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They Thought They Were Free (1955)

press.uchicago.edu

421–430 of 545 posts

Re: They Thought They Were Free (1955)

#421

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US constitution is outdated and vulnerable. Modern constitutions like Germany’s basic law are a lot more resilient. We are watching the US constitution fail right now, it didn’t even take smart men to start dismantling it. I hope I’ll be proven wrong, but what indications do you see right now that the US constitution is performing as intended?

I’m unfamiliar with German basic law, but considering the lawlessness we’re seeing play out in the US right now, I’m curious how/why modern constitutions are less vulnerable? By this I mean: it’s not as if the things we see playing out are lawful. Is there a structural difference that somehow prevents the same kind of lawlessness? Put another way, what stops a movement that decides to ignore Germany’s constitution fr…

For starters, Germany does not give a single person the right to be king with decrees and military leadership.

Also (though not an issue with the law itself) it's really dangerous only having two parties at the helm.

Re: They Thought They Were Free (1955)

#422

> "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…

Americans do not fuck around with loud proclamations but actions are harder. Don’t doubt that there are actions, though. But our media landscape is extremely fragmented and successful organizations of people are not covered. There are plenty of loud, mass protests happening everywhere in the country. But also understand that successful organizations that do get media attention are cracked down on. Not so long ago Los…

I saw widespread violence, property damage, and theft (including from immigrant-run businesses) in media coverage of those "protests". What do you think should have been done to stop those things?

Re: They Thought They Were Free (1955)

#423

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are delusional. Please seek help.

I'm curious what you believe is the point of your comment. For one, it's remarkably lazy compared to the previous poster's efforts in illustrating the inverted scenario. Two, do you believe he or anyone else is going to be convinced or 'seek help'?

Thank you, enlightened hacker. I will only respond to far-right gibberish with voluminous essays from now on.

I don't think that would make it any more likely to convince them, and I do not owe anyone my time for their indulgence. The best I can hope for is that they take a look in the mirror at some point, so I'll stick to that.

Re: They Thought They Were Free (1955)

#424
post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Once again, the minor concern and discussion of trans participation in sports is a wedge issue used largely by conservatives to rile up people and keep them from voting for liberal parties (in the US). This is undeniable IMO. Perhaps it is a liberal failure to discuss the sports issue more, since doing so would disarm the disingenuousness of the "I only care about sports" excuse of conservatives.

It is being used as a wedge issue by conservatives in the US, but I feel that liberal politicians made a rod for their own backs on this one. An unforced error that their opponents were happy to take advantage of.

This article has an interesting viewpoint, from the perspective of a feminist liberal who had been trying to warn Democrats about this for years: https://digitalcommons.uri.edu/dignity/vol10/iss2/8/

Re: They Thought They Were Free (1955)

#425

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1930s fascism can never occur again. It was a product of its time. But the psychology behind fascism stems from deep human quirks and is something eternal. All those nations, except perhaps China, share the DNA. If we didn't already have names for their systems, we probably would describe them as fascistic. What Trump has turned the American government into is closer to Fascism than to Liberal Democracy, no? In futur…

It's inaccurate to blame Trump. He is a greedy egotistical idiot. Blaming Trump is like blaming a rock that hit you in the head. Look up and pay attention to who threw the rock. Blame them. The Trump presidency is the culmination of a roughly 45 year campaign to return the United States to the Gilded Age, and to ensure it stays that way until it's bled dry and nothing remains of its corpse. The political and social p…

A country doesn't become fascist solely because of one man. If my previous comment implies that, I worded it poorly.

If I blame anyone it's the American electorate.

It's tempting to continue and discuss which phenomena I blame for the poor judgment of the average American, but that would triple the length of my comment.

Re: They Thought They Were Free (1955)

#426
post #105

I’ve read the book. It’s genuinely interesting. It’s very interesting to see how people misremember the post-war years. It also contains a) passages that are very much quoted out of context and b) an awful lot of stuff about “national character” that is… questionable. I highly recommend actually reading it and understanding what it is and isn’t. Mostly I learned that there’s no simple answers, but also that people an…

To your point, the thing that jumped out at me reading this book is how familiar the German characters are. People have loved to imagine that the Nazi era in Germany was so anomalous it could never happen again. But no, the Germans were just like us.

I recently read 'Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland', Christopher Browning.

My takeaway was the same as yours; the Germans (and everybody else) were (are) just like us.

Re: They Thought They Were Free (1955)

#427
post #333

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anecdotally, having lived in Germany for a couple of years recently, there is a perceptible national character. The best way to understand it is to ponder the difference between a drag race and a rally race - in one, success means going as fast as possible; in the other success means getting to navigation points within a window of error. Or, with beer: in America success is discovering a new beer with a different fla…

Eh, I think that's a bit overblown. In theory, Germans are famously methodical and precise, in practice the rail network is falling apart, a major bridge in my city recently collapsed due to lack of proper maintenance, and "made in Germany" is mainly an encouragement to buy local, rather than buying for quality. My experience of Germans, having lived among them for almost a decade, and having married one of them, is…

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Re: They Thought They Were Free (1955)

#428
post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

> get ideology out of academia This reads like someone who needs to take the time to understand the breadth of “ideology”. What will be left when what you consider ideology is gone? As you note, even science has its ideology. What about science itself? That too can be (is) considered ideology, although I assume you reject that position… that doesn’t make you correct (or wrong). There is a lot of theoretical writing a…

> What will be left when what you consider ideology is gone?

The scientific method, that is what you're left with. Even when the results of your study do not track with your feelings, your religion, your political opinions or any other irrelevant factors. I can give examples galore and I'm pretty sure you can come up with close to the same examples of where ideology trumped the scientific method by either not releasing studies, by simply falsifying or otherwise manipulating data so the results fit with the narrative and other interferences with the scientific method so as to use the cachet of the institution to amplify some desired narrative.

As far as I'm concerned there is no 'Science', what there is is people who use the scientific method to study some phenomenon in the search for more insight. People who know how to use this method and who apply it diligently, who publish their data and methods and outcomes and to the best of their ability try to interpret the results are 'doing science'. It can be bad science if they don't know what they're doing or if they're using bad methods but as long as they follow the tenets of the scientific method they're doing science. Their experiments can be repeated, their methods can be researched, their data can be inspected and others can apply their methods to their data to verify their results. Their conclusions can be questioned and discussed.

If the same people start with a given position and tailor their experiments and data and methods around that position to reach a pre-defined conclusion they are not doing science no matter how lofty an institution they happen to be employed by and how impressive their titles are. If one of these people says something which clearly does not stroke with the truth and starts throwing epithets at those who call him or her out on this that person is not a scientist but something else - a charlatan, an activist, a propagandist, a troll, anything but a scientist. A scientist, when confronted with clear and obvious refutation of his or her claims will retract or revise those claims and - if their character allows for this - thank those who pointed out the error in his or her way. That is how knowledge grows, by learning from our mistakes and by turning back when we happen to have entered a dead end.

In short, science does not have an ideology, it is the application of a method - the scientific method - which is orthogonal to ideology. You can take the most left-wing radical and the most convinced orthodox conservative person and have them do a study into ${subject}. If both of them strictly adhere to the scientific method and use valid method and valid research data there's a good chance they'll arrive at more or less the same conclusions. They may differ on their interpretation of what these conclusions mean when applied to society but the actual conclusions should be similar.

Re: They Thought They Were Free (1955)

#429
post #353
post #323

The shocking thing isn't that fascism would come back. The shocking thing is that the people I thought were smart would allow it to normalize so fast and give up without a fight. And that even some people I know are apparently fascists at heart - they just needed "permission" to show themselves. For most of my teens I wondered what side I would have been on in 1930s Germany. If I would have had the courage to stand u…

> For why they can't stand up to this. How have you been standing up to "this"? How do you expect others to stand up?

I expect people to be decent human beings.

Re: They Thought They Were Free (1955)

#430

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is one solution to the problem. But it isn't as if its the only solution or one that has no downsides. I mean from a very trivial point of view, government spending constitutes a large amount of GDP. What this comes down to, in my opinion, is the question of democratic allocation of resources and labor . Most people believe that there is a role for democracy in the allocation of resources and labor, which is to…

The system you describe is majority rule, which often abuses minority rights. It is better to have a constitutional democracy with very limited government powers.

Isn't it quite difficult to know what is better, even if the question weren't subjective?

It is very hard to conduct randomized controlled and double blinded trials on forms of government. I don't think people can even agree on how to measure how good a government is.

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