maybe i don't really believe this, but...

I’m going to go ahead and call out the some of the women of Germany after WWII. While I agree that they did not deserve the punishment and harassment for their behavior, I feel like the reaction they received was an inevitable consequence from their actions. If you’re a German soldier fighting on the front, the last thing you would want to see when you came home was your wife, girlfriend, daughter, acquaintance, neighbor, etc. “fraternizing” with the enemy. And I think that the term enemy is important. To the men, it might have felt as if the women of their country had abandoned them in their time of greatest need and dejection and had even abandoned their own country and jumped on the winner’s bandwagon. And the women’s excuse – oh, I’m physically lonely and these guys are rich – rich in body, spirit, and goods. While I can imagine war time was tough for the women, especially with the absence and then deterioration of their men, bombings, and food shortages, I can imagine an equally tough and even worse time for the soldiers fighting. Some might argue that the men didn’t have it so bad, or that there is a double-standard, because the men were able to have all the women they wanted on their soldierly travels – but get real. How many women are half-starved and defeated German soldiers going to be getting in the latter years of the war? Regardless, some might sympathize with the women who were only trying to assert their natural right to happiness and satisfaction, but I tend to see the women instead abandoning more important virtues including loyalty, courage, and perseverance while adopting a degree of selfishness. I have to sympathize with the men, particularly the soldiers, who at the lowest of lows, have to in some cases endure more punishment and the complete stripping of any sense of masculinity.

oh fritzsche

Peter Fritzsche, in the chapter entitled “January 1933” from his Germans into Nazis, makes a few quick arguments that I believe are dubious at best. One of his arguments is that the best place to look at to explain Hitler’s rise to power is Hindenburg’s 1925 election victory. Fritzsche claims that both Hitler and Hindenburg are alike because they are able to motivate the masses, blah blah blah, same thing over and over again. But in looking for ways to make his whole “mobilization of the masses” argument look more solid (and I do think it does look solid already) he tries to stretch it to a link between Hitler and Hindenburg. Firstly, although Hindenburg’s 1925 victory might have roused popular support, a few years later in the 1932 presidential election he is forced to go to a run off because he failed to get a clear majority of the people. Moreover, Hindenburg was only able to initially gain the people’s support in 1925 because he was the only logical and most stable choice. He did not inspire, like Hitler, the people to support him because of his answers or potential solutions. In fact, he didn’t inspire the people at all, believing instead that he should not have to rally for people’s support or even try to win their favor. Sure, there were “grassroots” movements in favor of Hindenburg as Fritzsche claims, but they were grassroots movements not started by Hindenburg himself, but grassroots political movements in general that happened to join his bandwagon. If those grassroots movements had voted for another leader in 1925 I suppose Fritzsche would claim that that new leader is the best place to look at to explain Hitler’s rise, in essence making his argument ridiculous - because people, forming a majority (get out of town Fritzsche, no way! Not a majority!), voted means that people might also vote later for a guy named Hitler. Wow. That is a good argument. Bottom line, Hindenburg was just the best option at the time – nothing like the political force that was Hitler who arose from nothing with a new untested political party to assume control of the people. The other argument that Fritzcshe makes (just so he can make his Hindenburg argument seem more accurate and cutting edge and shiny and new) is that the economic conditions did not predispose Hitler’s assumption of power. Well of course it did not equal Hitler’s rise to power, but the Nazi party was the party who took advantage of the economic situation the best, and had the most inspiring message for recovering from the economic depression. So, in that sense, the economy is important in explaining the rise of the party – would the whole country even look for leadership from an untested and radical party if things were running smoothly? No way. Get out of town Fritzsche. On a more serious note, I believe Fritzsche is being controlled by his thesis. He formed his thesis (mass mobilization = Nazis) before doing the research, or was so excited about his thesis that he tries to force his thesis into every situation – which does not work.

ramblings

Although Fritzsche repeats his main thesis of political mobilization ad nauseam, I was most interested in a point he seemed to make in passing that nevertheless does much explain the progression he seeks to delineate – Germans into Nazis. With the increasing amounts of political participation by the German citizens, another trend emerges simultaneously – the squaring off of “working-class socialists and bourgeois nationalists […] into mutually opposed and increasingly radical camps” – that Fritzsche only briefly touches on. But this point seems extremely important. The political mobilization of the masses would amount to little and would have little historical significance if their new participation was not increasingly extremist and divided. Through all the examples of political participation that Fritzsche gives, it is clear that all participation happened on one extreme side or another. Within these extremes themselves there was obviously much disagreement, but regardless the line had been drawn – nationalists versus socialists. Increasingly the German population seemed to abandon any attempts to stay inbetween these two sides, the middle ground. This large-scale abandonment of the middle ground leads inevitably to the radicalization of each extreme. Now, with two such extremes pitted against each other, when, in the course of events, one of the two groups takes over that group will have taken control without having to compromise any of their positions – literally prying control from the opposing side by sheer political mobilization. Thus the radical agenda they had fostered in order to separate and differentiate themselves from their opponents becomes the dangerous and radical agenda of the state. If, however, one of the two extreme sides fails to take control then the inevitable result will be the flourishing of a new group who arises by pandering to specific radical desires of both sides. Either way, the state becomes controlled by radical thought.

city vice versus rural vice

In German history the city carries the reputation as the vice-creating, underworld-protecting institution that inevitably destroys the historic virtue of the German villages and rural population. The existence of widespread prostitution in during the urbanization in Germany is often pointed to as proof enough of the city’s detrimental effect on the German population. The city, however, in my opinion, does not initiate these vices – they are instead merely an exaggeration from the vices already found in the villages. That the city somehow, once a large numbers of people gather together, creates vices ignores the possibility that these so called vices existed previously but lacked a medium through which to be expressed. The city is that medium, that weaving, nook-and-crannied structure that serves to exaggerate vices that its citizens possessed earlier. Prostitution, an exaggerated form of carnal vice, finds its origins in the oh-so-cleanly villagers. Some of the practices that villagers undertook in the rural areas also reflect a certain carnality that flies in the face of supposed religious doctrine. The practice of letting a couple live together indefinitely until the woman’s father can pay a dowry is one such practice that, after again putting a price on a woman’s body, deliberately abandoning supposedly held virtues. That the villagers themselves could account for the actions of the couple and make sure the marriage came to fruition is undeniable, but with the acceptance of a practice like this in the countryside, when moved into the city the accountability is lost and the “vice” can be exposed, increased, exaggerated. It is not, therefore, the city that creates these vices but rather commonly held practices that let’s these so-called vices sneak into the cities and multiply just as the population itself does.

village people

I enjoyed reading Blackbourn’s “Populists and Patricians” this week. Throughout the class so far I became under the impression that the peasant class was just was just a conservative, dependent, and politically removed class in Germany during this time period. Blackbourn, however, seemed to shed light on some of the intricacies, and realities, of this peasant class. Their involvement in the small (slightly crazy sounding) political parties stunned me—it made me see that these rural village communities were aware of the changes taking place in the German states, especially with regards to the rise of cities. That these groups essentially facilitated the rise of mass politics because their own involvement forced other, larger groups to begin appealing to the peasants flies in the face of other notions which assumes that mass politics arose from the enlightened upper classes who realized the righteousness of extending political consideration to all. It wasn’t the upper and liberal classes aiding the supposedly progressive rise of mass politics, it was the lowly peasants themselves. Another thing that I found surprising was the lower class’ very un-conservative political support. This group, which I had been led to believe by other historians was an eternal stitch in the conservative garment, actually held radical political ideology. Now although many of the peasants might have voted for the more liberal organizations only because they were the only groups to address their needs directly, their failure to vote conservatively still marks a break with the notion that this class is under the under the influence of the conservative Junkers and their conservative Catholic priests. The revolution from the top/change from the top attitude that seems to have dominated the German mindset hitherto this point seems now to have failed, as the lower classes are now the ones ushering in their own revolutionary views—acceptance of mass politics, socialist agendas as well as anti-Semitism that will play a large role in Germany’s future.

don't tread on me

Talk about one cool group of people – the post-Kulturkamph Catholics in Germany had it going on. I was just amused during Anderson’s “The Kulturkamph and the Course of German History” that this supposedly ignorant, illiterate and un-autonomous group was able to repeatedly puzzle and anger the upper-class, educated, and politically savvy individuals attempting to control the outcomes of elections. I found it humorous that the more liberal parties, after advocating and receiving more universal suffrage, get angry when local Catholic majorities use their votes to outvote liberal sentiments. All of a sudden they no longer seem pleased with more universal suffrage. Angry at the Catholics’ densely uniform voting patterns, Wilhelm Wehrenpfennig attributes their success to their “dumbness.” What was really dumb, however, was the amount of attention and fear-mongering that rose up over this new Catholic threat. For example, Anderson mentions how in the elections of Upper Silesia in 1871 the Center Party (supported by Catholics) only “garnered a mere 27%” of the votes in a regency where Catholics made up more than 90% of the population.” All the attention of the election, however, went to one small district’s results, Pless-Rybnik, where little known esthetic Father Eduard Muller was able to defeat a much wealthier, cultured, incumbent, prince/duke. Round of applause ladies and gentlemen for Father Ed Muller. What I loved was that he beat the prince at his own game – pretend not to care about politics, let natural deference play the deciding factor, etc. He was essentially a hermit, and he beat the prince. Awesome. Further evidence for the coolness of this group of Catholics in Germany at this time is their non-loyalty to papal decision. No one, not even Bismarck (or the Pope apparently), can put a finger on these guys to control them – they flow in their own current.

Hausen's Homogenity

While reading Karin Hausen’s “Technical Progress and Women’s Labour in the Nineteenth Century” I particularly enjoyed her portrait and development of a Germany centered around the sewing machine. By limiting the scope of her essay she was able to paint a very detailed picture of the popular, supposedly liberating yet actually enslaving, sewing machine. When thinking of history the first thing that comes to mind are the battles, the heroes, the major conferences, treaties, etc, etc. It’s slightly humorous to see how important something as simple as an appliance can be in shaping social history. With that said, however, I do believe Karin Hausen likely exaggerates her argument regarding the sewing machine’s burdensome and enslaving nature. While it is true that an astonishing number of sewing machines are sold over the last half of the 19th century, many of them on hire purchase, Hausen leads the reader to believe that the majority of those women became slaves to their equipment. She paints an extreme picture where women in the lower classes, fearing absolutely work in the factories, are forced into the sewing machine trap and work countless hours in messy houses with annoying children with massive debts in an oversupplied Market for the rest of their existence on earth. Most examinations into social history, however, show that human experience is never that homogenous. People will not all live the same lives even if they’re under similar conditions. There are too many independent variables to lump a whole entire population of lower class women into a terrifying picture. Furthermore, while her statistics are powerful, her primary sources are mild at best. Although the lack of first hand accounts may be understandable, statistics by themselves can never paint a full story and only mask the little realities and small personal stories of thousands of individuals.