On useful idiots

[Perd Hapley]

Below is a question from an online class I'm taking, and then my answer. What do you think?

In the early 20th Century, several individuals who initially appear to be losers (I think here of Adolph Hitler) are able to amass tremendous power and hold it over millions of people.  Is it that the mass of individuals who constitute nations like Germany or Russia were all fooled, or did most of them somehow become "true believers" in an individual and voluntarily hand over their freedom in exchange for some felt collective need?  What do you see as the basic dynamic at work?

"I'm not sure I understand the difference between the true believers and those who were fooled.

Anyone who followed the Nazis because they thought the Jews were the source of their problems may have been fools just as much as they were true believers. After all, harassing or beating or killing Jews could never have solved Germany's problems, no matter how truly one believed it might. Soviet Communism was another fool's errand, and a bloodier one, notwithstanding its many devoted followers.

If the true believers were those who foresaw the loss of freedom, but deemed it a necessary sacrifice, I think they were more effectively fooled than anyone else. Fooling the voters is not as hard as we wish it were. Wrong-headed politics is usually a result of lazy thinking, going for the easy answer, without looking for the unintended consequences. Or in the case of scapegoating the Jewish people, ignoring consequences that fall on someone else. An easy trap to fall into; an easy trap to set for others. I would say that is the dynamic at work."

[TommyGunn]

I recall watching a documentary on WW2 on History channel (Yeah, I know; "The Hitler Channel"   ) several years ago in which an old German woman was reflecting back on how she (and others) perceived Hitler.  She was reflecting on how people were being assaulted and "disappeared" and how bad it was, and how, if "Mr." Hitler only knew about it, surely he'd put a stop to it.  She paused for a second and continued to say that it was only later she realized that they weren't disappearing in spite of Hitler's wishes, they were being disappeared by Hitler.
I am in the middle of Andrew Nagorski's recent book, Hitlerland, which is a book about Hitler and his rise to power as witnessed by Americans living in Germany at the time.  I note I have highlighted a quote by a Pulitzer Prize winning reporter named Edgar Mowrer; "in the great game of fooling the public he is an incomparable master."  (page 101).
Here's an observation by Chicago Times' Sigrid Schultz; "I could see the man's face as Hitler went into his routine and, to my horror, those usually cynical eyes responded adoringly to whatever message Hitler was giving out." (also page 101).

Fooling the voters is not as hard as we wish it were. Wrong-headed politics is usually a result of lazy thinking, going for the easy answer, without looking for the unintended consequences.

This is certainly true .... but one ought not forget that Hitler rose to power in a time of great strife in Germany, and he promised to bring Germany out of the economic horrors it was experiencing and make it (again) a great nation.  During bad times it's even easier to obtain power if you can make people believe you can bring them to good times.  We saw this to a lesser degree in 2008.  McCain represented in the minds of many "Bush redux" while Obama was "hope and change," and promised us great things and he would be able to unify the nation.  Sound .....familiar?

If your interested in the rise of the Nazis I would recommend highly you pick up Hitlerland and read it for yourself.  It's intriging, frightening, and paints certain horrible parallels which seem improbable but....are.

[Perd Hapley]

Thanks for the recommendation. I'm reading In the Garden of Beasts right now.

[AJ Dual]

Thanks for the recommendation. I'm reading In the Garden of Beasts right now.

Throw in a little 2008 elections as a way of comparison... if you dare. 

[RoadKingLarry]

I'm just unable to accept that Obama and his campaign leadership and staff are ignorant of the historical significance of the imagery and slogans they continue to use.
Either they admire the previous usage or they believe the public is too stupid to understand.

[Monkeyleg]

I'm just unable to accept that Obama and his campaign leadership and staff are ignorant of the historical significance of the imagery and slogans they continue to use.
Either they admire the previous usage or they believe the public is too stupid to understand.

I'll vote for the "too stupid to understand" option.

I don't think there's been a politician in the US or elsewhere who didn't utilize at least some part of the techniques the Nazi's used to gain and retain power. The "big lie", the use of scapegoats, giving the faithful the goods of someone else (if you were a good party member, but homeless, you could always get the home of a Jew). Granted, this isn't unique to the Nazi's, but they really refined the methods.

It's really hard to know whether the Grecian sets are a reflection of Obama's narcissism or an effort to manipulate the faithful.

[Perd Hapley]

Throw in a little 2008 elections as a way of comparison... if you dare.  

I'm more inclined to bring up the final solution to unwanted pregnancy.

[Jamisjockey]

I'll vote for the "too stupid to understand" option.
I don't think there's been a politician in the US or elsewhere who didn't utilize at least some part of the techniques the Nazi's used to gain and retain power. The "big lie", the use of scapegoats, giving the faithful the goods of someone else (if you were a good party member, but homeless, you could always get the home of a Jew). Granted, this isn't unique to the Nazi's, but they really refined the methods.

It's really hard to know whether the Grecian sets are a reflection of Obama's narcissism or an effort to manipulate the faithful.

Stupid and ignorant.  Che Guerva is idolized by the left.  Islam is propped up as the victim class by the left.  They are *expletive deleted*ing morons that think everyone they admire is soft and cuddly.

[brimic]

Read Liberal Fascism by Jonah Goldberg- it will explain evverything you ever wanted to know about populist movements of the time.

[roo_ster]

Read Liberal Fascism by Jonah Goldberg- it will explain evverything you ever wanted to know about populist movements of the time.

This.
You can get the same information by reading the original sources from the era (LFs & their critics), but JG brings all the threads together into one, easy to access, tome.

[MechAg94]

Stupid and ignorant.  Che Guerva is idolized by the left.  Islam is propped up as the victim class by the left.  They are *expletive deleted* morons that think everyone they admire is soft and cuddly.

Yes, liberals talk about compassion, but many seem to completely lack the ability to really put themselves in the shoes of the people they supposedly admire and/or want to help.  Or at least many seem to think they have a monopoly on compassion and I think reality is almost the exact opposite in many cases.  

I recall reading a book by a guy who said that groups like the Nazi's who recruited True Believers to the cause rarely the poor or downtrodden.  They were more often middle class and educated people who were unhappy or disaffected.  The Nazi's and Communists hated each other because they recruited the same people.  

[longeyes]

Below is a question from an online class I'm taking, and then my answer. What do you think?


"I'm not sure I understand the difference between the true believers and those who were fooled.

Anyone who followed the Nazis because they thought the Jews were the source of their problems may have been fools just as much as they were true believers. After all, harassing or beating or killing Jews could never have solved Germany's problems, no matter how truly one believed it might. Soviet Communism was another fool's errand, and a bloodier one, notwithstanding its many devoted followers.

If the true believers were those who foresaw the loss of freedom, but deemed it a necessary sacrifice, I think they were more effectively fooled than anyone else. Fooling the voters is not as hard as we wish it were. Wrong-headed politics is usually a result of lazy thinking, going for the easy answer, without looking for the unintended consequences. Or in the case of scapegoating the Jewish people, ignoring consequences that fall on someone else. An easy trap to fall into; an easy trap to set for others. I would say that is the dynamic at work."

"Lazy thinking" defines the human race and human history.  The vast majority are followers and true believers.  The few have tried to drag the rest into the light.   For the most part we are beasts without the benefit of unadulterated instincts.

[Perd Hapley]

"Lazy thinking" defines the human race and human history.  The vast majority are followers and true believers.  The few have tried to drag the rest into the light.   For the most part we are beasts without the benefit of unadulterated instincts.

I was thinking about saying that, given the innate evil of the human race, we really should be asking not, "Why was there a Hitler?" but "Why aren't all of our leaders Hitlers

[Blakenzy]

I see it like this: That the vast majority of us humans are fairly straight forward and mostly honest. What you see is what you get, so to speak. As a consequence, we usually project onto the people we consider akin to us, by default, general honesty and straight forwardness... "I mean what I say, therefore he means what he says". We find it very hard to second guess something that is being told to us with a straight face in public view... it is rude almost to outright doubt what someone claims. We choose to believe because it makes us feel good about our society to take honesty for granted. We believe to get along.

This naivety is an inherent weakness of the human condition and allows for the most unscrupulous and pathological of us to take advantage of the willful blindness, easily manipulate perception and misrepresent their way into positions of authority through fraud and forgery of character... and once in a position of authority and status, oh boy, their lies take on a whole new layer of "credibility".. they become "Official".

If the >insert position of authority here< said it, it is taken as truth with little scrutiny. If someone raises questions about the "Official Narrative", they are immediately cast out as crack pots and batshit crazies, traitors... It becomes very costly(socially) to call out liars and lies. Just look at reactions to the "troother" comments, we don't want to hear about it or them.

So when "authorities" go about pointing blame of all our woes onto people who don't quite fit into our culture, with the added spice of imminent danger, we suppress skepticism, gobble it up and follow down the rabbit hole...

[AJ Dual]

I see it like this: That the vast majority of us humans are fairly straight forward and mostly honest. What you see is what you get, so to speak. As a consequence, we usually project onto the people we consider akin to us, by default, general honesty and straight forwardness... "I mean what I say, therefore he means what he says". We find it very hard to second guess something that is being told to us with a straight face in public view... it is rude almost to outright doubt what someone claims. We choose to believe because it makes us feel good about our society to take honesty for granted. We believe to get along.

This naivety is an inherent weakness of the human condition and allows for the most unscrupulous and pathological of us to take advantage of the willful blindness, easily manipulate perception and misrepresent their way into positions of authority through fraud and forgery of character... and once in a position of authority and status, oh boy, their lies take on a whole new layer of "credibility".. the become "Official".

If the >insert position of authority here< said it, it is taken as truth with little scrutiny. If someone raises questions about the "Official Narrative", they are immediately cast out as crack pots and batshit crazies, traitors... It becomes very costly(socially) to call out liars and lies. Just look at reactions to the "troother" comments, we don't want to hear about it or them.

So when "authorities" go about pointing blame of all our woes onto people who don't quite fit into our culture, with the added spice of imminent danger, we suppress skepticism, gobble it up and follow down the rabbit hole...

I don't think people are inherently evil either. At worst we average out to "neutral".

Evil is often an emergent property of systems where everyone involved believes they're "doing good" or at worst, "just doing their job"/Nurenburg Defense etc.

Even the subset of folks who actually is getting off on the suffering of others, the majority of them has some sort of rationalization mechanisim as to why it's happening or why they're doing it. Such as that "they're bad people" and they deserve it" etc.

Only a very small minority of humans are consciously and willfully evil IMO, and actually go around saying "I'm going to hurt XYZ and oh boy are they going to SUFFER, and it's going to be so AWESOME!" in advance of what they're going to do.

As bad as they were, I'm not sure even Hitler and Stalin fall into that category.

[brimic]

"I mean what I say, therefore he means what he says". We find it very hard to second guess something that is being told to us with a straight face in public view... it is rude almost to outright doubt what someone claims. We choose to believe because it makes us feel good about our society to take honesty for granted. We believe to get along.

There might be something to that...

A lot of what I see is that there are many white elephants in the middle of the room that we all see, but because of shame, peer pressure, political correctness, or threat of force, we fail to acknowledge them or speakabout them.

[ArfinGreebly]

If the "goodness" of people is computed from a root motivation of "survival," then it's fairly straightforward to align things according to "circles of influence" (self, family, groups of which one is a member, mankind as a whole, etc.) to determine a "net vector" which kind of indicates "how good" someone is.

If it's "all about me," and family, groups (including nation), and mankind don't figure in at all, we have, what, a potential sociopath?

To the degree that one's survival is calculated in terms of family, community, human race, etc., we have levels of "enlightened" self interest.

Most people of my acquaintance act with deliberate intended benefit for at least themselves, their family, and their [favorite grouping] (club, church, state, country).

Things can get pretty screwed up when the survival alignment includes only, for example, self and "all life" (where, mysteriously, "mankind" doesn't seem to be included).

In certain totalitarian regimes, we have seen young people "programmed" to survive as "myself and my country" with family pushed off to one side unless all members align with "my country."

So, in my estimation, there is a basic "goodness" to people.  And then there is cultural programming, which can screw up the alignment of vectors in the various "circles of influence."

Without weird programming, the "self, family, my society" grouping is almost a given.

[Scout26]

RIVER:
          People don't like to be meddled
          with. We tell them what to do,
          what to think, don't run don't
          walk we're in their homes and in
          their heads and we haven't the
          right. We're meddlesome.

TEACHER:
          (gently taking her STYLUS)
          River, we're not telling people
          what to think. We're just trying
          to show them how.


Most Evil Leaders looked at a group and decided that either 1)They didn't fit into his "plan" and had to go. 2)They were out to get him/undermine what he was trying to accomplish, 3)Scapegoats for all the troubles/problems his chosen group was suffering, or they were 4)Simply murderous bastards.

But all were doing it to make things "better" for their group/tribe people in accordance with their belief system, and the most murderous were the totalitarian. 


http://www.amazon.com/The-Great-Book-Horrible-Things/dp/0393081923

[MrsSmith]

I see it like this: That the vast majority of us humans are fairly straight forward and mostly honest. What you see is what you get, so to speak. As a consequence, we usually project onto the people we consider akin to us, by default, general honesty and straight forwardness... "I mean what I say, therefore he means what he says". We find it very hard to second guess something that is being told to us with a straight face in public view... it is rude almost to outright doubt what someone claims. We choose to believe because it makes us feel good about our society to take honesty for granted. We believe to get along.

This naivety is an inherent weakness of the human condition and allows for the most unscrupulous and pathological of us to take advantage of the willful blindness, easily manipulate perception and misrepresent their way into positions of authority through fraud and forgery of character... and once in a position of authority and status, oh boy, their lies take on a whole new layer of "credibility".. they become "Official".

If the >insert position of authority here< said it, it is taken as truth with little scrutiny. If someone raises questions about the "Official Narrative", they are immediately cast out as crack pots and batshit crazies, traitors... It becomes very costly(socially) to call out liars and lies. Just look at reactions to the "troother" comments, we don't want to hear about it or them.

So when "authorities" go about pointing blame of all our woes onto people who don't quite fit into our culture, with the added spice of imminent danger, we suppress skepticism, gobble it up and follow down the rabbit hole...

The thing is, many of us ARE able to see the danger/evil in a thing, even if we WANT to believe (because of projection, as you said) that it isn't possible, isn't true, couldn't REALLY be. We've all talked about the potential for disaster/danger in the way things are going in our country right now. But even if we didn't get labeled as crackpots, batshit crazies, traitors, or outright TERRORISTS, what power do any of us have to change it? What power did the subset in Germany, the ones like us who dared talk about the danger that was Hitler, in pubs or back rooms, what power did they have to stop the flood that was the Third Reich? None. And neither do we.

Yes, we can vote. We can encourage everyone we know to vote the existing administration out of office. But that's it. There just isn't anything else that won't get us (as individuals) in a world of hurt.

[Blakenzy]

The thing is, many of us ARE able to see the danger/evil in a thing, even if we WANT to believe (because of projection, as you said) that it isn't possible, isn't true, couldn't REALLY be. We've all talked about the potential for disaster/danger in the way things are going in our country right now. But even if we didn't get labeled as crackpots, batshit crazies, traitors, or outright TERRORISTS, what power do any of us have to change it? What power did the subset in Germany, the ones like us who dared talk about the danger that was Hitler, in pubs or back rooms, what power did they have to stop the flood that was the Third Reich? None. And neither do we.

Yes, we can vote. We can encourage everyone we know to vote the existing administration out of office. But that's it. There just isn't anything else that won't get us (as individuals) in a world of hurt.

Well, what can you do? You are fighting for people's minds. It's a slow fight of attrition, poke as many holes in the lies as you can, while you can. Hope that consciousness of what is really going on reaches critical mass before evil doers nail the lid shut.

Don't remain quiet, don't hunker up in the backrooms and pubs. Take your voice out in public if you can. Show support for whistle-blowers. The internet is one hell of a tool, quite free and beyond censorship for the time being. Just like Mizz Janet Napolitano  instructs us: "If you see something, say something".. un-apologetically.

[Boomhauer]

Stupid and ignorant.  Che Guerva is idolized by the left.  Islam is propped up as the victim class by the left.  They are *expletive deleted* morons that think everyone they admire is soft and cuddly.

The real hardcore left is fully aware of the evils committed by Che Stalin et. al. The hardcore left believes the killing didnt go far enough and thats why communism fails.

[MrsSmith]

Well, what can you do? You are fighting for people's minds. It's a slow fight of attrition, poke as many holes in the lies as you can, while you can. Hope that consciousness of what is really going on reaches critical mass before evil doers nail the lid shut.

Don't remain quiet, don't hunker up in the backrooms and pubs. Take your voice out in public if you can. Show support for whistle-blowers. The internet is one hell of a tool, quite free and beyond censorship for the time being. Just like Mizz Janet Napolitano  instructs us: "If you see something, say something".. un-apologetically.

Oh I do, believe me. Just had a rather ... invigorating discussion with a neighbor in which he basically stated that my facts are fiction, my reasoning irrational, and that nothing is Obama's fault, that he NEEDS four more years to fix Bush's mistakes. I hear this from SO MANY people and each time I try to calmly and logically point out the flaws in their media-driven theories. And each time, I get this almost belligerent refusal to even consider another way of looking at things. 

[Perd Hapley]

Oh I do, believe me. Just had a rather ... invigorating discussion with a neighbor in which he basically stated that my facts are fiction, my reasoning irrational, and that nothing is Obama's fault, that he NEEDS four more years to fix Bush's mistakes. I hear this from SO MANY people and each time I try to calmly and logically point out the flaws in their media-driven theories. And each time, I get this almost belligerent refusal to even consider another way of looking at things. 

Anyone already planning to vote for the dark side should be considered a loss. We can't waste our time with them. If we're going to spread the good word, let's concentrate on the young and the undecided.

[Hawkmoon]

Either they admire the previous usage or they believe the public is too stupid to understand.

Or both.

[Hawkmoon]

I was thinking about saying that, given the innate evil of the human race, we really should be asking not, "Why was there a Hitler?" but "Why aren't all of our leaders Hitlers

On a world scale, a lot of them are (or were).

How many people were "disappeared" in Chile under Pinochet, or Argentina under what's-his-name? Take a look at Venezuela under Chavez, or any of a number of African countries. Sadly, human nature hasn't evolved very much in several thousand years.

What the true believers don't understand is that if there weren't a United States with a 2nd Amendment and a bunch of patriots with boom sticks, the world would be even worse than it is.