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Yes, the Nazi appeal was largely a response to the absolutely crazy things that had happened to Germany between 1914 and 1933. Losing a world war, and all the d

Yes, the Nazi appeal was largely a response to the absolutely crazy things that had happened to Germany between 1914 and 1933. Losing a world war, and all the death and humiliation and privation that entails (The winter of 1916 was known as the Turnip Winter, because of food shortages, and that was barely halfway through the war!). Hyperinflation, where an egg might cost a billion marks. Then a Depression! And all the while, a ton of money gets siphoned off to pay reparations to the WW1 allies. I'm not at all saying Nazism was justified. I'm saying that the insane German experience over the 20 years leading up to it had caused the average German citizen to accept extremely radical solutions.

etempleton 4y ago
It is always a poor choice to humiliate your opponent after defeating them. You either completely annihilate them or help them back up.
galaxyLogic 4y ago
I'm not sure Germany's condition was very exceptional. (What about Italy?) It was more that Nazis simply got into power and once they were in power it was no longer a question of whether the average German accepted it or not. And once Nazis were in power they had the propaganda machinery of the state to make people believe them. It could happen here too, almost did on January 6th. And in Russia, it's a crime to criticize the war.
- Akronymus 4y ago
  > It was more that Nazis simply got into power They got helped quite a bit by fighting communists at the time. They legit were the lesser evil to a lot of people.
  - galaxyLogic 4y ago
    I would say "communists" were just fascists by another name. The distinguishing factor is does one support democracy, or not.
belorn 4y ago
Two third of the population was unemployed, and as orewell write here "the situation in Germany, with its seven million unemployed, was obviously favourable for demagogues". Starving, economical depression and without any hope in sight. Then within a couple of years half or more of those previous unemployed got a job from the government and the government refused to do any more reparations and redirecting those fund back to the populace (farmed food was a common item in reparations).
- imtringued 4y ago
  Meanwhile Silvio Gesell just wanted a simple currency and land reform at the time to make it easier to pay off the reparations without dooming the country into poverty. Nowadays people write books how he was literally worse than Hitler. It is kind of amusing how easy it is to be hated by everyone because you have a difficult to attack argument. Is the idea of negative interest rates really that taboo? I personally got interested in negative interest rates due to macro economic balance mechanics which don't even require the existence of a real economy to justify negative interest rates. If you want to shrink the money supply without causing a deflationary spiral you must lower the interest rate below zero so that the real interest rate is zero which is fair for consumers and savers alike.

etempleton 4y ago

It is always a poor choice to humiliate your opponent after defeating them. You either completely annihilate them or help them back up.

galaxyLogic 4y ago

I'm not sure Germany's condition was very exceptional. (What about Italy?) It was more that Nazis simply got into power and once they were in power it was no longer a question of whether the average German accepted it or not. And once Nazis were in power they had the propaganda machinery of the state to make people believe them. It could happen here too, almost did on January 6th. And in Russia, it's a crime to criticize the war.

Akronymus 4y ago
> It was more that Nazis simply got into power They got helped quite a bit by fighting communists at the time. They legit were the lesser evil to a lot of people.
- galaxyLogic 4y ago
  I would say "communists" were just fascists by another name. The distinguishing factor is does one support democracy, or not.

belorn 4y ago

Two third of the population was unemployed, and as orewell write here "the situation in Germany, with its seven million unemployed, was obviously favourable for demagogues". Starving, economical depression and without any hope in sight. Then within a couple of years half or more of those previous unemployed got a job from the government and the government refused to do any more reparations and redirecting those fund back to the populace (farmed food was a common item in reparations).

imtringued 4y ago
Meanwhile Silvio Gesell just wanted a simple currency and land reform at the time to make it easier to pay off the reparations without dooming the country into poverty. Nowadays people write books how he was literally worse than Hitler. It is kind of amusing how easy it is to be hated by everyone because you have a difficult to attack argument. Is the idea of negative interest rates really that taboo? I personally got interested in negative interest rates due to macro economic balance mechanics which don't even require the existence of a real economy to justify negative interest rates. If you want to shrink the money supply without causing a deflationary spiral you must lower the interest rate below zero so that the real interest rate is zero which is fair for consumers and savers alike.