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there is little more painful than ostracism? Tell that to the tens of millions of graves that Nazis and Fascists littered Europe with, within living memory. A

there is little more painful than ostracism? Tell that to the tens of millions of graves that Nazis and Fascists littered Europe with, within living memory. All this pearl clutching about cancel culture is just a naked attempt to permit the normalization of Fascism, gay bashing, Jew hating, and pushing down the Blacks again, in order to energize the last vestiges of the aging-out conservative right wing. 'there is little more painful than ostracism.'

rpmisms 3y ago
And the little that is more painful, we look at with abject horror.
somenameforme 3y ago
I'm not sure many understand the historical context of the rise of the Nazis. Germany had just ended up on the losing side of "the war to end all wars" or WW1. In the Treaty of Versailles, which Germany was not allowed to participate in the negotiation of, they were forced to accept all guilt for the war, give up vast tracts of land, and then pay an a unpayable amount on top, which many even at the time argued was excessively myopic. Following their defeat in WW1, the country fell into civil war which eventually led to the creation of the short lived Weimar Republic. Their economy then collapsed into hyperinflation and was stabilized only by even more lending (and thus more debt) from the West. Then in 1930 the Great Depression hit, which ended that lending, and their entire economy spiraled into destruction, with widespread unemployment and the rise of violent extremism across all political ideologies. To think this could have been stopped by more censorship is not realistic. In fact censorship was one of the key ways the Nazis finally managed to consolidate power, as they were never especially popular. They never won a single election with a majority. Their best result in anything even vaguely resembling a fair election was in July 1932 where they gained a plurality with 37%. By November, when another election was called after they failed to form a government, they were down to 33%. They only won by shenanigans, and consolidated with censorship and totalitarianism.
- wredcoll 3y ago
  > In the Treaty of Versailles, which Germany was not allowed to participate in the negotiation of, they were forced to accept all guilt for the war, give up vast tracts of land, and then pay an a unpayable amount on top, which many even at the time argued was excessively myopic. This repeats several depressingly common myths. For starters, germany was "forced to accept all guilt" (several other countries were considered "guilty" by those treaties) because they were guilty. While not the sole participant, they actively encouraged the starting of the war and then immediately took advantage of it by invading france. After spending 4 years of brutal fighting literally just to make the germans go home, the people defending themselves were more than a bit mad. As to the famous war debt, for one thing its size wasn't much larger, relatively speaking, to the debt germany had just imposed on france a generation previously after france lost a war in which they invaded germany. This kind of war reparations was extremely common, and while obviously burdensome, hardly an excuse to launch another global war of conquest. Much like france and its war debt, germany could have easily paid what it owed without collapsing. One of the thing the nazis and friends deliberately did was cause hyperinflation in order to both decrease the debt and to encourage anger among the populace to hopefully cause them to "rebel" against the existing leadership and support the extremists in thr nazi party. Even after hitler took power (as you point out, at best semi-democratically) germany's economy was no worse off than any of the other major powers going through the depression, but instead of doing public works like america did, hitler deliberately allocated an unsustainable amount of money into war production, money that obviously had zero return to the german people. A large part of the reason hitler started invading when he did was because they had basically run out of money and their choice was use their expensive army or sell it off in order to buy food and oil.
  - somenameforme 3y ago
    That is not a particularly fair recounting of WW1. The entire world was at fault for that war. A Bosnian Serb, probably with state backing, assassinates the heir of Austria Hungary. Serbia then refuses Austria Hungary's terms for settlement of the affair, so Austria Hungary decides to invade Serbia. This then drives Serbia's ally Russia to intervene. But Germany had a military alliance with Austria Hungary which then drove them to intervene on behalf of Austria Hungary. Of course France then also had a military alliance with Russia, so they're now in the game. And so on, and so forth. Germany is only uniquely guilty there in the sense that the loser of a war is always the one who did wrong. And the Nazis didn't cause hyper-inflation. They didn't take power until 1933. The inflation, that would quickly end up turning to hyperinflation, began shortly after the Treaty of Versailles in the early 1920s, in the Weimar Republic. Germany didn't have anywhere near enough money to pay off their debts under the Treaty of Versailles, which demanded payments in gold or foreign currency only. With their gold reserves long since exhausted, Germany had little choice but to begin printing money in order to buy foreign currency. And even that wasn't enough, as their currency inflated to the point of worthlessness causing them to default on their debt, which then lead France/Belgium to make things even worse by invading and occupying the [industrially key] Ruhr region of Germany in 1923, and responding to predictable German acts of civil disobedience by killing civilians. And as above - 'so forth, and so on.'

rpmisms 3y ago

And the little that is more painful, we look at with abject horror.

somenameforme 3y ago

I'm not sure many understand the historical context of the rise of the Nazis. Germany had just ended up on the losing side of "the war to end all wars" or WW1. In the Treaty of Versailles, which Germany was not allowed to participate in the negotiation of, they were forced to accept all guilt for the war, give up vast tracts of land, and then pay an a unpayable amount on top, which many even at the time argued was excessively myopic. Following their defeat in WW1, the country fell into civil war which eventually led to the creation of the short lived Weimar Republic. Their economy then collapsed into hyperinflation and was stabilized only by even more lending (and thus more debt) from the West. Then in 1930 the Great Depression hit, which ended that lending, and their entire economy spiraled into destruction, with widespread unemployment and the rise of violent extremism across all political ideologies. To think this could have been stopped by more censorship is not realistic. In fact censorship was one of the key ways the Nazis finally managed to consolidate power, as they were never especially popular. They never won a single election with a majority. Their best result in anything even vaguely resembling a fair election was in July 1932 where they gained a plurality with 37%. By November, when another election was called after they failed to form a government, they were down to 33%. They only won by shenanigans, and consolidated with censorship and totalitarianism.

wredcoll 3y ago
> In the Treaty of Versailles, which Germany was not allowed to participate in the negotiation of, they were forced to accept all guilt for the war, give up vast tracts of land, and then pay an a unpayable amount on top, which many even at the time argued was excessively myopic. This repeats several depressingly common myths. For starters, germany was "forced to accept all guilt" (several other countries were considered "guilty" by those treaties) because they were guilty. While not the sole participant, they actively encouraged the starting of the war and then immediately took advantage of it by invading france. After spending 4 years of brutal fighting literally just to make the germans go home, the people defending themselves were more than a bit mad. As to the famous war debt, for one thing its size wasn't much larger, relatively speaking, to the debt germany had just imposed on france a generation previously after france lost a war in which they invaded germany. This kind of war reparations was extremely common, and while obviously burdensome, hardly an excuse to launch another global war of conquest. Much like france and its war debt, germany could have easily paid what it owed without collapsing. One of the thing the nazis and friends deliberately did was cause hyperinflation in order to both decrease the debt and to encourage anger among the populace to hopefully cause them to "rebel" against the existing leadership and support the extremists in thr nazi party. Even after hitler took power (as you point out, at best semi-democratically) germany's economy was no worse off than any of the other major powers going through the depression, but instead of doing public works like america did, hitler deliberately allocated an unsustainable amount of money into war production, money that obviously had zero return to the german people. A large part of the reason hitler started invading when he did was because they had basically run out of money and their choice was use their expensive army or sell it off in order to buy food and oil.
- somenameforme 3y ago
  That is not a particularly fair recounting of WW1. The entire world was at fault for that war. A Bosnian Serb, probably with state backing, assassinates the heir of Austria Hungary. Serbia then refuses Austria Hungary's terms for settlement of the affair, so Austria Hungary decides to invade Serbia. This then drives Serbia's ally Russia to intervene. But Germany had a military alliance with Austria Hungary which then drove them to intervene on behalf of Austria Hungary. Of course France then also had a military alliance with Russia, so they're now in the game. And so on, and so forth. Germany is only uniquely guilty there in the sense that the loser of a war is always the one who did wrong. And the Nazis didn't cause hyper-inflation. They didn't take power until 1933. The inflation, that would quickly end up turning to hyperinflation, began shortly after the Treaty of Versailles in the early 1920s, in the Weimar Republic. Germany didn't have anywhere near enough money to pay off their debts under the Treaty of Versailles, which demanded payments in gold or foreign currency only. With their gold reserves long since exhausted, Germany had little choice but to begin printing money in order to buy foreign currency. And even that wasn't enough, as their currency inflated to the point of worthlessness causing them to default on their debt, which then lead France/Belgium to make things even worse by invading and occupying the [industrially key] Ruhr region of Germany in 1923, and responding to predictable German acts of civil disobedience by killing civilians. And as above - 'so forth, and so on.'