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They Thought They Were Free (1955)

press.uchicago.edu

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Re: They Thought They Were Free (1955)

#41

Post by jackstraw42 »

HK-NC wrote: post #39
jackstraw42 wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Excerpts from this have popped up in Reddit comments quite a bit the last few years. At first it did feel out of place, but now I'm going going back and listening to Dan Carlin talk about the headspace of society before something like Nazi Germany happens. With all the Executive Orders and lawlessness from the Executive Branch and throughout our federal government with this new regime, it's pretty clear they're attem…

Wasnt Germany better off in the decades following WW2 than the British that defeated them?

The Allies defeated Germany, not the British.

Re: They Thought They Were Free (1955)

#42

Post by hagbard_c »

heresie-dabord wrote: post #25

> They Thought They Were Free: The Germans, 1933-45 by Milton Mayer, published by the University of Chicago Press. ©1955, 1966, 2017 by the University of Chicago. Such books will no longer be published if universities are not free. And if freedom begins to disappear, even those who believe themselves safely conformist are not safe... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_They_Came

[flagged]

Re: They Thought They Were Free (1955)

#43

Post by nataliste »

kleiba wrote: post #2

Posted here multiple times before: - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42943973 (02/2025, 473 comments) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25083315 (11/2020, 382 comments) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31042304 (04/2022, 239 comments)

I was reading the comments from the past times this was submitted, and I just wanted a reason to draw attention to this comment from 2020:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25083315#25104589

Re: They Thought They Were Free (1955)

#44

Post by immibis »

HK-NC wrote: post #39
jackstraw42 wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Excerpts from this have popped up in Reddit comments quite a bit the last few years. At first it did feel out of place, but now I'm going going back and listening to Dan Carlin talk about the headspace of society before something like Nazi Germany happens. With all the Executive Orders and lawlessness from the Executive Branch and throughout our federal government with this new regime, it's pretty clear they're attem…

Wasnt Germany better off in the decades following WW2 than the British that defeated them?

Mostly because the Allies took over and invested a bunch of money into them developing in ways that didn't involve fascism.

Re: They Thought They Were Free (1955)

#45

Post by brightball »

FridayoLeary wrote: post #35
thomassmith65 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This post from 2003 has made the rounds several times in recent years... "The 14 Characteristics of Fascism" https://ratical.org/ratville/CAH/fasci14chars.html ...and I recall people reading it and saying they don't see how Donald Trump ticks the boxes. It's all very tedious to complain about when half the electorate supports it. It makes one feel like a nag and a broken record.

There are clearly very many countries that tick most of those boxes. Including some that i wouldn't necessarily define as fascist. Prominent examples are China, Russia, Iran North Korea and other middle eastern countries. I'm not saying this list is incorrect, per se, but it is vague to the point of uselessness.

Authoritarianism is IMO the common thread whether you’re talking about fascism or communism.

At the root, there’s either principled freedom or control.

Re: They Thought They Were Free (1955)

#46

Post by Amezarak »

tobias3 wrote: post #18
brightball wrote: post #5

I wonder how many people interpret this based on “the other side” rather than objectively?

As a German outside observer I can tell you there is only one side going down the facist path. The "other side" isn't great either. Would be great to have a sane alternative, I guess.

Perhaps you are not aware that the “other side” declared Constitutional amendments by fiat, assassinated American citizens with drone strikes, lied to the courts to imprison influential Twitter users, used intelligence agencies to spy on Congress, dramatically expanded the surveillance state, declared by EO they simply wouldn’t enforce some laws on favored demographics, ordered social media companies to censor and ban users, locked people down unless they were protesting for approved causes, and engaged in politically motivated prosecutions of their enemies.

Authoritarianism is not a “one side” problem in the US and until we collectively figure that out each side will continue increasing it, all in the name of stopping the other sides’ extremists.

Re: They Thought They Were Free (1955)

#47

Post by immibis »

hagbard_c wrote: post #42
heresie-dabord wrote: post #25

> They Thought They Were Free: The Germans, 1933-45 by Milton Mayer, published by the University of Chicago Press. ©1955, 1966, 2017 by the University of Chicago. Such books will no longer be published if universities are not free. And if freedom begins to disappear, even those who believe themselves safely conformist are not safe... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_They_Came

[flagged]

First they came for those who thought the sky was pulsating green, but I did not speak out for I did not dare to question the blue sky narrative.

Then they came for those who thought the earth was flat, but I did not speak out for I did not dare to question the round earth narrative.

Then they came for those who thought the internet was carried by little elves, but I did not speak out for I did not dare to question the fiber optic narrative.

Not all narratives are equal.

Re: They Thought They Were Free (1955)

#48

Post by delichon »

jackstraw42 wrote: post #41
HK-NC wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wasnt Germany better off in the decades following WW2 than the British that defeated them?

The Allies defeated Germany, not the British.

It turns out that the British were one of the allies and about 380,000 of them died fighting the Nazis, so they have a good claim to having defeated Germany, with help from their friends.

Re: They Thought They Were Free (1955)

#49

Post by Loughla »

Waterluvian wrote: post #34

> "Your ‘little men,’ your Nazi friends, were not against National Socialism in principle. Men like me, who were, are the greater offenders, not because we knew better (that would be too much to say) but because we sensed better.[...]" I read this book a few years ago and I can't stop thinking about this line of discourse (there's more of this subject in the book). I've felt this exceptional frustration and disgust t…

The right in the US has convinced people that the only way to protect their own freedoms is to let them take the freedom from everyone, and allocate out appropriate permissions to the right people afterwards.

There's also a spirit of "I don't care as long as they get hurt more" that's stronger than ever.

The party of self-sufficiency and pulling yourself up into a better life with minimal oversight from government has become the party of cutting off your nose to spite your own face.

It's ridiculous.

Re: They Thought They Were Free (1955)

#50

Post by nativeit »

HK-NC wrote: post #39
jackstraw42 wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Excerpts from this have popped up in Reddit comments quite a bit the last few years. At first it did feel out of place, but now I'm going going back and listening to Dan Carlin talk about the headspace of society before something like Nazi Germany happens. With all the Executive Orders and lawlessness from the Executive Branch and throughout our federal government with this new regime, it's pretty clear they're attem…

Wasnt Germany better off in the decades following WW2 than the British that defeated them?

Which Germany?
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