Thursday, November 24, 2011

Which Strategies Did Hitler Use to Strengthen His Propaganda?

     On January the 2nd of 1939, Time magazine published their annual “Man of the Year Issue”, on the cover of it, was Adolf Hitler. The cover showed Adolf Hitler, playing on an organ whilst victims dangled on a St. Catherine’s wheel. Adolf Hitler, which became the Chancellor of Germany on January 30th 1933, was elected “Man of the Year” and “The Most Influential Person” of 1938. In just about 4 years, Adolf Hitler reduced the number of unemployment from 6 to one million. The people were influenced by Hitler’s and the Nazi’s propaganda which was very popular at the time.

After the Wall Street Crash in 1929, the Nazi party got 107 seats in the 1930 elections, which made up for 18% of the votes, making them the second largest party in Germany. 2 years later, the party would become the largest political party in Germany, winning the elections with 37% of the votes, which made up to 230 seats in the parliament. But how have Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party, with the help of Reich Minister Joseph Goebbels succeeded to influence the German citizens in to voting for the Nazi party?

"Propaganda attempts to force a doctrine on the whole people... Propaganda works on the general public from the standpoint of an idea and makes them ripe for the victory of this idea.” those were the words that came out of Adolf Hitler’s mouth and simply showed how important propaganda seemed to be for Hitler. Propaganda helped Hitler get to power and made him to one of the most influential people of the 20th century.

After being appointed Chancellor, Hitler set up the Reich Chamber of Commerce which gave him and the Nazi party the rights to all types of Medias, such as literature, films, radio stations, art and various other Medias. Through these three means of propaganda: posters, films, and education, Hitler was able to consolidate his position as the Fuhrer, and gain new supporters.
Education also played an important role in Hitler’s propaganda plans. Many teachers in the Nazi regime were members of the “Nazi Teacher’s Association”. In the “Nazi Teacher’s Association, teachers were trained to teach their students according to the Nazi curriculum, which enabled the Nazis to control what was being taught in school classes. Under the Nazi regime, “Hitler Youth” an after school activity was very popular amongst younger boys.

The most effective technique employed by Adolf Hitler and Joseph Goebbels was the theory of the “Big Lie”. False information was told to the public, but what made it believable was that it was repeated so often. In the end, the statement wouldn’t turn out as a lie, but as a truth which people would then believe in. The German citizen believed in the lies told told to be the truth and then didn't believe the actual truth which was told by the other parties. With the "Big Lie", Hitler famously accused the "Jews" of using this very technique.

Hitler and the Nazi party formed the “Gaue system”, where Germany would be divided in 37 Gaues (regions). Under each 37 regional leaders, there was a district leader, then under him a suburban leader, then a cell leader and finally a block leader. The Nazi party organized an idea of propaganda which they hoped was going to work, but it didn’t. In the elections of 1928, The Nazi party won 12 seats, which considered 1,6 % of the votes. This made them the second smallest party in Germany. All this hard work seemed like it was worth nothing in the end, but in the later years, the “Gaue system” did help Nazi party in terms of spreading out their words and ideas to the German population.

The depression helped the Nazi party a lot. The depression allowed new parties with new ideas to come up at the front of the political debates. Germans were desperate for new ideas and saw the Nazi party as a glimpse of new hope that they lost for the other parties. Until the 1930’s, the Germans were enthusiastic about new ideas the Nazi party had, but soon Hitler built up a system based on fear to have everybody’s votes, also during his rallies for the presidential elections.

Many low classed people started supporting the Nazi party, people were unemployed because of the Wall Street Crash and Hitler started campaigning for the presidential elections in 1932. He got 13 million votes, that couldn’t beat Hindenburg’s 19 million votes, but even though he lost the election, it gave a big image for him and his party. The reason why he got so many votes is because Hitler knew and understood the people’s problems and they knew he was their man. 

Hitler realized what a good way to get many votes was, and this was to target farmers in his speeches. No other mainstream parties targeted them and made their problems a priority; Hitler saw it as a good chance to get votes. The German farmers had been experiencing economic problems since 1926 and the Nazi party was the only party, to listen to the farmers problems and to make promises to them. It wasn't only that, the Nazi party also used propaganda to get attention from the farmers, such as posters and billboards. Heinrich Heine said this sentence: “Cowards are born in towns; heroes are born in the countryside!” making farmers feel like they were important. The Nazis also said that the farmers were “the blood spring of the German nation”.

In conclusion, Adolf Hitler used propaganda to his good use in a non-good way. Hitler also used the bad situations such as the Wall Street Crash and the depression to his advantage and grew popular, but he also manipulated people by switching the school’s education system to a Nazi regime education and used the “Big Lie” to make people believe false information and discriminate other “races”. By the end of the Second World War the German population saw what happened to their country and after seeing their country turning into ashes again for the second time in 30 years, many German people regretted following Adolf Hitler’s ideas and movement which were thought to be successful at the time.

Words: 1041

Bibliography:

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_did_Hitler_use_propaganda_to_control_the_German_people
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Lie
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adolf_Hitler
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazism
http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/GERunemployment.htm

Monday, October 31, 2011

Notre interprétation du monde est-elle correcte ?


Notre interprétation du monde est correcte, mais seulement pour nous-même. Quelqu’un d’autre n’aurait pas la même interprétation que nous.
Ce sont nos yeux qui voient et ce sont nos propres yeux qu’on croit. C’est pour cela que les personnes qui se droguent croient en leurs hallucinations, puisqu’ils croient que nos yeux voient la réalité. S’ils ne seront pas dépendent sur leurs yeux pour être sure de la réalité, ils ne verront peut-être pas d’hallucination.
Nous sommes tous différents, il n’y a pas quelqu’un d’autres sur cette terre qui a l’aire comme nous ou qui ont les même caractéristiques ou savoirs que nous. C’est pour cela qu’il n’y a pas une seule interprétation du monde mais plusieurs.
Peut-être que si tous les 7 milliards d’habitants sur terre auraient la même ADN et savoirs, il y aura une seul interprétation du monde et elle serait surement correcte, au moins pour ces personnes.