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George Orwell’s 1940 Review of Mein Kampf

gutenberg.net.au

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Re: George Orwell’s 1940 Review of Mein Kampf

#511

Post by soperj »

InTheArena wrote: post #77
soperj wrote: post #44

Quoted post unavailable.

I find this statement deeply ignorant of history. I am no defender of imperialism in general, however, Hitler started his conquest with the idea of a systematic genocide of anyone not of the master race. He started with Jews and polish and had plans to mass murder Slavs, and eventually all the mixed races of the world. Britain’s empires (there were more then one) were usually accidental and commercial in nature. They…

So you're saying that the genocides that Britain enacted were just accidents? I think you're the one who is ignorant here. You realize that the British expressly didn't want to help the Jews in the concentration camps (of which they were fully aware) because they were afraid that they would go to Palestine after the war (British Territory), and cause an issue. So they purposefully let them die.

Re: George Orwell’s 1940 Review of Mein Kampf

#512

Post by soperj »

advisedwang wrote: post #71
soperj wrote: post #44

Quoted post unavailable.

Orwell wasn't exactly pro-british-empire either [1]. But he British empire's vision was of economic exploitation (at the parallel of a gun) not of racial replacement. [1] https://www.orwellfoundation.com/the-orwell-foundation/orwel...

When economic exploitation didn't work (the americas) they killed off the populace and replaced it with workers they could exploit (africans). What is that other than racial replacement?

Re: George Orwell’s 1940 Review of Mein Kampf

#513

Post by hedora »

tasty_freeze wrote: post #415
superb-owl wrote: post #9

> Hitler, because in his own joyless mind he feels it with exceptional strength, knows that human beings don’t only want comfort, safety, short working-hours, hygiene, birth-control and, in general, common sense; they also, at least intermittently, want struggle and self-sacrifice This fact has been the downfall of every utopian ideology, and ignoring creates a vacuum that fascist regimes readily fill. I wonder what…

The funny thing is we are facing a deep crisis that will require sacrifice and huge effort, but 50% of the country claims it's a hoax and the other 50% accept the problem but are whistling past the graveyard. I speak, of course, about climate change. We have had a century of millions of people worldwide working ferociously and spending tens of billions of dollars every year to extract coal and oil for profit. To fix…

A tiny minority claims climate change is a hoax at this point.

Unfortunately, that tiny minority controls the Senate, and now the Supreme Court.

Re: George Orwell’s 1940 Review of Mein Kampf

#514

Post by soperj »

fumblebee wrote: post #75
soperj wrote: post #44

Quoted post unavailable.

AFAIK: the British Empire caused much suffering, but your comment is a blatant fabrication of it operated. For example, the British East India Company succeeded in gaining control in India not through war, but by striking deals with (or strong arming) local rulers and land owning elite, whom they rarely interfered with directly but instead used them for collecting taxes and enforcing law and order. The size of the Br…

It isn't. They operated whichever way worked, whether that was hooking a country on opium (China), or wiping out the population and rounding up the rest into camps on undesirable land(Americas). There's also the Boer war.

Re: George Orwell’s 1940 Review of Mein Kampf

#515

Post by anigbrowl »

ixtli wrote: post #502
anigbrowl wrote: post #429

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which means your institution has been captured.

All correct. It’s a real shame because there was a more subtly disconcerting thing where if you look at the Jewish groups Corbyn did spend time with, and compare them to the few Jewish leaders who supported the antisemitism claims … you start to see a picture of what you have to think to be accepted into the halls of government as a Jewish person. It’s disconcerting.

I don't keep up with UK politics that well and wasn't aware of this report, so thanks to you both for these insights, that's useful perspective.

Re: George Orwell’s 1940 Review of Mein Kampf

#516

Post by MichaelMoser123 »

helge9210 wrote: post #269
MichaelMoser123 wrote: post #240

Orwell omitted a few details: Hitler never had a majority in the Reichstag/german parliament - he benefited from the enmity between the Social democrats and the Communist. I mean a popular front, like in France of 1936 would have stopped them. The German soial dems and communist were mortal enemies, because the social dems shot a lot of communists in the aftermath of the Kapp putsch. Also Hitler had the massive suppo…

> he benefited from the enmity between the Social democrats and the Communist To support Hitler Stalin ordered German Communists to not join forces with Social Democrats.

that's true. On the other hand: when the nazis came to power the communists were advocating for a generals strike, whereas the SPD leaders were staunchly against it.

in German: https://www.gewerkschaftsgeschichte.de/1933-konflikt-ueber-d...

now both parties took part in a general strike in 1920 against the Kapp putsch, and that was the end of the coup attempt.

It all could have been averted, I think people exaggerate the strength of the NSDAP in march 1933. They were already on a downturn, when they took power - in terms of the popular vote. It is possible that they would not have mattered, half a year later.

Re: George Orwell’s 1940 Review of Mein Kampf

#517

Post by [deleted] »

helloworld11 wrote: post #414

>Probably, in Hitler's own mind, the Russo-German Pact represents no more than an alteration of time-table. The plan laid down in Mein Kampf was to smash Russia first, with the implied intention of smashing England afterwards. Now, as it has turned out, England has got to be dealt with first, because Russia was the more easily bribed of the two. But Russia's turn will come when England is out of the picture—that, no…

[deleted]

Re: George Orwell’s 1940 Review of Mein Kampf

#518

Post by megablast »

tomkat0789 wrote: post #30

I think he highlights some fundamentally toxic aspects of human nature with this bit: “The Socialist who finds his children playing with soldiers is usually upset, but he is never able to think of a substitute for the tin soldiers; tin pacifists somehow won’t do.” The engineer in me wishes we could substitute the soldiers with construction workers or something, but I can’t deny enjoying war games growing up. These da…

So, Bob the builder??

Re: George Orwell’s 1940 Review of Mein Kampf

#519

Post by hackerlight »

dalbasal wrote: post #334
rossdavidh wrote: post #186

So, there's a lot to be said about Hitler and fascism and propaganda and all the other fascinating topics Orwell brings up here, but I'd just like to point out how routinely excellent Orwell's analysis is. Of course I mostly see the best bits brought out and dusted off, no doubt he did mediocre stuff as well, but it is worth noticing how often it turns out that Orwell, nearly a century on, still has plenty in his wri…

Yes. There are spots where Orwell gets convoluted. His famous and impactful (on me, lol) essay "On Nationalism" includes a confusing/backtracking carve-out for (presumably) Churchillian patriotism. But I think this is the nature of such ideas. They aren't absolute, falsifiable, scientific ideas. Just observations about people.

Why did you see this as confusing and convoluted? My interpretation is that he's saying the human psyche requires this and if a tame and healthy version of patriotism and national pride isn't provided by the centrist elements in society, then that vacuum will be filled by a populist demagogue who weaponizes it. It seems debatable but highly plausible.

Re: George Orwell’s 1940 Review of Mein Kampf

#520

Post by hackerlight »

khazhoux wrote: post #449
dcolkitt wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The counterpoint is that regional support for the Nazis generally indicates the opposite. Their weakest electoral performance was in the West and South, which generally was the wealthiest and most liberal part of Germany. By contrast their base of support was the Prussian hinterlands which was already the most militaristic part of the country to begin with, as well as having a weak region economy. I think it’s under-…

> I think it’s under-appreciated how much the rise of the Nazis was a direct result of Germany’s loss in World War One FWIW I thought this was very widely understood as a leading cause.

Yes, if anything it's over-appreciated in public consciousness.

The Russian revolution and the Great Depression were also crucially important events that explain the rise of the Nazis.

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