How The Holocaust Happened

[Music] it's 1932 you're a young poverty stricken working class german with a starving family you haven't had a job for months your savings have been wiped out you're about to be evicted you fought and saw the unimaginable during the first world war two million of your countrymen that's men you and your family often knew died sometimes horrifically 1.5 million disabled veterans struggle to survive up and down the country addiction alcoholism prostitution suicide they're all endemic germany has been made to sign a humiliating peace treaty pay unreasonable and economically devastating reparations to america britain and france and seed territory on all of its borders then to top it off the great depression hits liberalism and democracy are failing hyperinflation reaches one thousand percent per month even money is becoming worthless election after election failed to reach a majority and parliament that's the reichstag is unable to govern conservatives liberals communists authoritarians the church the army they're all competing for power moral values and attitudes are blurred too religious belief continues to decline women's liberation sweeps europe morals loosen the jazz scene hits to many though all of this depravity seems to be contributing to what's happening germany is at risk of extinction enter adolf hitler charming charismatic seemingly brilliant after being elected in 1933 he quickly revitalizes the german economy problem after problem seemed to be miraculously fixed you get a job roads are built reparations are halted a wave of euphoria sweeps across the nation life in germany becomes good again why because hitler and the national socialists stand firmly against all the things that were causing its destruction the greedy capitalists godless communists determined to overthrow the state vindictive enemy countries abroad and an enemy within that connects all of these things that's responsible for them all that wants you dead the jews for almost 10 years you're surrounded by anti-semitic propaganda and conspiracy theory the jews control wall street hollywood america britain the soviet union then the war starts they threaten to take all of it away from you all those things you've gained you're too old to fight in the army but you're drafted into the reserve police force one morning on duty in occupied poland you're rised from your bed and are driven to a nearby village your commander major wilhelm trap known to you affectionately as papa trap is pale faced has a choking shaky voice and tears in his eyes he informs you of your orders remember he says back home bombs are falling on your wives and daughters too the jews in the village were involved with the partisans the enemy it's us or them they must be rounded up and taken to the work camp but those not able to work women children the elderly must unfortunately be shot trap makes you an offer you can be excused from this task if you wish you look briefly at your friends but don't take up the offer instead you step forward take the men women and children into the forest order them onto the ground aim and pull the trigger two million men women and children would be murdered this way and at least four million more in the death camps and gas chambers and statistically speaking you would become a murderer in that way too you would participate in the holocaust what drives ordinary everyday people to become mass killers men and women but usually men like you and me the holocaust was not perpetrated solely by a few sadistic psychopaths but by tens of thousands of everyday germans poles frenchmen austrians slovakians in fact much of europe took part if any of us could be motivated under the right conditions to become mass serial killers how can we protect against the threat how might we inoculate our societies and cultures from descending into genocide one estimate puts the number of victims of genocide and democide that's murder by government at 269 million in the 20th century alone stalin mao the khmer rouge rwanda the congo armenia what's undeniable is that we're a disturbingly violent species and there are even more distressing questions what makes the 20th century the most advanced century in history the most genocidal too as the journalist mark bowden has put it the holocaust disturbs us so much because none of the things we associate with modern civilization peace industry technology education frees us from the dark side of the human soul he said that just as there is evil at the heart of every man there is evil at the heart of even the most civilized human society and the german philosopher jurgen habermas has said that a veil of naivety was torn up with the holocaust something happened that was unimaginable until then it ended the optimism of what seemed like the inexorable progress of western enlightenment i want to focus on a kind of inoculation against that kind of evil a moral vaccine a social psychologist thomas blass puts it this way what psychological mechanism transformed the average and presumably normal citizens of germany and its allies into people who would carry out or tolerate unimaginable acts of cruelty against their fellow citizens who were jewish resulting in the death of six million of them but first a definition the un says that genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy in whole or in part a national ethnic racial or religious group as such a killing members of the group b causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group c deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part d imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group and e forcibly transferring children of the group to another group so what are the psychological cultural social and political factors that might lead ordinary men and women to commit crimes of this scale we'll look here at a number of factors propaganda outgrouping rationalization authority conformity and compartmentalization or distancing but rather than the nazi leaders those ordinary men might be a good place to start that scene of major trap tearfully informing his men of their duty did actually happen trapp was a police officer who commanded reserve police battalion 101 of the order police he was executed for war crimes in 1948. the order police were made up of ordinary germans too old to be conscripted into the army they are around 33 to 48 years old predominantly working class but also too old to have only known nancy propaganda as they were raised in the democratic era of the weimar republic these ordinary policemen joined ss units called the einsatzgruppen who were tasked with following the army into occupied territories in the east particularly russia and poland they were to assist the ss in a number of jobs and as their name suggests keep order rounding up polish soldiers guarding camps organizing equipment and ultimately executing enemy soldiers partisans and jews stalin had given the order for partisan warfare which made it easier politically for hitler to order communists in occupied russia to be immediately executed because they were a threat the nation he argued was being attacked from all sides germany was at war and as one ordinated the men are to be instructed continuously about the political necessity of the measures in june 1942 police battalion 101 was sent for guard duty to a town called lublin in poland where around 40 000 jews lived in july major trap was ordered to round up the 1800 jews living in a nearby village working age men were to be sent to a labor camp the elderly women and children were to be immediately shot when traps lieutenant was informed of the order he requested another assignment insisting that he would not participate in an action in which defenseless men and women would be shot before being told of the details the men were informed that they would be doing some difficult work one sergeant told them that he didn't want to see any cowards they arrived at the village at dawn trap assembled his men and said that any of the older men who didn't feel up to the task could step down one man stepped forward another 10 or 12 followed they were dismissed almost 500 men remained they were to round up the jews and take them to the marketplace trap didn't join his men he couldn't bear the sight one of the men reported hearing trap say that oh god why did i have to be given these orders he apparently haste back and forth another officer reported that trapp had told him that the job didn't suit him but that orders were orders one said that when he and trap were alone he sat on a stall and wept bitterly the tears really flowed he said another confirmed that he wept like a child meanwhile the air was filled with gunshots and screams a doctor explained to the men that shooting victims above the shoulders and into the backbone would result in an instant death the executions lasted all day alcohol was supplied but many aimed too high or too low one man said that when he shot the entire skull exploded rains and bones flew everywhere another said that the entire skull or at least the rear skull cap was torn off and blood bone splinters and brain sprayed everywhere after a while many of the men just couldn't take it anymore one policeman simply slipped off another avoided taking his turn shooting those who resisted were called weaklings but suffered no consequences for not participating some hid in a priest's garden another said after one shooting his nerves were totally finished one man said he had become so sick that i simply couldn't anymore another ran into the woods and vomited many were sick in fact and the word repugnant was used a lot one said he'd go crazy if he had to do it again some shot 10 or 20 jews before they were asked to be relieved one man said that his companion was such a terrible shot that the backs of heads were torn off from brain sprayed everywhere he simply couldn't watch any longer this is the testimony of some 200 men tried in a german court after the war when they were finished the bodies were left in the woods and the men returned to the barracks depressed angered and bittered and shaken they said none of them talked none ate they simply drank in court it was said that after only a brief period the commandos of the einsatz groupon got into considerable difficulties the members were in the long run not up to the mental strain caused by the mass shootings there were disputes refusals to obey orders drunken orgies but also serious psychological illnesses even heinrich himmler commander of the ss and one of the architects of the holocaust was distraught after watching the execution of a hundred men in minsk another ss officer had said to him look at the eyes of the men in this commando how deeply shaken they are these men are finished for the rest of their lives but the men soon got used to killing by the end of 1942 they'd executed at least 6 500 jews and deported 42 000 more to the gas chambers once the initial massacres had ended the jew hunts began the searching for runaways in the villages and forests they were so frequent that the men described them as their daily bread and by the time the war was over only a minority 10 to 20 percent of police battalion 101 had abstained from killing and over the course of their service they became increasingly efficient killers the massacre at joseph was typical of an early problem for the nazi leadership the men seemed to find killing innocent humans repugnant and difficult even himmler struggled with the sight of the mass death so it was quickly established that later executions would involve a division of labor so as to ease the psychological burden for the killers this is the historian christopher browning writes allowed the men to become increasingly efficient and calloused executioners the literature on genocide research in general supports this that initial executions are usually distressing but the distress quickly subsides with each subsequent death and worse while in the minority some actually develop a pleasure from killing over time polish prisoners being marched off to nazi prison camps an eventual extermination for the nazi master race theory calls for the complete wiping out of so-called inferior races [Music] and in village after village local judases point out loyal polish neighbors [Music] himmler ordered the gassing of victims whether in mobile gas fans or in the death camps so that there would be less direct stressful involvement for the men division of labour reduced the burden as some worked on the trains some were guards others filled the gas some worked in offices as accountants while others moved the victims into the chambers the shootings by the einsatzgruppen were divided too some would round up others would strip the prisoners and the actual shooting was often done by eastern europeans under german occupation making mankogs in a machine diminished individual personal responsibility similarly historian daniel goldhagen has argued that the steps towards genocide were incremental so as to reduce the resistance that would have been felt if all of the steps had been carried out at once he said that verbal assaults led to physical assault both the results of millennia of anti-semitism in europe then legal and administrative measures like the 1935 nuremberg laws that deprived jews of rights and forbid the marrying of jews and germans fourth the nazis pushed jews to emigrate then there was forced resettlement sixth physical separation in the ghettos one study has shown for example that murder rates were higher in the more ghettoized areas then starvation debilitation disease slave labor and finally death marches and genocide compartmentalizing and incremental actions reduces individual responsibility in an act that seems to be much larger than you but does this really explain much men and women still knew what they were doing what they were partaking in they still pulled the triggers so maybe they were just following orders in his classic study of the french revolution gustav labon argued that crowd psychology differs from individual psychology for two reasons first anonymity can result in the diminishing of personal and individual responsibility responsibility becomes shared so that each individual is more protected the nazis for example made it law that their soldiers in russia would be absolved from any wrongdoing when executing anyone suspected of being anti-german anonymity and the protection of the group meant that the feeling of personal responsibility shrank the second factor he identified was mimesis that in a crowd actions by individuals shouting chanting clapping attacking seemed to be copied more readily the psychologist ervin janis coined the word group think in the 1970s he described groupthink as a mode of thinking that people engage in when they are deeply involved in a cohesive in-group when members striving for unanimity override their motivation to realistically appraise alternative courses of action there's a human tendency to want to agree to conform with your in-group if a group of friends is deciding on a takeaway or a restaurant you don't want to be the one to object you don't want to be the one to cause a problem the sociologist george simmel has described how the desire to stay in an in-group motivates the fear of being censored or excluded by that group but this has another effect it also increases the chance that individuals will want to distance themselves from an out group so as to prove loyalty to the in group the desire for conformity seems to be a universal of human experience and when that conformity is compounded with authority the impulse to obey increases in his study of police battalion 101 christopher browning draws on stanley milgram's famous experiments in which participants are ordered to give supposedly painful shocks to actors screaming in the next room if the participants hesitated the phrase the research requires that you continue was enough to convince 64 of them to continue to shock those wired up to the highest possible pain threshold banana apple green orange lemon orange is incorrect milgram was directly influenced by the holocaust he concluded after the experiments that men are led to kill with little difficulty which fits nicely into the narrative that many were only following the law of the land or only following orders during his trial in jerusalem for example one of the architects of the holocaust adolf eichmann who was tasked with organizing transport across the reich claimed that he was only following orders the philosopher hannah arendt wrote when commenting on the trial that most were not sadists or killers by nature on the contrary a systematic effort was made to weed out those who derived physical pleasure from what they did most were normal everyday men and women complying with the law of their country together with others during the period 1939-1945 caused the killing of millions of jews in his capacity as the person responsible for the execution of the nazi plan for the physical extermination of the jews known as the final solution of the jewish problem milgram's approach is what social psychologists call situational that individuals are moved by the external pressures of the situation that they find themselves in if a scientist asks you to shock someone for an experiment you're likely to conform because the scientist is a trusted symbol of authority and wisdom but there's a problem here the participants in milgram's experiment clearly thought what they were doing was right at least in some way that it was a scientific experiment about learning that the pain was secondary to the benefit of what was being learned that they didn't think they were permanently harming someone that there was some kind of greater good and that the scientists are trustworthy this is clearly not the same as the murder of defenseless children now it could be argued that the pressure to conform to authority during the war in nazi germany was much much greater than in milgram's laboratory as we've seen conformity is a powerful force and those who didn't do what they were asked were leaving their comrades to do the dirty work they risked being ostracized rejected isolated losing their support network in a horrific totalizing war and authority punishment court-martialing the threat of death for not complying was surely difficult to resist except after decades of research and trials absolutely no cases have been found of anyone being punished for refusing to follow orders to kill jews zero in fact as we've seen with police battalion 101 many were able to avoid killing so the argument that the desire to conform to authority was total here is insufficient and even for those that did the question remains who did they think they were conforming to and what did they think they were conforming to did they believe it was evil but conformed anyway or did they think that their superiors were wise and knew what they were doing like milgram scientists does the perpetrator still not have to believe that they're making the right choice in some way in pulling that trigger after all every action good or bad requires some kind of mental justification there's always some kind of rationalization a belief that the action or the authority that convinces you to act is legitimate in some way is the right thing to do milgram argued that hierarchy and authority led participants to adopt their superiors definition of the situation and in doing so some of their moral responsibility was passed to them in some way and personal responsibility was diminished like it was in a crowd for labon individuals are just following orders of someone they trust because of some greater good that they believe in so ultimately conformity and authority simply don't explain enough beliefs what the individuals think are obviously important too there's always a context always a rationalization for what you're doing guring said in nuremberg that it's always a simple matter to drag people along whether it's a democracy or a fascist dictatorship parliament or a communist dictatorship voice or no voice the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders this is easy all you have to do is tell them they're being attacked and announce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger it works the same in every country murder can always be rationalized in some way all wars are justified by those involved the participants convinced of the righteousness of what they're doing but what does it mean to rationalize something well to rationalize is to justify an action with logical reasons to fit it into a larger framework of what correct and right behavior is there were a number of ways that the men rationalized what they were doing and a whole ideology that rationalized the war most obvious was the justification that we are at war it's us or them that they're bombing your wives and children back home these were often powerful motivators sometimes it was even argued that killing prisoners was the humane thing to do his food was short or prisoners wouldn't survive through the winter train cars were torturous and many died on journeys anyway they said to themselves forced marches led to many perishing in the summer there were long hot days without water and in the winter short cold days without food one officer told a policeman in battalion 101 that nothing could be done with such people another said that the jews were not going to escape their fate anyway one justified killing a child by telling themselves that they wouldn't survive without their mother anyway and most perversely health itself could be rationalized not as the health of the individual but the health of the nation before the war the nazis had begun the t4 program euthanizing and murdering men women and children with incurable diseases and mental illness they were described as mercy killings the death camps in poland were run by doctors drafted from this t4 programme who had already been using gas because it was cheap quick and unalarming and humane for the victims who thought they were going for a shower eichmann's lawyer described the gas chambers as a medical matter when questioned on this by the judge he said that it was indeed a medical matter since it was prepared by physicians it was a matter of killing and killing two is a medical matter in these ways executions were often rationalized as the most humane thing to do for people who just wouldn't survive anyway or were damaging to the health of the nation but again twisted rationalizations like this were not enough the justifications for nazi ideology and anti-semitism went much deeper and had dominated germany since hitler came to power in 1933. [Music] so how powerful was nazi ideology and its propaganda as an incitement to murder propaganda philosopher jason stanley writes uses the language of virtuous ideals to unite people behind otherwise objectionable ends the order police undertook a basic training that included a month-long course on ideological education topics included maintaining the purity of blood and the jewish question in germany pamphlets and training films were distributed to troops throughout the war before being sent to russia the einsatzgruppen were given special training with ss figures who gave them pep talks on the war of destruction one with these leader reinhard hedrick himself but the nazi propaganda machine had existed long before the war when the nazis came to power they immediately created a new ministry for public enlightenment and propaganda the rmvp hitler the artist leader of the new reich was the chief storyteller and joseph goebbels ran the ministry the rmvp included the press publishing houses writers theatres radio film music in fact all culture at noon every day a press conference issued press directives and topical words of the day dictating which stories can be covered and details like the presentation and the language to be used the free press ceased to exist almost immediately 200 social democratic newspapers and 25 communist papers were closed otto dietrich the nazi press chief placed all other publications under government control editors had to be aryan of course moreover the nazi party actually purchased newspapers and publishing houses themselves and by 1939 controlled 82 percent of newspapers the franzaia publishing house became the largest publisher in the world large word of the week posters were designed to be displayed in public squares kiosks and shop windows the posters officials were informed must not be absent anywhere the word of the week must penetrate every last community in the nation and should always be in the pedestrians field of vision the propagandists drew on hitler's mind camp drawing up the basic laws of hitler's ideology simplification repetition appeal to the emotions contrasting simple good and evil lines one designer wrote must express simple emotional rhythm in mind camp hitler wrote that all propaganda should be popular and should adapt its intellectual level to the receptive ability of the least intellectual of those whom it is desired to address thus it must sink its mental elevation deeper in proportion to the numbers of the mass human has to grip the receptive ability of the masses is very limited and they're understanding small on the other hand they have a great power of forgetting this being so all effective propaganda must be confined to very few points which must be brought out in the form of slogans posters leaflets pamphlets were all produced in their millions all soldiers were given access to a radio and in short for seven years before the war nazi propaganda was ubiquitous in an environment where hitler could be seen to do no wrong [Music] the report lists the surviving inmates as representing every european nationality it says the camp was founded when the nazi party first came into power in 1933 and has been in continuous operation ever since although its largest populations date from the beginning of the present war one estimate put the camp's normal complement at 80 000 in the official report the buchenwald camp is termed an extermination factory the means of extermination starvation complicated by hard work abuse beatings and tortures incredibly crowded sleeping conditions and sicknesses of all types bodies stacked one upon the other were found outside the crematory the nazis maintained a building at the camp for medical experiments and liver sections with prisoners as guinea pigs few who entered the experimental buildings ever emerged alive [Music] propaganda was central to the dissemination of the nazi ideology which at its core was an ideology of purity and unification the nazis believed that a pure german nation led by the singular will of a leader would rid it of division producing a natural efficient and utopian society national socialism was the doctrine then of blood soil and race and goebbels wrote in his diary that the jew is the enemy and destroyer of blood-based unity instead of a pure nation goebbels wrote in his most famous essay why we are enemies of the jews germany had become an exploitation colony of international jewry jews would have no place and would have no shared interest in a unified and cohesive german community of course anti-semitism is mankind's oldest prejudice dating back to the foundations of christianity the jews christ killers rejected jesus and the teachings of the new testament as an older outdated religion that christianity was meant to supersede the jews became a natural outgroup for christians an early leader of the church john christatom wrote in the 5th century that where christ killers gather the cross is ridiculed god blasphemed the father unacknowledged the son insulted the grace of the spirit rejected if the jewish rites are holy and vulnerable our way of life must be false but if our way is true as indeed it is theirs is fraudulent jewish people were stateless had no allegiance to the nation to the church to the race lived in a culturally different way and so over the centuries became an easy lightning rod scapegoats jews have been banished tortured converted and killed across europe in countless episodes for centuries and centuries pogroms in russia for example were motivated by conspiracy theories that jews murdered christian children but it took social darwinism and racial ideology the survival of the fittest race eugenics and the desires for racial purity in the 19th century for anti-semitism to develop into the modern form it took in germany the nazis were not only motivated by the idea of a natural necessity of racial purity but by a powerful conspiracy theory that jews were plotting to take over the world anti-jewish policies were often portrayed as being a response to jewish aggression giving the impression that it was the jews that were the aggressor and germany that was the victim in 1933 the first year of hitler's rule an anti-nazi boycott was organized by jewish groups around the world as a response to hitler's rise to power hitler responded with an official nazi boycott of jewish shops and stormtroopers stood menacingly guard at jewish shop doors the nuremberg laws were passed in 1935 forbidding the marriage of jews and germans and stripping jews of their rights as citizens and in 1937 a german diplomat was murdered by a 17 year old jewish refugee whose family had been persecuted by the nazis the response was kristallnacht the knight of broken glass a widespread pogrom across germany that saw almost a hundred jews murdered countless synagogues and jewish businesses vandalized torched or destroyed and 3 000 jews taken to concentration camps for their own protection they were told anti-semitic actions then were presented by hitler as defensive the nazis were simply heroes preventing the judeo-bolshevik domination of the world jews on the other hand were depicted as having total control of the soviet union of american government of wall street to britain the trick was to consistently associate the jews with the aggressors and germans as being in a heroic battle surrounded on all sides and victimized by the rest of the world the perpetrators of genocide often see themselves as the victims after the first world war germany was forced by america britain and france into what many historians have called a harsh unfair and punishing agreement to pay reparations for the war the treaty of versailles stipulated that germany take full responsibility for the war make repayments to the allies and seed german land at its borders to france poland and czechoslovakia this was one of the catalysts for hitler's rise to power on top of this throughout the 1920s and early 30s germany was as we've seen in chaos in election after election no majority or coalition could be formed between competing parties liberals conservatives authoritarians communists the church the army they all vied for power after hitler was elected the setting on fire of the right stack gave the impression that the country was on its knees we just have to imagine the capital or the houses of parliament being burned down today then after all of this the war came destruction death poverty hunger desperation psychologist irvin stubbs research on genocide shows that periods like this are a consistent factor during this phase stub writes difficult life conditions frustrate basic human needs these needs can be the need for security a feeling of control the need for a positive identity and social connections and of course the need for food water shelter but this alone doesn't lead to violence the frustration of basic human needs is almost always experienced relative to some other group in this context a vision an ideology a politics a definition of the situation as milgram put it is more likely to be offered that proposes a particular solution while excluding the status quo factors that seem to have led to the crisis in nazi germany liberalism democracy britain france america and of course the jews were all obvious targets to blame for germany's problems creating numerous out groups because the problems were so urgent the potential for friction and hostility towards outgroups increased any history of antagonism or prejudice against a particular ant group like the jews is more likely to be drawn upon sometimes in grouping and outgrouping manifests itself in simple disagreements other times it can escalate so that outgroups become enemies sometimes the outgroup can be depicted as evil and occasionally the relationship can become a zero-sum game a matter of survival it's either us or them in this context everything good can be associated with the in-group and everything bad with the act when a person perceives themselves as a victim and a prisoner as an aggressor in a war of survival and then we combine this with the pressure to conform and to submit to authority the probability for murder increases in nazi germany everything was made to fit this formula the jews were not only meant to be everything that was wrong within germany but were a powerful aggressor attacking the country on all sides entire academic works were dedicated to associating jews with germany's enemies nazi historians like peter aldagh wrote histories like the jews in england the film why war with stalin argued that the war was a pre-emptive defensive battle to stop the bolshevik extermination of germany it was a conspiracy of jews and democrats bolsheviks and reactionaries with a goal to plunge germany into powerlessness and suffering a 1941 headline of der volkisch bayerbachta the nazi party newspaper declared that roosevelt's main tool of jewish freemasonry sensational documents reveals connections of the warmonger with the international clique where roosevelt's hebraic hatred of germany comes from it published a so-called secret photo of roosevelt with jewish freemasons another story in 1942 titled the mask fools featured a photo with roosevelt and his advisors and each adviser labelled as jew underneath when churchill brought the left-leaning stafford crips into his government it became a sign of the bolshevisation and therefore the jurification of the british government the same year goebbels wrote an essay entitled mimicry which informed readers that jews were masters in deception at adapting to their surroundings hiding in plain sight the jew goebbels wrote is the master of the lie a photo collection jews in the usa was published that included evidence of this mimicry jews looking supposedly normal and blending in when necessary juxtaposed with photos that depicted jews with so-called stereotypical jewish features once a global conspiracy involving millions of people is defined evidence can always be found to justify it in 1941 for example theodore kaufman an unknown jewish american author published a book titled germany must perish the nazis depicted kaufman as being an influential figure in america and in the american government despite publishers refusing to publish the book which when published by kaufman himself was universally panned a headline in the volkswagen though inexplicably linked the author to the foreign policy of the american government announcing that roosevelt demands sterilization of the german people the germans are supposed to be exterminated in two generations the book was even published in pamphlets distributed throughout germany kaufman's face was often used in propaganda the caption under a photo of kaufman in the book jews in the usa read he demands the complete extermination of the german people by the end of 1941 goebbels declared in a radio broadcast that the historical guilt of world jury for the outbreak and expansion of this war has been so extensively demonstrated that there is no need to waste any more words on it the jews wanted their war and now they have it and in his article the jews are guilty gerbils wrote that all jews by virtue of their birth and their race are part of an international conspiracy against national socialist germany if we lose the war these harmless looking jewish chaps would suddenly become raging wolves they would attack our women and children to carry out revenge the jews are a parasitic race that feeds like a foul fungus on the cultures of healthy but ignorant peoples there is only one effective measure cut them out the jews were responsible for every german soldier's death he wrote and they were enemy agents within the country they were being gradually exterminated for a war that they had brought on themselves they were also continually associated with laziness dirtiness and exploitation an early nazi manifesto for example asked who are we fighting against the answer is against all those who creates no value who make high profits without any mental or physical work we fight against the drones in the state these are mostly jews they live a good life they reap where they have not sown if something wasn't done the nazis continually emphasized about the virus spreading throughout germany and the world then germany's destruction would be inevitable but there's another problem here it was hardly ever admitted in the post-war trials of ordinary german soldiers that anti-semitism was a motivating factor for murder furthermore many psychologists today have pointed to the limitations of propaganda as a method for influencing views one officer of battalion 101 said during interrogation that under the influence of the times my attitudes to jews were marked by a certain aversion but i cannot say that i especially hated jews many repeated similar lines browning has argued though that this is probably because admitting anti-semitism in court was enough to be convicted of murder rather than homicide and many claimed that some of the more sadistic officers were anti-semites out of quite conviction is it any surprise that this wasn't admitted but still one auschwitz inmate insisted that nothing would be more misguided than to believe that the ss were a horde of sadists another inmate estimated the sadists at not more than five to ten percent but as we've seen you don't have to be sadistic to be convinced to kill you just have to be able to rationalize what you're doing and within the economic social and cultural conditions of nazi germany plenty of rationalizations were provided by years of dogmatic ideology and propaganda during eichmann's trial the prosecution tried to depict him as a monster but six psychiatrists described him as normal a man with very positive ideas who personally had nothing against the jews as the defense argued he was simply following the law it seems then that in the majority of cases the aggressors simply had to accept some version of the nazi definition of the situation as milgram put it the extent to which that was motivated by anti-semitism conformity duty or authority clearly differed from case to case and while it's difficult to assess with any certainty many germans clearly believe the nazi's anti-semitic conspiracy theories goebbels and hitler certainly believed what they were saying they believed in a conspiracy many doctors judges philosophers teachers and lawyers all joined the nazi party one study that took place in the 90s found that interviewees that lived through the nazi era had two to three times more anti-semitic views than those who didn't and propaganda works in another way too nazi politics was built upon a strict chain of authority from the fuhrer down through the ranks to each citizen the propaganda machine represented this unbroken chain of authority the fuhrer's word was law the fuhrer knew what he was doing we're back to milgram scenario in which the scientist the authority figure simply knows best it's in this way that anti-semitism authority rationalization and conformity combined into a potent motivator to kill these things had to fit together to supposedly justify horrific acts as historian geoffrey hearth has concluded the central justification for the war and the holocaust was the depiction of jewry as a powerful international anti-german conspiracy in 1942 hitler gave a speech in berlin he said the jews in germany once again laughed about my prophecies i don't know if they are laughing today or if the laughter has already gone out of there i can promise only one thing they will stop laughing everywhere and with this prophecy as well i will be proved right the audience cheers in agreement so let's recap in short we have compartmentalization incrementation conformity authority rationalization propaganda victimhood and association the process i've described here has attempted to work backwards from an event a murder by peeling back the layers of an onion to try to understand how the onion functions as a whole while also hoping to get some kind of core a seed a series of central factors and primary causes that lead to its growth pulling a trigger happened in the context of an order authority conformity simple rationalizations like they won't survive anyway but those factors weren't enough there were deeper motivators that had already been planted the motivations of ordinary men and women had to be structured within an ideological framework what milgram described as a definition of the situation this framework was developed in a period of economic chaos followed by nazi rule based on conspiracy theory it presented a simple way out of a difficult period a good versus evil story of victims and aggressors irvin stubb proposes a model of genocide that has three initial stages first there's the frustration of basic needs second an out group is identified that's the cause and next the in-group is motivated by a utopian vision that excludes the outgroup and herbert kelman has also argued that the requirements are threefold authorization routineization and dehumanization he says that through processes of authorization the situation becomes so defined that standard moral principles do not apply and the individual is absolved of responsibility to make personal moral choices through processes of routinization the action becomes so organized that there is no opportunity for raising moral questions and making moral decisions through processes of dehumanization the actor's attitudes towards the target and towards himself become so structured that it's neither necessary nor possible for him to view the relationship in moral terms inoculation should stop a disease before treatment is necessary right at the core of the onion the most obvious warning sign is economic difficulty or as stub phrases it the frustration of basic needs the next warning sign is multiple social groups with different social statuses or economic positions especially groups with pronounced religious cultural or social differences living in a single shared environment or geographic area when these first two factors combine there's the potential for the in-group out-group dynamic to deepen and widen this as we've seen can be particularly powerful when the in-group is or at the very least feels victimized has lost prestige or their dominant status in the world in the case of the holocaust the factors seemed most fertile when the aggressors were made to feel both powerful and victimized at the same time both strong in a group and protected by that group and under the threats of forces that they believed could be too powerful for them later on conspiracy theories have the potential to take hold in this context conspiracies that are often directed at an out group similarly ideological visions develop that exclude certain groups and associate them with negative traits as enemies as dangerous lazy or labeling them with euphemisms like virus that intend to dehumanize them group psychology as we saw leads to the pressure to conform individual anonymity and a shared responsibility that could lead to increasingly violent acts the group does not have to be a physical group in the same location for example but could be a social group a movement or an organization that's developed as a result of these factors these are the factors that led to the holocaust inoculation in this case should be both political and cultural it means shining a light on these factors when they occur calling them out and pulling them out at their root and consistently warning of their consequences it means education media responsibility press standards and an ethical baseline with an emphasis on a fundamental equality between all people currently the genocide early warning project considers at least 30 countries around the world to be at high risk of genocide including pakistan afghanistan india china and turkey it's often thought that warning signs would appear well in advance that there would be plenty of time to stop going down that road or that it just couldn't happen here in this country in this modern world elise stanley wrote in her memoirs that a concentration camp for those on the outside was a kind of labor camp there were whispered rumors of people being beaten even killed but there was no comprehension of the tragic reality we were still able to leave the country we could still live in our homes we could still worship in our temples we were in a ghetto but the majority of people were still alive for the average jew this seemed enough we didn't realize that we were all waiting for the end the year was 1937. what we've seen here is not a philosophy of evil not a biblical tale of black and white of angels and devils but a theory of the incremental development of evil a study of the causes of minor changes within this there must be a recognition that evil is not external to us all but that its seeds live within each of us william blake said that cruelty has a human heart evil is molded and twisted into shape gradually no person just wakes up one day with hate in their hearts it has to be learned which means we all have a responsibility to inoculate ourselves and our own cultures from what always lurks within as usual a huge thanks to my patrons for making this possible especially on longer projects like this and difficult topics that won't be monetized by youtube if you want to help me make more videos like this you can do so for as little as a dollar per month through patreon at patreon.com forward slash then and now or through the link in the description below it's simply the only way i can continue making these videos if not just remember to like subscribe and share below as always thanks for watching and i'll see you next time

Channel: Then & Now

Views: 449,603

Keywords: the holocaust, genocide, psychology, culture, theory, causes, nazis

Id: RPCKzgITCRI

Length: 61min 49sec (3709 seconds)

Published: Wed Jan 27 2021

Reddit Comments

[u/bluedanube27]

I watched this when it first came out, and given the length (you could literally talk for days on the various factors surrounding German psychology and the Holocaust) it is truly a spectacular work.

Thanks for sharing OP!

[u/IceFireTerry]

that channel has a good video on jim crow & lynchings too

[u/ibBIGMAC]

Three Arrows also has a great series called the Iron Dice about how Wiemar Germany fell.