The Nazi’s perpetrated many horrors during the Holocaust. They enacted many cruel laws. They brainwashed millions into foolishly following them and believing their every word using deceitful propaganda tactics. They forced many to suffer doing embarrassing jobs and to live in crowded ghettos. They created mobile killing squads to exterminate their enemies. Finally, as part of “The Final Solution to the Jewish Question”, they made concentration and killing camps. Another thing the Nazi’s did was to use eugenics as another mean to micromanage the population. What is eugenics, you might ask? It’s the field of scientific study or the belief in genetically improving qualities, attributes and traits in the human race and/or improving the species as a whole—usually done by controlled/selective breeding. Those with positive, desirable, and superior traits are encouraged to reproduce and may be given monetary incentives by the government to have large families. Those with negative, undesirable, or inferior traits may be discouraged from having offspring. They may be sterilized, or undergo dangerous medical procedures or operations with high mortality rates. I chose this topic because it appealed to me and seemed interesting. In the following paragraphs, the tactics, methods, and propaganda the Nazi’s used will be exposed.
Adolf Hitler (the Führer or leader of the Nazi party) “believed that a person's characteristics, attitudes, abilities, and behavior were determined by his or her so-called racial make-up.” He thought that those “inherited characteristics (did not only affect) outward appearance and physical structure”, but also determined a person’s physical, emotional/social, and mental state. Besides these ideas, the Nazi’s believed tha...
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The eugenics movement started in the early 1900s and was adopted by doctors and the general public during the 1920s. The movement aimed to create a better society through the monitoring of genetic traits through selective heredity. Over time, eugenics took on two different views. Supporters of positive eugenics believed in promoting childbearing by a class who was “genetically superior.” On the contrary, proponents of negative eugenics tried to monitor society’s flaws through the sterilization of the “inferior.”
In the years between 1933 and 1945, Germany was engulfed by the rise of a powerful new regime and the eventual spoils of war. During this period, Hitler's quest for racial purification turned Germany not only at odds with itself, but with the rest of the world. Photography as an art and as a business became a regulated and potent force in the fight for Aryan domination, Nazi influence, and anti-Semitism. Whether such images were used to promote Nazi ideology, document the Holocaust, or scare Germany's citizens into accepting their own changing country, the effect of this photography provides enormous insight into the true stories and lives of the people most affected by Hitler's racism. In fact, this photography has become so widespread in our understanding and teaching of the Holocaust that often other factors involved in the Nazi's racial policy have been undervalued in our history textbooks-especially the attempt by Nazi Germany to establish the Nordic Aryans as a master race through the Lebensborn experiment, a breeding and adoption program designed to eliminate racial imperfections.
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Adolf Hitler’s rise to power in 1933 and his sudden control over Germany sparked a new age of reform within the new “Nazi-state” (Hunt 848). As Nazism became a major aspect of everyday life in Germany, Hitler plotted against his enemies and those he blamed for Germany’s defeat in World War I: the Jewish race. In his biography, Mein Kampf, Hitler discusses the artistic, social, and technological superiority of Germany (“Aryans”), why he believes the Aryans are the ultimate dominant human race, and he makes many anti-Semitic remarks against the Jews. (Lualdi 224). In 1935, the “Nuremberg Laws” were enacted to deny Jewish Germans of their citizenship; this ultimately led Hitler to carry out his “Final Solution,” in which he hoped to fully exterminate the Jewish race from all of Europe (Hunt 864). After gathering the Jews from their “ghettos” and forcing them into concentration camps all across Europe, Hitler and his Nazi advocates began one of the most destructive and horrifying genocides in history, known today as the Holocaust. Only after being introduced to the conditions of these concentration camps, the hatred and abuse put towards the Jewish, and the gruesome lifestyle they were trapped into living can one understand why the Holocaust affected so many as it did. What exactly were the conditions of these camps, and how did a few lucky survivors prevail while their friends and families perished?
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Several of the concepts had to do with idea of racial make up and “Survival of The Fittest”. Hitler states in Chapter 11 of Mein Kampf, titled “On Nation and Race”, “Nature’s rule: the inner segregation of the species of all living beings on this earth (Hitler, ¶ 2).” Hitler suggested that God’s rule was that there must be an internal (genetic) separation (make-up) of everything living on earth. “The stronger must dominate and not blend with the weaker, thus sacrificing his own greatness (Hitler, ¶ 6).” “Maintaining race purity was important according to Hitler and others, because mixing with other races would over time led to bastardization and degeneration of a race to the point where it list its distinguishing characteristics and, in effect, lost the capacity to effectively defend itself, thus becoming doomed to extinction (Victim, ¶ 12).” Both meaning if the superior race reproduces with the inferior race, then the s...
The treatment of Jews and other minority groups by the Nazi’s can be described as actions that could only be done by a totalitarian state. Hitler believed in eugenics, the idea of improving a race by selective breeding. Nazi ideology of the Jewish race was severe anti-Semitism and pure hatred. The Nazi policy towards the Jews has been said to be the most brutal and horrific example of anti-Semitism in history.
Eugenic studies first began in the United States and Britain in the early 1900’s. It began as a way to try and improve society by removing the inept and insane from the gene pool. Laws were enacted in the United States from 1907-1931, which called for sterilization of those with a tremendously low IQ and those that were deemed mentally unstable. While the actions of the U.S. were immoral, eugenics took a turn for the worst in post WWI Germany. The term eugenics turned into racial hygiene, which became a festering point for racism and destructive social programs. Racial hygiene became most historically known in Germany, these events are often known as the Holocaust. The Holocaust is the well known German operation that set out to rid the world of Jews and the disabled. Starting in 1933 under the rule of Adolf Hitler, Germany enacted sterilization laws, and it would only get worse. Soon sterilization and euthanasia became common place in Germany, leading to the many death camps that were used during WWII. This is the first thing that people think about when they hear the word eugenics, and leaves them with an immovable position of contempt for the