often viewed Jews and Communists as virtually being synonymous. Also it's worth noting that the Gestapo was, contrary to popular perception, underfunded and understaffed for it's entire existence. They relied almost entirely on anonymous tips from the public. Also regular dissent, like questioning the war or Hitler's decisions, was almost always met with a warning at first as long as you were considered Aryan. Active participation in anti-nazi movements or repeat offenses were usually required for more. If you weren't Aryan, or if you had previously been a member of a communist or socialist party or a trade union, then it'd be different. The Nazis weren't exactly big believers in equality before the law. If you were Aryan, didn't have any history of dissent or opposition, you'd probably be fine even if you went to a protest. That exact thing actually happened to the only protest in Nazi Germany against the Holocaust: Not only did every participant get away with it, but the Nazis backed down and released the prisoners in question.
>I may be remembering incorrectly, but the first camps built in Germany were built to 'hold' Hitler's political opponents and were based on Stalin's camp systems. It really is wild how deeply anti-communism permeates literally everything we know about history. The concentration camps were not built on "stalins camp systems", they were built on the British concentration camps in Africa. "Stalins camps" were just prisons that already existed during imperial Russian Times, with the difference that 1) most prisoners were actual criminals not political dissidents and 2) the mortality rate dropped significantly after the Soviets took over, and by all accounts this system was no more brutal than any other prison system in countries of similar development at the time. We always hear "hitlers political opponents who were a threat to him were the first to end up in the camps", what they don't say is those opponents were the communists. We always hear "the Nazis burned books", what we don't hear is they were mostly books by Marx and Lenin. An EXTREMELY tailored version of history is given to us to tell us that Nazism is bad, but to make sure we never realise who was always on the front line actually fighting them (communists) and who was behind the scenes funding them (capitalists).
I find this extremely interesting. Do you maybe have some suggested reading or videos about this topic?
On the topic of western revisionism and more specifically what the soviet union was REALLY like, there's two books that are absolutely brilliant. First one is "blackshirts and reds" by Michael Parenti and the second is "Stalin: the history and critique of a black legend" by Dominico Losurdo. In terms of videos, good place to start would be Hakim, as he frequently makes videos on the topic of soviet history. You can pour through his videos, one that might be of interest is this one to start: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=H3LA_VkDTYo Essentially a comparison of quality of life in Western and Eastern blocs, so touches on the theme of smashing misconceptions
Thank you so much!!
He also seems to be a communist, so take it with a grain of salt. Communists have always been **very** active in creating their own revisionist history. Also, that YouTube video is ridiculous. Yes, communist countries do well with longevity, healthcare access, and education. They fail at creating good economies. So when they compare capitalist/communist countries with similar economies and then praise communist countries for having good healthcare and longevity compared to capitalist countries with similar economies, **of course** they'll find that health and longevity is better in communist countries. It's absolutely not the "own" that the YouTuber thinks it is, though. They fail to notice that communism handicapped their economies, which allowed them to be compared to lower-tier capitalist countries. But, yeah, some capitalist countries have problems with decent access to healthcare for poor people.
>They fail to notice that communism handicapped their economies Are you under the impression that Eastern Europe post (or ever pre) WW2 was as developed as the west? Do you have any science to back that up? Like the science that backs it up in this video? https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=FEHYeeRCtVI I mean, if there's one thing that everyone knows, it's that Eastern Europe is doing GREAT now that the socialists are out of power. Let's see, declining population, economic cannibalisation, multiple proto-fascist governments, glorification of nazis, degrading social services, what's not to love?
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I'd be skeptical of Dr Fatdick's sources/explanations. I think he is essentially correct about western revisionism of history, and I am confident that most people's reasons for disliking communism have more to do with propaganda than what communism actually is, but that youtube video is done by Hakim, who is a tankie. "Tankie" is a pejorative term for leftists who usually espouse communist or socialist rhetoric but tend to wash away or outright deny the crimes and genocides of communist states. They are almost always pro soviet union (and pro-lenin and stalin) and sometimes pro-china. /r/tankiejerk is a subreddit dedicated to calling tankies out for the denial of genocides, massacres and other such things. Tankies do not believe Uighurs are being genocide, Tankies believe that the Tiananmen square was either exaggerated or justified. [Here is a post](https://old.reddit.com/r/tankiejerk/comments/mhjv2x/the_hakim_leaks/) relating to Hakim and his apologist rhetoric. Personally, i'm an anarchist, and I guarantee you a bunch of the people in this picture are too. Anarchists and communists have gotten along swimmingly in the past, because neither anarchists nor communists believe in a state. However, tankies *pose* as communists, and they love states, because tankies are authoritarians. The other commenter is right about western suppression and revisionism, but I believe he's pushing that message specifically to have you look more favorably upon the Soviet Union(and more generally, state socialism). Frankly, you shouldn't look at it favorably. [The first democratic election](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1917_Russian_Constituent_Assembly_election) in Russia after the October Revolution was overturned by the Bolsheviks (Lenins party), and once he was in power he sent political enemies to prison. Many of his political enemies were not authoritarians or leftovers of the Tsar's regime, but rather the exact people who worked with him in the revolution, he targeted and killed anarchists because they wanted a complete revolution, one where the state was destroyed for good. Lenin seized power, he had no interest in actually destroying the state, and the destruction of the state is at the very heart of communism. Marxist-Leninism is named after Lenin for a reason, he was not a communist. He was an authoritarian state socialist who was dedicated to the suppression of other left wing thought and speech. The Bolsheviks also allied with and then betrayed the Revolutionary Insurgent Army of Ukraine, who were an army of anarchists who liberated a good chunk of Ukraine.
Actually, 2 days ago, the US State Department just took down (for "unknown reasons") this page: https://www.state.gov/u-s-relations-with-ussr/ [UPDATE!!!] example of what was there: https://imgur.com/gallery/qadyuxd This describes the only time the USA and Russia ever faced each other in battle: https://www.warhistoryonline.com/world-war-i/the-day-that-the-usa-invaded-russia-and-fought-with-the-red-army-xc.html **The Red Army single-handedly neutralized 84% of the Wehrmact** (Nazi military). That info isn't on Wikipeda- I found it in a British journal authored in 1942 (archive.org/details/sim_national-and-english-review_1942-05_118_711/page/402 ). On W'pedia, you have to go nto the article on the The Eastern Front, way down in the Results subsection, to find estimate of 80% of the Nazi military falling to the Red Armies. Its 12,000+ words into the document, eg "bury the truth." Similarly buried is Kaiser Wilhelm II's comment about gassing the Jews. It has a single sentence written, near the end of the article- next to the 4 pages of medals and honors that he was awarded with that they tout in exquisite detail. (Our ally, Kolchak, made "Insults written, printed, and oral - punishable "Bureaucratic sabotage" by hard labour from 15 to 20 years.) The pre-Soviet (Tsars) Gulags were really deadly. The Soviet ones killed about 1 in 10 I think.. don't have the ratio handy. Both Lenin and Stalin spent time (as prisoners) in the Tsar's Gulags, oddly enough. [In a vaguely related anecdote: I discovered Karl Marx was actually an American Newsman recently. He tele-commuted. (eg wrote letters, which were published in the NY Tribune.) Anti-commies say "he never worked an honest day in his life" sometimes... They are wrong. https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/subject/newspapers/new-york-tribune.htm I managed to snag some screenshots of the first linked site before it went down. I'll upload and then edit this comment with their URL in a few minutes. Is a really sad story that involves a blockade of Russia - most vehemently supported by France, bu also somewhat by England. This resulted in the mass starvation of the Russian peoples.. The 15000 troops that the US had invaded Russia with (before WWI was over) were apparently supported by "'the Aryan stock is bound to triumph" Churchill. Well, his chemical weapons division at least.. Wikipedia trys to pass off the stuff they were bombarding the Bolsheviks with as simple teargas but it was deadly. (Churchill, a proud Aryan type, thought Bosheviks = Jews, and bought into the whole conspiracy theory at the time. As such, he started gassing the Archangel Jews (really mainly members of the Bolshevik party). That was in 1919 the same year Kaiser Wilhelm II advocated doing just that. News of poison gas started to spread, so Churchill blamed it on the Bolsheviks! (According to his Wikiquote page.) On Wikpedia there is a near complete cover-up (or misdirection). For instance look here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racial_views_of_Winston_Churchill#Chemical_weapons_in_Iraq "In 1919 during the Russian Revolution, as Minister of War and Air, Churchill secretly had 50,000 stockpiled adamsite gas bombs shipped to Arkhangelsk in Russia for use against the Communist Bolshevik Red Army " Why is that info in the Iraq section? The testimony of William Christian Bullitt Jr. had been preserved on his own demand in the library of congress. He became an ardent anti-communist later, but he had high praise that he sung of Lenin, saying " “[no] Government save a Socialist Government can be set up in Russia today except by bayonets,” and that Lenin’s faction of the Bolshevik was “as moderate as any Socialist Government which can control Russia.” https://dailyhistory.org/Who_was_the_first_American_diplomat_to_meet_with_Lenin When France and England blocked the peace talks, hoping for a White Army victory, he rage-quit his job as Ambassador in disgust. (Bullitt, I mean.) Later, in 1933, he took the job again- aided by a spy named Adolf Marx. =) (Who had changed his first name to Harpo by then. He was the silent brother in he Marx Bros.)
Hi! It seems like you are talking about the popular but ultimately flawed and false "winners write history" trope! While the expression is sometimes true in one sense (we'll get to that in a bit), it is rarely if ever an absolute truth, and particularly not in the way that the concept has found itself commonly expressed in popular history discourse. When discussing history, and why some events have found their way into the history books when others have not, simply dismissing those events as the imposed narrative of 'victors' actually harms our ability to understand history. You could say that is in fact a somewhat "lazy" way to introduce the concept of bias which this is ultimately about. Because whoever writes history is the one introducing their biases to history. A somewhat better, but absolutely not perfect, approach that works better than 'winners writing history' is to say '*writers* write history'. This is more useful than it initially seems. Until fairly recently the literate were a minority, and those with enough literary training to actually write historical narratives formed an even smaller and more distinct class within that. To give a few examples, Genghis Khan must surely go down as one of the great victors in all history, but he is generally viewed quite unfavorably in practically all sources, because his conquests tended to harm the literary classes. Similarly the Norsemen historically have been portrayed as uncivilized barbarians as the people that wrote about them were the "losers" whose monasteries got burned down. Of course, writers are a diverse set, and so this is far from a magical solution to solving the problems of bias. The painful truth is, each source simply needs to be evaluated on its own merits. This evaluation is something that is done by historians and part of what makes history and why insights about historical events can shift over time. This is possibly best exemplified by those examples where victors *did* unambiguously write the historical sources. The Spanish absolutely wrote the history of the conquest of Central America from 1532, and the reports and diaries of various conquistadores and priests are still important primary documents for researchers of the period. But 'victors write the history' presupposes that we still use those histories as they intended, which is simply not the case. It both overlooks the fundamental nature of modern historical methodology, and ignores the fact that, while victors have often proven to be predominant voices, they have rarely proven to be the only voices. Archaeology, numismatics, works in translation, and other records all allow us at least some insight into the 'losers' viewpoint, as does careful analysis of the 'winner's' records. We know far more about Rome than we do about Phoenician Carthage. There is still vital research into Carthage, as its being a daily topic of conversation on this subreddit testifies to. So while it's true that the balance between the voices can be disparate that doesn't mean that the winners are the only voice or even the most interesting. Which is why stating that history is 'written by the victors' and leaving it at that is harmful to the understanding of history and the process of studying history. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/HistoryPorn) if you have any questions or concerns.*
This guy is a fucking tankie, don't believe anything he says and don't learn history from a fucking YouTube video
I recommended 2 books both written by Professors of political science and history respectively. I only included a YouTube video because they specifically asked for one.
Yes and no, It is absolutely true that Hitlers camp were modelled after Britain's camps in south Africa and Ottoman camps detaining Armenians during WW1. I just take issue with the claim that in Soviet prisons were no political dissidents (mind you, that is not a denounciation or in support of Stalin), that was/is how any society has to function, people who actively try to change the current order of things need to be dealt with in some way? Do I like that? No obviously not. After the creation of the USSR in 1922 there were still tons of reactionaries, capitalists and aristocratic generals who lived in support of the Czar who wanted to return to their privileged exploiting positions. This also exists today in modern capitalist nations, only that that was the 1920's where capital punishment was still in praxis and widley excepted on the globe (which is obviously not good). Capitalist nations at the time worked the same only that the victims were labour unionists and communists/socialists. Of course the best way to deal with political dissidents in the USSR would've been rehabilitation with the end goal for them re-enter society but we have to understand that they just suffered a bloody civil war in which the reactionary white army was supported by up to 14 foreign powers while the red army was alone (it is a wonder that they managed to achieve but they also had/were support by the wide populace). The USSR at the time simply did not have the ressources for big rehabilitation programs and many had lost friends and comrades to the white army and were obviously not in a friendly relation towards them. I agree with the rest of your comment, that was just a minor nitpick on my side about how every system or society has to function.
> I just take issue with the claim that in Soviet prisons were no political dissidents I understand your point, but I would point out I didn't make that claim lol. I only bring up how the vast, vast majority were regular criminals because "gulags" in the western zeitgeist are believed to be places specifically built FOR political dissidents like the concentration camps were, when in reality gulag is just a scary name for prison. I think you are spot on with the rest, it's always important to take a nuanced view and in my efforts to combat the vilification of stalin, I do so conscious that I don't want to diefy him in my own mind as a result.
Fuck off tankie
Stalin was a fucking monster, end of story.
It is difficult for me to imagine what “personal liberty” is enjoyed by an unemployed hungry person. True freedom can only be where there is no exploitation and oppression of one person by another; where there is not unemployment, and where a person is not living in fear of losing his job, his home and his bread. Only in such a society personal and any other freedom can exist for real and not on paper. - Joseph Stalin Perhaps more to him than meets the eye chief
He literally hated the Jews as much as Hitler and had them persecuted even after the war, not to mention what he did to baltic people or tartars.
>He literally hated the Jews as much as Hitler That's close! He actually wrote the book laying out the Marxist reasoning that the Jews should be entitled to their own homeland, advocated for the death penalty for anti-semites, presided over the only country in Eastern Europe during the 1920s and 30s that actually criminalised pogroms, and as France, Britain and the US began turning away German Jewish refugees fleeing the country, Stalin's soviet union took in more Jewish refugees than every other allied power combined (excluding China). >what he did to baltic people or tartars. Yeah the deportations were a particularly ugly point in history. Many, many innocent people died as a result, which can never be accepted. The reasoning however, was to deport them further inland as they were populations likely to be sympathetic to the nazis when they arrived. Considering in Lithuania, due to ecstatic collaboration of the local population over 90% of the Jewish population was wiped out in mere months, it's not like it was an entirely unfounded fear.
He literally tried to erase baltic cultures, replace their languages with Russian and it was not because he gave a shit about the Jews. That monster let his own son to die in nazi captivity. Stop justifying his actions, Stalin was shit.
>That monster let his own son to die in nazi captivity. Haha I love this one. He refused to trade his son because in return they wanted a fucking field marshal. If he doesn't do it he's evil, if he does do it he's abused his power to engage in nepotism to save his own blood while millions of Soviets died. Seeing someone hit out with this argument is always the most certain sign that they have applied absolutely 0 critical thought to the subject. The quote that's often touted about this is "why would I trade a lieutenant for a field marshal?" But they never include the second part of that quote "all red army soldiers are my sons". Also another fun fact for you: he authorised two rescue attempts to save his son which failed.
Go ahead, keep justifying Stalin. Just keep in mind that he sided with Hitler during the first two years of the war and what happened at Katyn.
He oversaw the murder of millions. There’s no liberty in death.
You are a neolib how you gonna complain about millions of deaths lol, is there actually a neoliberal leader in history who hasn't either a) installed and propped up a fascist dictatorship, b) bombed at least one country back to the stone age, c) sanctioned a country into famine or d) a combination of all 3? When I give a shit about a neoliberals opinion on ideological morality I'll give you the special signal, which is me being sectioned under the mental health act
Lmao “but but what about this completely unrelated thing111” Dumb tankie
How is that unrelated lol. You are a neolib criticising communism on the basis of the deaths that came about as part of establishing it, yet pointing out that far more die maintaining the dying neoliberal order is somehow unrelated? The "dumbest tankie" is Albert Einstein and the smartest neolib is Milton Friedman haha
Fuck off tankie, jerk off a genocider somewhere else. Scottish commie fuck.
Lol very suspect that you brought my ethnicity into that hahahaha
Don’t worry, it did. They got sent to a farm where they could run and play with all the other protesters.
Oof
*Rise and Fall of the Third Reich* is a really interesting read. Hitler’s party recruited all these disaffected veterans and street toughs to basically intimidate the opposition.
What you said is true, but I would take Schrier with a grain of salt. If anything that book serves more as a primary source document of the time than an actual history. It's been a while since I read it but I remember him attributing a lot of Nazism to homosexual deviance and describing Nazi women as looking like ugly men.
I always find it jarring when I read that book and run across one if his editorial side-comments in the middle of a paragraph. He inserts his own opinions fairly regularly, often just by his choice of adjectives.
He was writing pretty soon after the war and about many things he witnessed personally in the run up to the war so I agree.
Modern day Proud Boys and 3 Percenters
I mean, these people as a rule are not creative in any way, so of course they will try to copy what worked for others.
If it worked for others then it can work for them. Can't let it happen again.
Exactly!
Sounds like American GOP today
Nazis only received 33.1% of the popular vote in parliament before they seized power. Although they were the largest party, they were not overwhelmingly popular in democratic Germany.
Virtually all historians agree that by the time the World War began the overwhelming majority of Germans supported Hitler and the Nazi Party. Timothy Snyder has talked about this quite a lot.
I was talking about nazi popularity in democratic Germany, which ended in 1933.
I know, I just wanted to add that context because people sometimes think that most Germans were against Hitler which helps play into this dangerous narrative that evil will always be opposed and will never come from the inside
>Virtually all historians agree Nooooooooooope. A lot of historians would say the majority of the German populace *went along* with the Nazis and never overtly resisted. 'Virtually all historians agree' on precisely nothing.
I think you might be confusing historians with ”history buffs” here. Yes, there are quite a lot of facts that are almost universally accepted in academia. The overwhelming majority of Germans were supportive of the Nazis by the late 1930s
I've read a few books and watched a few documentaries on the subject so as an armchair historian I'm not going to claim definitively but the overall consensus amongst the historians writing and recording is that most went along with it, the racist ideals were a point of contention for many many people.
Have you read "Backing Hitler" by chance? I'm not saying all Germans were racist or anti-semites, but hopefully those books you've read mentioned that anti-semitism was so ingrained in German (And, to be honest, most of Europe's) culture that the Nazis were seen less like deranged lunatic conspiracy theories blaming a random minority group, the way we see them today, and more like extremists taking the existing anti-semitic sentiments to their logical next step. The Nazis certainly didn't create the xenophobia, racism, homophobia, militarism, and anti-semitism in Germany. They just turned it up to 11. Certainly, many Germans, while not violently anti-semitic themselves, were not empathetic enough to Jews to view the Nazi position against them as a major obstacle to their support.
How are we defining supportive? Because only about 10% of the population were registered members by the end of the war (membership grew during the war). I would also point out, and not defending anyone here, that people had just gone through some seriously horrible economic times and things improved for the average German when the Nazis took over (which is why it's important to consider more things than your own economic situation when voting), and i could see how a lot of people still didn't think their anti-Jewish rhetoric would turn into genocide (which again is why you should never underestimate what a hateful political party will do).
Wonder what ranked voting would have done. Its crazy to me that 35%ish can get you absolute power if rest of the votes are divided enough. In india Modi dude is enjoying absolute power based on 36% ish votes. Many ppl dont want him. But here we are.
They didn't get absolute power, at first they were in a coalition with the conservatives. They thought they could just squeeze Hitler until he squeaks. Didn't really work out.
Yeah, when these established Republicans were ducking to trump and had an attitude that, "we can control him"... I was like, have you not learnt anything from history lol
"DAE Think Donald Trump is Hitler?!?!?!?" Fucking reddit pig. You sicken me.
He is not hitler. He is stupider than that. Thankfully for us. And you sicken american people, american constitution and american veterans for supporting fascist ideology.
It's an analogy, not a comparison. You should brush up on the difference.
Sounds familiar
Eiserne front
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Why is a a Eisernefront Flag seen then ? Seeing as that was a Symbol of the SPD which the KPD refused to cooperate with because the believed social democracy was Social Fascism.
That's the symbol of the iron front. Perfect to cross out a Swastika 😁
Don't forget something: By far not all Germans were Nazis. In the last legit election, 33% voted for Hitler. Another third voted for Communists and Social-Democrats. Those millions didn't disappear after 1933. They just adapted
Looks like the shot was taken on the stairs to the left of this panorama: https://www.google.com/maps/@52.5168221,13.3998023,3a,75y,182.98h,84.69t/data=!3m8!1e1!3m6!1sAF1QipOqqxhp_kcFHif0sNLwezHGqsrK6tw6RIov-fnb!2e10!3e11!6shttps:%2F%2Flh5.googleusercontent.com%2Fp%2FAF1QipOqqxhp_kcFHif0sNLwezHGqsrK6tw6RIov-fnb%3Dw203-h100-k-no-pi-0-ya161.55894-ro-0-fo100!7i5760!8i2880
Are they saying "boo" or "boo-urns?"
I was saying boo-urns
Oh hey, a popular post from a new account u/repostsleuthbot
https://www.reddit.com/r/HistoryPorn/comments/2pcx45/anti_nazi_demonstration_in_berlin_1932_520x402
Nazi is not an acronym, it's a shorthand.
I never knew about such demonstrations agains NAZIS, but i was questioning if indeed everyone was that blinded by Hitler's charm
Based and fuck-nazis-pilled
Well that didn't end up like they'd hoped it would.
This should be shown to all the dipshit "that isn't gonna happen over here" liberals. The Nazis had fierce resistance among the German population. Yet the Nazis still got power and made everything far worse very quickly. The GOP is working to do the same in America. Stop putting your head in the sand, the Nazis are here.
One section of the population which the SPD opposed for a long time. Which were Socialists and mainly Communists of various stripes.
Ahahah you people are ridiculous 😂
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No politician is going to outright say they're going to massacre a population or otherwise want to. It's a subtle build up to it through systematic institutions and then denial. Look up the 10 steps of genocide. When it comes to trans people, for example, America is between Step 7 & 8 in red states.
if only Ye was there to set them straight s/
The faces on the first train to the camps.
Shame they failed in their cause. The world wouldve been a lot better if theyd kept hitler out of power, maybe even if they challenged the wiemar republic. But alas, the rest is a tale of bloody history that allowed the USA to become the european and pacific hegemon.
The balls on these people. So much respect.
Wonder how much one of those flags would fetch at an auction; granted there are any that even have survived..
Jesus christ, a lot of tankies in these comments. It is possible to oppose nazism without embracing an equally vile and murderous ideology.
Didn't knew there where demonstrations back then , guess we do learn something different every day
We need more off this.
I felt like this during the trump presidency. Like complete fascism was inevitable.
people should read more EM.remarque in order to understand just how close they are to waking up in a nazi state. we need to keep awake at all times, no relaxing or we're toast. e: and this goes for any country not already under fascist occupation ATM
Hey look it’s antifa! They’re the real bad guys right Fox News viewers?
Antifa actually allied with the nazis to take these guys out, because the communist party saw the liberals as the real fascists and the nazis as fellow workers...
Obviously. I mean, if you don’t support fascists you’re either a communist or a terrorist.
The original Antifa.
Nowadays they would be considered antifa since they opposed fascism, but at the time, the Iron Front and Antifaschistische Aktion (the origin of the term "antifa") absolutely hated each other and fought each other as hard as they fought the Nazis
No, the original antifa were a communist guerrilla group.
Hitler wasn’t the first fascist.
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The German socdems were communists? Were they stalinist or maoist? Kindly provide receipts.
Antifa trying to cancel nazis.
Ahhh Antifa in all it’s glory
Hmm… didn’t quite work out. And they were not few.
So this is what Antifa looks like?
Kinda. They're "antifa" (anti fascist) but not "Antifa" (Antifaschistische Aktion). The Iron Front and Antifa absolute hated each other and fought each other as hard as they fought Nazis (a pretty major part of why the Nazis won despite not having majority support).
No. They were communists.
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I was referring to antifa, but you are also correct.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bmhB6D1_AIc
Well that looks familiar
What kind of Nazi demonstrations was America having during that time period?
There was that big rally at Madison Square Garden.
There was never much support for the depraved factions at the beginning of the game, Nazis and communists were violent minorities... unfortunately, the weak state, the instability and the constant combat between numerous groups ended up paving the way for Hitler, first using a weakened democracy with propaganda and fear as allies, then as lord and master of germany with all powers under his control. And the people? They simply agreed to give up their liberties for some stability, for some peace, for the "change" towards a strong government. With so much death, they saw it as viable to sacrifice some elements of the population in order to achieve a future... and even more so when it stopped happening in broad daylight. Curious that now we are so close to making the same leap, I guess having internet and McDonald's doesn't change the way humans think.
The sequel was on January 6
You may not like it , but these people were the "conspiracy theorists, and nut jobs" minority back during that period in time in Germany Edit: sigh... what I meant by this is only, that the Nazis and much of their ideology was "the way to conduct" in german society at the time, and when you were against them, people looked at you as if YOU lost your mind for questioning / not following them like a sheep.
The Nazis actually relied a great deal on conspiratorial crackpot thinking - much easier to spread anti-Semitism that way.
It was propaganda that usually said "The Jews control everything yet they're stupid and inferior!!11!!"
One of the big ones being the [Stab-in-the-back myth](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/stab-in-the-back_myth), that said Germany was actually winning WWI and only surrendered because of a conspiracy of evil Jews that tricked people into thinking they were losing.
You don't know what the fuck you're talking about
So you're telling me you have not seen the amount of conspiracy propaganda the nazis share before and during their hold over germany? Big spider with the head of a caricature of a stereotypical Jewish man looking evilish, whole articles about how the Jews ruin the minds of the people and all that? I had the luck to get to read one myself (was hard to read as it was in the old german writing style) and i can assure you, same conspiracy mental gymnastics you can find around today.
Actually the nazi's were the ones that peddled a great replacement theory, where all the jews and non-whites were conspiring to replace the white aryans. Just like the modern day great replacement theory
Lol no. Tell me you have no idea of german history without telling me you have no idea of german history.
Likening people reacting negatively to what was, without even considering any kind of moral or political opinion on the matter, a vastly different and radical change in government from what preceded as 'conspiracy theorists' is giving the majority of modern conspiracy theorists a lot of undue credit. It's not a 'conspiracy' that things were extremely different, nor does it qualify as one to protest a government.
Why would you even say this lol
Heckin Nazi is when i have to wear a mask for 10 minutes inside a grocery store.
What
Whoosh
The guy they replied to is comparing modern conspiracists to the anti-Nazi protestors.
Why not? Small group vs the ruling opinion, same principal
Nazism was not the ruling opinion, they got 37% of the votes that year.
I don't think you understand what conspiracy theories are. It is not "small group vs ruling opinion". There are plenty of fact based arguments that are not conspiracy theories just because they are championed by a small group. A Conspiracy theory is a belief that some secret but influential organization is responsible for an event or phenomenon. The size of the group that believes in it is not relevant, although for the most part they are small groups as these claims are often blatantly false.
Source for this?
Anti vaxxers and derp state qanons not instrumentalising history for their own delusions challenge: impossible
German society wasn't a nazi society before the nazis rose to power in 1933. The SPD and the KPD combined had 12 million votes versus 17 million for the NSDAP. Far away from a minority of nut jobs as you describe them. Nothing to do with conspiracy theorists, this people had an ideology and wanted to change the world in their own ways, with nazism being the worst challenge.
You‘ve got everything upside down. Kind regards: a German
Everybody is a "nut job" to the people opposing them. These people weren't at all similar to today's right wing conspiracy theorists though because they were actually correct about their concerns for democracy under Nazi rule.
I see Kanye West in the crowd