Summary Of Hitler's Furies, By Wendy Lower

Thesis: Women being viewed as perpetrators in any type of violence in societies across the world is often overlooked, ignored, or their participation minimized (not only in their society, but also in judicial process especially when they are on trial for the same crimes as their male counterparts). In the book Hitler’s Furies by Wendy Lower, Lower attempts to address this double standard and shine light on the topic of German women’s participation in the marginalization and genocide of the European Jews alongside Hitler and his Nazi state. Lower’s purpose is to explore how in periods of war and extreme violence a majority of German women, not only female camp guards, became “conditioned to accept violence, to incite it, and to commit it...”

According to Lower, there was more participation from women in the atrocities of the Holocaust that can not be reduced to “...a few thousand brainwashed and misguided camp guards...” Throughout the book, Lower’s central argument was that women participation in the Holocaust couldn’t be confined to just them in the roles of (female) camp guards. Even women who were not in direct contact with the violence and murders that occurred during the Holocaust, such as secretaries, teachers, nurses, still participated in some degree to the destruction of the Jews during this time.

Throughout HItler’s Furies Lower gives multiple examples of German women’s opportunistic and greedy behavior during the Holocaust that had been overlooked and minimized throughout the retelling of the horrors that occurred. In Hitler’s Furies Lower explains how by continuously shoving women into stereotypical gender roles placed upon them by society, their crimes and participation in genocidal acts can go unnoticed and how these crimes can also be severely

underreported.
Methods: At the beginning of HItler’s Furies, Lower describes the start of her research for her book as surprising. This surprise quickly faded into curiosity as Lower took this as an opportunity to do more research. “With these leads in hand, I returned to the archives in the United States and Germany and started to look more systematically for documentation about German women who were sent east, and specifically about those who witnessed and perpetrated the Holocaust.” Lower’s central arguments were focused around these documents and proving that women too could be perpetrators of genocide. In Hitler’s Furies Lower provides evidence for her arguments by using pictures of women in their uniforms, or enjoying everyday life. These pictures show how violence was so intermingled with German everyday life that eventually it became normalized and eventually it was able to be ignored. Lower also used photographs of maps, as well as personal accounts from the Jewish victims and from the women themselves to show how women slipped effortlessly between roles in their society.
Sources: In Hitler’s Furies Lower uses multiple primary sources, such as diaries, journals and testimonies from the women and victims involved in the Holocaust.

For example she used letters, journals, and diaries from Vera Stahli (a wife of a SS officer), Pauline Kneissler (a nurse who directly participated in killing Jews), as well as multiple other women and testimonials from victims. She also used maps, and drawings of regions that needed to be ethnically cleansed to show that women still had knowledge of what was going on around them even if they didn’t have direct contact with the victims, or committ outright acts of violence like

murder.
Strengths: Hitler’s Furies has a multitude of strengths ranging from the types of sources used, to the format of the book, to the exploration of gender roles and double standards. Lower uses primary sources rather than secondary sources to give the reader a clearer look at how women of that time got absorbed into the ideologies of their state and the measures they went to, to prove their loyalty to Hitler and the Nazi Party. The format of the book is also a strength because it exemplifies how the rise of Hitler caused a majority of German men to accept his ideologies and goals, and from that how the women of society corrupted by it. Lastly, Lower’s exploration on how double standards and gender roles in society can minimize the effect of what a specific group of people did is the most important strength of this book. This exploration shows how important it is to critically view every aspect of a situation so that nothing gets overshadowed and forgotten.
Weakness: Hitler’s Furies had its share of weaknesses. I feel that Lower should have included more women, such as Irma Grese, and bigger excerpts from the letters, and journals that she had found during her research. This expansion of primary sources would’ve given the reader more sources to broaden their perspective of how gender roles could change due to circumstances, as well as the reasons behind it. Another weakness of Hitler’s Furies was the lack of pictures of maps, victims, houses and other things that would’ve the reader a more clear sense of the environment these women were in and how close they actually were to the violence of the Holocaust.
Contribution: The greatest contribution that Hitler’s Furies makes not only to the reader, but to history is the exposure of women as perpetrators of violence. This book is useful for those who want to really explore how gender roles can change, and women’s roles during times of war.