Was Hitler a unique person?

[Milk Sheikh]

Unique in the sense that he was the first - and perhaps the only - white leader to target white folks (yes, they were Jewish but practically indistinguishable from whites) instead of nonwhites?

Yes, he also killed gypsies and other nonwhites, but that doesn't change the fact that he was the only person to have treated whites in the exact same manner that the whites themselves have treated the natives (such as labor camps, heavy state discrimination etc.).

Was Hitler therefore a unique individual, at least in the sense that he broke this recurring historical pattern?

p.s.
Before overemotional people start yelling, this isn't a defense of Hitler. Just an interest in history, if anything.

[Sasha]

*facepalm*

no, white people for about as long as there have been white people have been killing and opressing other white people, and the jews even a bit longer (;))
ever heard about the inquisition, the roman conquests? the polepensian war? the whiping out of the neaderthall?

as an wise man once said;
"in all respect, you sir are an idiot"

[ComradeOm]

I'm going to have to concur with psycho here. This is as idiotic a question as I've ever heard. Do you honestly believe that Hitler was the first 'White man' to discriminate against 'Whites'? He wasn't even the first to systematically discriminate against the Jews

So no, Hitler did not "break this recurring historical pattern" because the latter is a figment of your imagination. And even if we were to accept such a staggeringly simplistic white/non-white analysis, you'd still be wrong because there are plenty of historical precedents for Hitler

[9]

this is def not a troll thread or anything

[Dimentio]

Unique in the sense that he was the first - and perhaps the only - white leader to target white folks (yes, they were Jewish but practically indistinguishable from whites) instead of nonwhites?

Yes, he also killed gypsies and other nonwhites, but that doesn't change the fact that he was the only person to have treated whites in the exact same manner that the whites themselves have treated the natives (such as labor camps, heavy state discrimination etc.).

Was Hitler therefore a unique individual, at least in the sense that he broke this recurring historical pattern?

p.s.
Before overemotional people start yelling, this isn't a defense of Hitler. Just an interest in history, if anything.

Not really. There have been white-on-white racial discrimination before. Just look at the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the continuous ethnic cleansing on the Balkans until the 1990's, and the British treatment of the Celtic minorities in Britain and Ireland during many years.

Hitler was unique as a fascist leader in the extent that he was an emo who really believed the crap he said.

[Sentinel]

Like the others pointed out, no type of discrimination was really unique for the national socialists. Most of the groups they murdered such as Jewish people, Romani people, homosexuals, prisoners of war, disabled people, political/religious dissidents, and of course communists had been targets of persecution and/or mistreatment to varying degrees already before the rise of Hitler.

What was unique about him and his followers was that they committed the first industrialised, centrally planned and systematic genocide. The sheer amount of people they managed to kill in such a short time, basically. But otherwise he wasn't really special or unique -- just your average bloodthirsty, charismatic sociopath. The list of the world's leaders is full of those.

[ComradeOm]

Troll or not, one of the reasons that this so annoys me is that its an example of that ridiculous American tendency to equate colour with class. The most obvious flaw in such a schema is that it doesn't make sense when applied to history or the ROTW. You have the likes of Noel Ignatiev claiming that at some point the Irish in America somehow 'became white', but I can assure you that the colour of your average Irishman has always been a painfully milky white. So, why use skin colour as a classification tool in the first place?

In this sort of US-centric view the OP's question does make a sort of weird sense. When you break everyone down into white and non-white (or people of colour or whatever) and then export this framework into Europe, well then it would be surprising if it didn't lead to craziness

Which doesn't excuse the simple historical ignorance of course. Surely its common knowledge that the term 'concentration camp' emerged during the Second Boer War when the British used them to intern the notoriously 'white' Boers?

[Sir Comradical]

Racist fascists are not unique under capitalism.

[Milk Sheikh]

Thanks for all the responses, although I wish people would be a little more gentle and polite while responding. No harm in being nice to people.

Anyhow, I wasn't talking about white on white discrimination that happened due to economic and political reasons (British vs. Ireland). Nor was I talking about discrimination faced by the Jews pre-Hitler.

I am talking about systematic attempts to exterminate an entire community based on race theories alone - no political compulsions (as in Ireland) or economic reasons (as in the invasion of countries like Iraq for oil). Systematically attacking and stripping people of their rights and freedoms is something that's always happened to people of color at the hands of white. It's never happened to whites ... until Hitler showed up.

This is the uniqueness I am talking about - the uniqueness of the events which occurred during Hitler's regime. This has never occurred before - this sort of systematic, cold and 'professional' methods of execution have never been applied to whites, only to native people.

Wasn't Hitler, therefore, the first person to do to whites what whites have always done to natives?

[Milk Sheikh]

as an wise man once said;
"in all respect, you sir are an idiot"

As another wise man replied to this: Takes one to know one.;)

[Sasha]

But the holocaust was first and foremost an political and economical decision and not an ideaoligical one. If the Nazi wanted to get and keep power they needed an enemy, an scapegoat. Also the holocaust, like the industrial-prison complex it was was highly profitable, free slave labor with an endless supply of workers to work to death, so no reason to provide adequate food and housing let alone medicalaid. The shoah might be in some ways unique, that doesn't mean that it can't be explained from an materialist viewpoint.

[IndependentCitizen]

He is unique.



He's the biggest **** in history...

[Widerstand]

the whiping out of the neaderthall?"

Actually there is no proof for:

- the Neanderthals being white
- the Homo Sapiens at that time being white
- the Homo Sapiens wiping out the Neanderthals to begin with (current theories are that it could be either that, or the Neanderthals mixing with Homo Sapiens, or Homo Sapiens simply coexisting with and surviving the failing Neanderthal population)

Correct me if I'm wrong.


Anyhow, I wasn't talking about white on white discrimination that happened due to economic and political reasons (British vs. Ireland). Nor was I talking about discrimination faced by the Jews pre-Hitler.

I am talking about systematic attempts to exterminate an entire community based on race theories alone - no political compulsions (as in Ireland) or economic reasons (as in the invasion of countries like Iraq for oil).

I think it's a stretch to say that the Nazi regime with it's actions and ideology (including race theory) had "no political compulsions or economic reasons." Jews have since the middle ages been blamed for plagues ("well poisoning"), famine (not sure what the construct here was), economic disasters (the "Jew = banker/money owner" stereotype, reinforced by forbidding them any other job) and unwanted political positions ("communism = Jewish conspiracy").

The Nazis justified a good deal of their extermination with social darwinist race theories, yes, but these theories were applied to the political and economical surroundings: The threat of communism and the Great Depression lingering around.



Systematically attacking and stripping people of their rights and freedoms is something that's always happened to people of color at the hands of white. It's never happened to whites ... until Hitler showed up.

I'm fairly sure that the majority of Europeans were white during the middle ages and later, and I'm fairly sure that they were systematically stripped of their rights and freedoms.

This whole "white - native" dichotomy is a false one, because guess what, whites were natives in Europe, they didn't just drop from the sky.



This is the uniqueness I am talking about - the uniqueness of the events which occurred during Hitler's regime. This has never occurred before - this sort of systematic, cold and 'professional' methods of execution have never been applied to whites, only to native people.

To be fair, I don't think ANY group ever ran an extermination machinery comparable to the Nazi's before them, whether or not it was against whites.

[ComradeOm]

Wasn't Hitler, therefore, the first person to do to whites what whites have always done to natives?No. Both because there are pre-Hitler examples of genocide in Europe and 'whites' have not "always done" this to 'natives'

In the first case, and you might want to consult this thread (http://www.revleft.com/vb/genocide-modern-phenomenai-t146491/index.html), the idea that genocide only arrived in Europe with the Holocaust is simply false. The eradication of Carthage springs to mind, as do the many examples given in the Bible. The complete destruction of city-states or tribes was not an overly uncommon occurrence. Beyond this, it is extremely difficult to annihilate a large population group with medieval technology, but there are countless examples of discriminatory measures being directed at one European population by another

Secondly, drawing comparisons between the Holocaust and the depopulation of the Americas is tenuous in the extreme. The former was a centralised and industrialised system that purposefully killed millions in the space of a few years as part of an explicit political programme. In contrast the vast majority of deaths in the Americas occurred due to disease. Drawing any real parallels between the Spanish conquers and the Nazis is highly controversial at best and simply nonsensical at worst. Arguing that these deaths were part of some overriding "racial theory" - ie, that the various European kingdoms purposefully set out to eradicate the native population due to perceived racial inferiorities - is baseless


Systematically attacking and stripping people of their rights and freedoms is something that's always happened to people of color at the hands of whiteSo all 'white on colour' violence is racially motivated whereas all 'white on white' violence is simply "due to economic and political reasons"? Let me get this straight - the British Empire invaded African and Asian countries solely because of some overarching "racial theory" but it conquered and ruled Ireland for an entirely different set of reasons that can be categorised "economic and political"? Nonsense

[Invader Zim]

But the holocaust was first and foremost an political and economical decision and not an ideaoligical one. If the Nazi wanted to get and keep power they needed an enemy, an scapegoat. Also the holocaust, like the industrial-prison complex it was was highly profitable, free slave labor with an endless supply of workers to work to death, so no reason to provide adequate food and housing let alone medicalaid. The shoah might be in some ways unique, that doesn't mean that it can't be explained from an materialist viewpoint.

Eh? You are arguing that the 'jewish question' and 'racial hygene' were not ingrained core elements of Nazi ideology? I'm not disputing that the Nazi racial policies did not provide a vast source of slave labour and stolen material wealth, or that the Jews, gypsies, slavs, or indeed anybody classified as racially inferior, but the notion that the nazis were not, and did not attract, individuals with a buring ideologically motivated 'racial nationalism' is to fundermentally misunderstand the Nazis. The Nazis did not plan to merely restrict their genocidal policies of Jews. They had whole series of self-proclaimed racial 'experts' who had classified and graded the various different 'types' of individual to be found in Europe. The Nazis attempted to, first and foremost, destroy the Jewish population first because they were the ones they hated the most, and because the Jews constituted a small enough portion of the population that they believed this could realistically be achieved. That is not to say that they didn't plan, once the war was won, to vastly expand their policies of extermination. This is because they genuinely believed in their sick 'racialy pure' "utopia", and there was literally no room for Jews, Slavs, etc, in this "utopia".


the whiping out of the neaderthall?

Correct me if I'm wrong, but this is the history forum, where we discuss history? Not the literature forum or chit-chat?

[scarletghoul]

Thanks for all the responses, although I wish people would be a little more gentle and polite while responding. No harm in being nice to people.

Anyhow, I wasn't talking about white on white discrimination that happened due to economic and political reasons (British vs. Ireland). Nor was I talking about discrimination faced by the Jews pre-Hitler.

I am talking about systematic attempts to exterminate an entire community based on race theories alone - no political compulsions (as in Ireland) or economic reasons (as in the invasion of countries like Iraq for oil). Systematically attacking and stripping people of their rights and freedoms is something that's always happened to people of color at the hands of white. It's never happened to whites ... until Hitler showed up.

This is the uniqueness I am talking about - the uniqueness of the events which occurred during Hitler's regime. This has never occurred before - this sort of systematic, cold and 'professional' methods of execution have never been applied to whites, only to native people.

Wasn't Hitler, therefore, the first person to do to whites what whites have always done to natives?
Thing is the Jews weren't considered 'white', the whole definition of who is white changes all the time. Jews, Italians, Irish, East Europeans, etc, did not used to be considered white. The idea of a what race did not even exist until relatively recently. What I'm saying is you can't evaluate history by the racial classifications that exist today.

[Rafiq]

Cmon guys, what do you expect from a 'saddamist'?

[Sasha]

Eh? You are arguing that the 'jewish question' and 'racial hygene' were not ingrained core elements of Nazi ideology? I'm not disputing that the Nazi racial policies did not provide a vast source of slave labour and stolen material wealth, or that the Jews, gypsies, slavs, or indeed anybody classified as racially inferior, but the notion that the nazis were not, and did not attract, individuals with a buring ideologically motivated 'racial nationalism' is to fundermentally misunderstand the Nazis. The Nazis did not plan to merely restrict their genocidal policies of Jews. They had whole series of self-proclaimed racial 'experts' who had classified and graded the various different 'types' of individual to be found in Europe. The Nazis attempted to, first and foremost, destroy the Jewish population first because they were the ones they hated the most, and because the Jews constituted a small enough portion of the population that they believed this could realistically be achieved. That is not to say that they didn't plan, once the war was won, to vastly expand their policies of extermination. This is because they genuinely believed in their sick 'racialy pure' "utopia", and there was literally no room for Jews, Slavs, etc, in this "utopia".



sure there was (and is) an deeply ingrained anti-semitism, but i believe that the mayority of leading nazi's more seazed upon the convinient scapegoat to push through their other programs.
i think that the fact that also on the Allied/Russian side noone at that moment cared about what was hapening in auswitch etc speaks volumes that A. at the time it was just considerd an side-project B. the absolute banality of evil.


Correct me if I'm wrong, but this is the history forum, where we discuss history? Not the literature forum or chit-chat?it was an halfarsed answer at an halfarsed question

[Dimentio]

The Neanderthals had genes for red hair and blue eyes.

Analyses on the first Homo Sapiens who walked into Europe show that they were black.

[L.A.P.]

Well if we're going to use the definition of the caucasian race in the actual sense and not just "white" meaning European but every group that are caucasian, which include Jewish people. Then no Hitler was not the first caucasian man to discriminate against other caucasian people since the British Empire and East India Company discriminated against Indian people before that, European states have discriminated Hispanic people, and I'm not sure on how much the European world discriminated Arab people but I'm sure when Arab people immigrated to European countries they got shit.

[L.A.P.]

As another wise man replied to this: Takes one to know one.;)

That wasn't a wise man who said that, that was an immature 10 year old.

[Invader Zim]

sure there was (and is) an deeply ingrained anti-semitism, but i believe that the mayority of leading nazi's more seazed upon the convinient scapegoat to push through their other programs.

I don't agree, I think they were all about creating a Europe sized racially pure utopia. That was their program, from which all policies were derived. That isn't to say that way to achieve this 'utopia' did not change and indeed the idea of it evolve (indeed the Nazis never initially intended to exterminate jews, that particular facet of the ideology grew out of the expansion of the Reich and the subsequent impracticality of the Madagascar plan, etc.



i think that the fact that also on the Allied/Russian side noone at that moment cared about what was hapening in auswitch etc speaks volumes that A. at the time it was just considerd an side-project B. the absolute banality of evil.

I don't think that is true either, but ultimately difficult to address with out establishing precisely what options were open to the Allies. If we can establish that it was realistically possible, to in some way seriously undermine the process of industrialised genocide, then it will be possible to address the issue in greater depth - why the allies didn't do all they could. But I suggest that we reserve these issues for a different thread.

[ComradeOm]

I don't agree, I think they were all about creating a Europe sized racially pure utopiaAnd I think that you're both wrong for arguing which side of the same coin was more important. Nazi racial theory, the intellectual heritage of which goes back to the 19th C, was obviously a key element of the Holocaust. But then so too was the economic and political exploitation that was to go hand-in-hand with the creation of this "racially pure utopia". The whole purpose of this grotesque racial hierarchy was to determine which peoples deserved to economically/culturally thrive, have access to resources, etc, etc. As such this crackpot racism merged almost seamlessly with even older imperialist ambitions to create the highly toxic mixture we call National Socialism

So you have racial or cultural concerns ('race suicide', Americanisation) with economic answers, and economic concerns (peasant land reform, access to markets) with racial answers. In both cases the answer being the same - kill all the 'subhumans' and take their stuff. Trying to decide which factor was more important risks creating distinctions that did not exist, or were not relevant, in reality

[Sasha]

I don't think that is true either, but ultimately difficult to address with out establishing precisely what options were open to the Allies. If we can establish that it was realistically possible, to in some way seriously undermine the process of industrialised genocide, then it will be possible to address the issue in greater depth - why the allies didn't do all they could. But I suggest that we reserve these issues for a different thread.

the Allied forces knew in an quite early stage already about the Shoah, not only did they fail to inform people (both at home and in the occupied countries) they later even flat out refused when pressured to bomb the railroads too the camps, because A. they valued their bombers too much (letting 90% of them die on an raid on some minor weaponsfactory was O.K. though) and B. in an later stage bombing the railroads would benefit the russians and they didnt want the russians reach berlin first.

but indeed this is getting offtopic

[L.A.P.]

can you explain that.the OP is not arab.

Ok? What does that have to do with anything? The OP isn't Arab therefore I have to explain what Arab people are? I don't understand what you are asking.

[Invader Zim]

yeh and by the nazis 'league tables' the arabs were graded next after the jews of europe.

this thread is pointless.like the OP

I am at a loss to see how the former point here os cnnected to the latter observation, or precisely what you are trying to achieve by stating either.


And I think that you're both wrong for arguing which side of the same coin was more important.

It is important if you want to try to understand why 11 million people (a low-end estimate) were murdered, and as valid as any other question within the topic.


Nazi racial theory, the intellectual heritage of which goes back to the 19th C, was obviously a key element of the Holocaust. But then so too was the economic and political exploitation that was to go hand-in-hand with the creation of this "racially pure utopia".

Granted, but is it not a valid question to ask which, specifically is most important, whether it is a chicken/egg scenario or whether some other factor is actually at the heart of the issue? Surely these are exactly the questions which historians should be asking, as they are also if keen relevence to wider historical questions which can be applied across the chronological and geographical spectrum; what is the role of ideology in the wider structural development of historical phenomenon? Seems worthwhile to me, far more worthwhile than re-hashing the Stalin numbers debates that we constantly have on this board.

[Dimentio]

In the Middle Ages, there weren't much immigration.

Arabs did invade Spain in 711, but they were never more than 20 000, and most Spanish muslims were Spanish convertites to Islam.

[ComradeOm]

...what is the role of ideology in the wider structural development of historical phenomenon?A worthwhile question but not the one that has been asked. I am not positing a conflict between Nazi ideology and political circumstances/opportunism (which has been done to death) but arguing that Nazi ideology itself contained compelling economic/political arguments that were at least as prominent as the racial dogma. Indeed often they were indistinguishable. To provide a basic example, no one ever would have argued that a campaign of racial extermination was desirable if it were felt that this would weaken Germany or threaten her interests

So I strongly believe that it is necessary to treat National Socialism, as an ideology, as a whole. Trying to prise it apart and treating its various intellectual currents in isolation (aside from charting their pre-Nazi evolution of course) is pointless; as is arguing over which was the more influential element in Nazi ideology. These were currents that reinforced each other and can only be understood in the context of each other

Edit:

In the Middle Ages, there weren't much immigrationDefine 'Middle Ages'. I'm assuming that you're not including the rather aptly named 'Migration Period' in this? Or the Norse, Turkish, Hungarian or Mongol movements?

[scourge007]

Hitler wasn't unique at all. The British rounded up Boer women and children and put them in camps because they couldn't beat the Boers during the Second Boer War. They also used the scorched earth policy on Boer civilians too.