Yeesh, over 3 months since I last visited this subject. Hate leaving loose ends (and occasionally dealing with symptoms). Better late than never.
Last time when talking about how the bourgeois wants to avoid the lower classes at all costs, primarily out of finding the idea repellent that they could ever fall back down to that level, creates a resentment between them and the lower classes. I find that similar to how Hollywood and Political and Corporate elites view the very people they claim to entertain/support/serve.
Anyway, this next section of the chapter begins with the title Social-Democratic Tactics. Guess what one of those tactics is?
[…] the infamous mental terrorism carried out against the bourgeoisie, who are neither morally nor spiritually equipped to withstand such attacks […] consisted in opening […] a veritable onslaught of lies and slanders against the man whom they viewed as their strongest adversary — until his nerves gave way and they sacrificed the man who was attacked, simply in the hope of being allowed to live in peace.
p.113
Yet even though this tactic never works the way they hope it would (not that the lies and slanders don’t finally break the man, but that they would achieve peace by doing so), it’s something they relentlessly do again and again to every new target they can find. Like how the mainstream media does this in the hopes that the corporate/government overlords they serve will cause peace in the country, while always highlighting stories showing anything but.
Tell me this doesn’t sound so similar to today that it’s fucking scary:
Social Democracy […] attacks mostly those who are of a stronger nature […], it praises every weakling among its opponents […], they highly commend those who are devoid of intelligence and will-power.
The Social Democrats know how to create the impression that they alone are the protectors of peace. [… T]hey conquer one position after another — now by methods of quiet intimidation and now by sheer daylight robbery. They employ these tactics at those moments when public attention is turned towards other matters, or when the public considers an incident too trivial to raise a fuss about and thus provoke the anger of a vicious opponents.
These tactics are based on an accurate estimation of human weaknesses; they will lead to success, with almost mathematical certainty, unless the other side also learns how to fight poison gas with poison gas.
p.113
A political party that claims to stand for peace and being the protectors of the weak and the minorities (or the weak minorities), while methodically attacking and breaking down anyone who proclaims (with good reason backed by evidence and history) they stand for anything but. For instance, various YouTubers and websites who cry foul regarding Democratic policies (or hell, even certain Republican policies; some claiming they’re two sides of the same coin in the pocket of the deep state); and how their channel/website gets scrubbed just like that. But there isn’t enough of an outcry of this form of censorship, or against slander directed at the site/channel that has been eliminated. Because it is viewed as a trivial matter, because one shouldn’t worry about any slippery slope that we may be sliding down.
But if there is enough of an outcry and backlash against this form of attack? Well, there’s always a backup plan:
It will appeal to the authority of the state, though they have previously repudiated it. In doing so, their aim is to add to the general confusion, so that they may have a better chance of reaching their own goal unobserved. They will search for some idiot among the higher government officials, one who hopes to ingratiate himself with them, and who will help this world-pest defeat its opponents.
p.115
In other words, get someone else who isn’t officially associated with the state/party to go on the offensive against those calling out the corruption. While the text says they look for “some idiot” official, it’s worth noting that another strategy is to ensure “some idiot” becomes an official in the first place. In other words, ensure “some idiot” gets elected into office somehow, whether by vote or by some other means. Believe me, this book gets in-depth with that tactic in a later chapter. And I think I can safely say there are a lot of dumbass motherfuckers that managed to get into political office. I think everyone can admit that’s the case, no matter which political party they claim to stand behind, while the political party passes gas in their general direction.
Even George Carlin acknowledged that the voting system is rigged, your vote doesn’t count, because if it did count and it did matter, they wouldn’t allow you to do it anyway. The only way it matters is in what controllable schmuck they allow you to put into office so they can wrap their strings around him/her which they can pull at their leisure. For a time I used to think Donald Duck Trump was an exception to this. Well, he isn’t.
And then there’s the roles of trade unions amidst all this, how they became appropriated as tools to serve this party’s cause. That being said, Hitler states that trade unions in of themselves aren’t hostile to the good of the nation. After all, their purpose is to provide employment to the working class, who thus go about doing tasks that are intended to improve and/or maintain the good and stability of the nation. The problem lies with corrupted employers.
As long as there are employers who lack social understanding and have wrong ideas of justice and fair play, it is not only the right but also the duty of their employees — who are, after all, an integral part of our people — to protect the public interest from individual greed and irrationality. To safeguard the loyalty and confidence of the people is as much in the interests of the nation as to safeguard public health.
Both are seriously menaced by dishonorable employers, who are unaware of their duty as members of a national community. Their personal greed or ruthlessness sows the seeds of future trouble.
To eliminate the causes of such a development is truly a service to the nation.
p.119
It’s here that I’d like to point out a film that tackles this topic directly and very effectively. A film from 1978 titled Blue Collar, starring Richard Pryor, Harvey Keitel, and Yaphet Kotto; written and directed by Paul Schrader (who wrote Taxi Driver). It’s about these 3 union workers who are in dire financial straits despite working full-time. Men who are being broken down by the system and lifestyle in a manner similar to how Hitler described the environment of Vienna. They resort to robbing the union that employed them, only to find there wasn’t much money in the safe. But they do get a hold of a notebook that contains all the corrupt financial dealings the union does. And do these three men blow the whistle on the union to expose how corrupt it is in the hopes of making the community a better place with less corruption (assuming that outcome is even possible)? Nope. Their thinking is more selfish and materialistic. They blackmail the union, hoping to get a lot of money as a result. Well, things don’t work out that way. Each of them winds up either dead, outcast, or just as bad as those they wanted to blackmail in the first place. And it all results in the blue collar workers fighting against each other rather than the corrupt officials they should be fighting against. Any love for their fellow man becomes disintegrated by the end because they had been broken down long before the start of this film; there was no hope of them having a nationalist pride to do anything different when the political and corporate system had nurtured them into materialists.
Which finally brings us to the point in the book I’m sure you all were waiting for. The portion of the chapter titled The Jewish Question.
Knowledge of the Jews is the only key whereby one may understand the inner nature, and therefore the real aims, of Social Democracy.
The man who comes to know this race succeeds in removing a veil from his eyes, one that shows the aims and meaning of this party in a false light. And then, out of the fog and mist of socialist phrases, rises the grinning figure of Marxism.
p.127
You knew this had to come sooner or later. There is a reason this book is considered taboo after all. Because Hitler hates Jews, and blames them for everything wrong with Germany. You know, like how some white nationalists blame blacks for much that is wrong in America. Or how some black nationalists blame whites for everything that is wrong. Or how many for some reason believe that anyone who is an anti-Semite is a horrible person who should be wiped off the face of the Earth. Aren’t you curious as to the reasons some of these people have for harboring such hatred? Don’t you often hear a reason regarding why blacks should have reparations for stuff whites did to them in the past, and then get pissed off at all the reasons you perceive as illogical, false, or just plain bullshit?
There’s usually something off about someone’s logical for coming to hate an entire race of people. Because from my experience, no individual should be condemned just on the basis of their race. But let’s say that this form of generalization/stereotyping is justified to an extent, that a race of people do tend to act a certain way simply because it’s in their nature; if only for the sake of argument. Aren’t there always exceptions for certain individuals? Like if it’s true black people statistically cause more crime on average than any other race in America, what about the black people who don’t cause crime? If it’s true white people in America owned slaves back in the pre-1870s, what about the white people who didn’t (and better yet, fought to eradicate it)? If it’s true the majority of Asians are great at math, what about those who can’t do Calculus? If it’s true the majority of Koreans can kick everyone’s ass at Starcraft, what about those who suck at computer games? If it’s true the majority of straight men only find women attractive, what about the few straight guys who see this one man and think, “You know, I don’t consider myself gay, but I wanna have sex with that guy” (if women can have that line of thinking, so can men)?
If it’s true the Jews were responsible for all the ills in Germany during this time period (the early 1900s), what about those who were in no way responsible? You going to tell me every single Jew owned a bank and screwed every non-Jew out of money somehow, and promoted drugs and pornography and other materialistic drivel while making everyone anti-nationalist? Let’s just say, even though I’ve become more receptive and sympathetic (and sometimes even agreeing) with the opinions of those who believe Jews are responsible for the ills of society, I have a hard time swallowing a racism pill that big. In fact, I don’t even think it’s possible for me. Too much wrong with that line of thinking.
So how did Hitler come to have this viewpoint? Well, he didn’t start out as a Jew-hater. In fact, you could say he started out like anyone else.
I believed that they [Jews] were persecuted on account of their faith, and my aversion at hearing such remarks nearly grew into a feeling of abhorrence.
I hadn’t the slightest idea that there could be such a thing as a systematic anti-Semitism.
[…]
I saw in the Jew only a man of a different religion. Therefore, on grounds of human tolerance, I opposed the idea that he should be attacked because he had a different faith. And so I considered the anti-Semitic press in Vienna to be unworthy of the cultural traditions of a great people. The memory of certain events that happened in the Middle Ages came to mind, and I felt that they should not be repeated.
p.127-129
Seems like a reasonable man so far doesn’t he? Not this evil “Kill ’em all and let dogs rape their babies before devouring them. Muahahahah! I twirl my short mustache!” villain that’s been built up and ingrained into pretty much everyone everywhere whose been to an average school with an average history curriculum. And those Middle Age events Hitler refers to basically indicates how the Jews have been expelled from several countries over the course of history up until this point in time.
The start of Hitler’s change of opinion, at least according to his own work (and to be fair, anything written by anyone else that has a different opinion regarding how his hatred came to form, assuming they don’t conclude he was just born with it, is just speculation), began with the newspapers. How he eventually picked up on not just an element of bias overtime, but also on the opinionated aspects of it.
I was outraged that, in a nation where any half-wit could claim for himself the right to criticize others as a ‘legislator’ in the Reichstag, the bearer of the imperial crown was himself subject to reprimand by the most miserable assembly of drivellers that has ever existed.
I was even more disgusted at the way this same Viennese press pandered to the every rickety horse in the Court, and then flew into wild ecstasies of joy if he wagged his tail in response. At the same time, these very newspapers displayed anxiety at anything to do with the German Emperor — all the while trying to hide their enmity. But to me, it was poorly cloaked. Of course, they denied any intention of meddling in Germany’s internal affairs — God forbid. They pretended that, by touching these wounds in a friendly way, they were both fulfilling the duties of the mutual alliance between the two countries and were also meeting their journalistic obligations. Having thus excused themselves, they then poked their finger ruthlessly into the wound.
[…]
One thing that got on my nerves was the disgusting manner in which the big newspapers cultivated admiration for France. One really had to feel ashamed of being a German when confronted by those saccharine hymns of praise for ‘the great cultural nation.’
p.133
Replace “Germany” and “German” with “America” and “American”, “Emperor” with “President”, “France” with “Israel” or “Africa” or “England”, or whatever fucking state or continent the press feels like saying is better than America at this point in time, and you’ve got yourself a mirror of today’s reality.
Anyway, Hitler did some investigating into the papers, who wrote them and some such. Eventually he determined that Jews were the primary writers and owners of most, if not all, of the major news agencies in Germany. For instance, one of the papers in circulation at the time was the Neue Freie Presse, which was co-founded by Max Friedlander (Jew), with a couple of Zionist correspondents, and was run by a Jewish businessman in Hitler’s time.
Eventually he began to figure out how much of a stranglehold Jews had over the press altogether. And not just the press, but the theater, arts, banks, and the influence they held over politicians. And amazingly enough, he’s not wrong in reaching this conclusion. Going back to the Introduction section of the book, the author cites a study by Sarah Gordon:
“The reader may be surprised to learn that Jews were never a large percentage of the total German population; at no time did they exceed 1.09 percent of the population during the years 1871 to 1933… [In spite of this, Jews] were overrepresented in business, commerce, and public and private service… Within the fields of business and commerce, Jews… represented 25 percent of total sales…; they owned 41 percent of iron and scrap iron firms and 57 percent of other metal businesses… Jews were [also] prominent in private banking under both Jewish and non-Jewish ownership or control. They were especially visible in private banking in Berlin, which in 1923 had 150 private (versus state) Jewish banks, as opposed to only 11 private non-Jewish banks…”
[…]
“Jews were overrepresented among university professors and students between 1870 and 1933… [A]lmost 19 percent of the instructors in Germany were of Jewish origin… Jews were also highly active in the theater, the arts, film, and journalism. For example, in 1931, 50 percent of the 234 theater directors in Germany were Jewish, and in Berlin the number was 80 percent…”
p.34
And one other topic that Hitler mentioned the Jews were overrepresented in that Gordon didn’t cover:
The relationship of the Jews to prostitution and, even more, to human trafficking[.]
p.143
Beyond how overrepresented Jews were in such things, Hitler came to believe that Jews acted different enough from the average German that they should not just be considered non-German, but people of a different race altogether. Their mannerisms, the way they carried themselves. He would also conclude that, despite what conflicts there appeared to be between “liberal Jews” and “Zionist Jews”, they all strove towards the same goal.
Whatever doubts I may still have had at that point were finally removed by the activities of a certain section of the Jews themselves.
There was a great movement among them, well-represented in Vienna, and which strongly confirmed the national character of Jewry: this was Zionism.
[…] The so-called liberal Jews did not reject the Zionists as if non-Jews, but only as brother Jews with an impractical or even dangerous way of promoting Jewry.
There was no real conflict in their inner nature.
This fictitious conflict between the Zionists and the liberal Jews soon disgusted me; it was thoroughly false, and in direct contradiction to the moral dignity and immaculate character on which that people had always prided itself.
p.137
Hitler would go on to state that he realized the Jews were behind the Social Democratic party all along. And how the Jews seemed to hold a deep hatred and resentment towards Germans.
But impossible to explain was the boundless hatred against their fellow citizen — how they disparaged their own nation, mocked its greatness, reviled its history, and dragged the names of its most illustrious men through the gutter.
[…] It was deeply unnatural.
One could temporarily cure this malady, but only for a few days or some weeks. But upon later meeting those were converted, one found that they were the same as before.
p.145
Hitler began to view them as something other than German. And also viewed them as the founders of Marxism, noting that Karl Marx was a Jew, and the relation to the Bolshevik Revolution. Marxism (ie Communism) was something Hitler viewed as the root of all that was wrong in Germany (or at least most of what was wrong). So he studied it, and came to the conclusion that Marxism must be eradicated, as it only could have originated from the devil incarnate. A statement I found most amusing. But not quite as enthralling as the statement that Marxism is destined to bring about the collapse/destruction of the entire human civilization if it isn’t stopped.
Eventually he went on to debate some Jews (informally) in an attempt to show them the absurdity of their Marxist/Zionist teachings. And as a result of this, he would come to the conclusion that “a Jew can never be parted from his opinions.”
It seemed that the more they understood the destructiveness of Social-Democratic doctrine and its consequences, the more firmly they clung to it.
The more I debated them, the more familiar I became with their argumentative tactics. At the outset they counted upon the stupidity of their opponents; but when they got so tied up that they couldn’t find a way out, they played the trick of acting as innocent simpletons. Should that fail, in spite of their tricks of logic, they acted as if they couldn’t understand the counter arguments, and jumped away to another topic of discussion. They stated truisms and platitudes; and if you just accepted these, they applied them to other matters of an essentially different nature. If you pointed this out, they escaped again and avoided any precise statement. […]
But if you really struck a blow on one of these adversaries and, due to the audience present, he had to concede the point, a surprise was in store for you the following day. The Jew would be utterly oblivious to what had happened the day before.
p.147-149
And then comes the most (in)famous line in the entire book.
I gradually came to hate them.
p.149
His position changed from one wanting to peacefully resolve the problems and conflicts plaguing German society by debate and compromise, to one of finding it necessary to stand and fight. His opinion of Jews changed to one of hatred, thus becoming an anti-Semite.
Now, with all that being said, let me tell you why I don’t agree entirely with his conclusions. He does make many valid points, and in my opinion Jews as a race (and I do believe they are a race, not just simply followers of a religion) should be criticized for certain aspects of their stereotypes just as much as one would criticize the black race for being less intelligent and more prone to criminal activities than others, just as one would criticize whites for being charitable to a fault (or having strings attached to said charity), just as one would criticize Asians for lacking creativity, just as one would criticize wolves for being unable to be tamed. Which brings me back to my earlier point regarding the dangers of generalizing everyone belong to a race. Obviously such generalized criticisms don’t apply to every single individual. Each individual should be criticized on an individual basis, never concluding they adhere to a racial stereotype just because they belong to that race. But neither should one be surprised if they do possess such a stereotype.
For instance, how do we know Hitler wasn’t just a victim of the anecdote fallacy, which can also be said to be the small number statistics fallacy? In other words, using a small number of isolated incidents regarding his personal encounters with Jews to make a generalized conclusion about all Jews. I say this in regard to his debate experiences, as he’s obviously done his homework on the other aspects regarding Jewish control over news, banks, etc., which doesn’t fall under such a fallacy. Regardless, not every Jew debates like those he debated anymore than every Jew is associated with banking, sex trafficking, film-making, etc.
But that’s a more obvious and minor criticism. The major criticism comes with regard to Jews being responsible for Marxism, Communism, and thus the Bolshevik Revolution. It’s true that there was a disproportionate amount of Jews directly involved with the revolution, and another disproportionate amount were in leadership positions of the USSR post-revolution in the Politburo. However, believing Marxism was created to benefit Jews, and to be used for their ends in corrupting the world while paving the way for the creation and expansion of Israel (ie Zionism) is not something I’ve come to agree with in my research. It cannot be understated that Karl Marx was a self-hating Jew who hated other Jews (probably for the same reasons Hitler did, minus the Marxism). Hell, Marx even wrote a short work independent of the Communist Manifesto that directly criticized Jews (it’s even in the title). There’s no evidence to indicate Marx wrote this for the purpose of empowering Jews into creating and/or altering forms of government into a communist/socialist form that they could easily control and manipulate. Besides, even if that was the case, the aftermath of the Bolshevik Revolution once Vladmir Lenin died proved that Jews may not be able to maintain positions of such control and manipulation, as Stalin went on after that to eradicate all Jews from any leadership positions within the USSR, formed a banking system that was free of Jewish control as far as I can tell, and massacred Jews on a scale worse than the previous czar that ruled Russia ever did (or would have). Let alone killing off a good portion of his own people via Holodomor.
That, and the reasons why Hitler wrongfully came to the conclusion that Jews were responsible for Marxism/Communism/Socialism in the first place. Now to be fair, Hitler cannot be blamed for coming to this conclusion. Hell, some people today still come to this conclusion. Hitler cannot be blamed because pretty much all the main resources available with regard to historical research on the subject were heavily dosed in an element of bias.
The reason it was believed Jews were responsible for the Bolshevik Revolution (and thus Communism) in the first place, as far as I can tell, has to do with this British reporter named Robert Wilton who went to Russia near the end of the Bolshevik Revolution to get information and write a report on what was happening (many countries were curious after all). However, his main sources involved groups such as The Black Hundreds, which were a very anti-Semitic group who blamed the Jews for much, and associated them with the Revolution and many leadership positions in it. These names and Jewish associations proved to be false in hindsight, because the reporter was given false information by this group (Russia pre-Revolution always had a bit of anti-semitism to it; justified or not, it resulted in such radical groups as The Black Hundreds spreading lies). But regardless, the report was made, and it influenced the opinions of many, including Winston Churchill, who repeated aspects of this report in speeches, proclaiming Jews to be responsible in-part for the Bolshevik Revolution. This all trickled down in various history books and newspapers of the time period, which Hitler used for his research into Marxism, and thus came his conclusion about Jews being behind Marxism.
More information on the topic regarding Jews not being behind the Bolshevik Revolution can be found here:
In any case, it can be stated that this information that got to Hitler caused him to have a wrongful belief about the Jews, or at the very least viewing them as a blight upon humanity in an exaggerated fashion.
Regardless, this doesn’t negate the other points Hitler made regarding how Jews somehow managed to get into all those powerful/influential positions which negatively impacted Germany. One must ask, despite his error in hindsight (which again isn’t entirely his fault due to misinformation), was he entirely wrong in believing the Jews must be removed from their positions so that Germany can stop being in such dire straits? Considering what happened after Hitler came to power and kicked the Jews out of the banking positions and implemented a new monetary system (if you can call it that) which transformed Germany into a country more powerful than it had ever been, it’s difficult to dispute that Hitler’s line of thinking resulted in some good for the country.
The Anomalous Host 