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To: betty boop; Stultis
[the genesis of Hitler's race policies]

Stultis: The point of Nazi race policy was to restore the original created order: to restore the purity of the blood and thereby the purity of the racial soul. This had nothing to do with evolution, but to the extent you can put it in those terms the purpose of the Nazis was not to advance evolution, but to reverse it.

Indeed, I challenge anyone to show where any of Hitler, Rosenberg, Himmler et al ever advanced the thought that Jews and Aryans shared a common ancestor. I don't think it's useful to call someone an "evolutionist" if they don't accept the common ancesry of all people.

betty boop: You miss my point here, Stultis. The fundamental claim of the Nazi ideologists was that man could decide, respecting his fellow men, who was "fit" and who was not. And therefore, what living beings were privileged to continue in a living state, and which were not. Whatever "excuse" the Fascist makes to support his claim -- the recovery of a "lost" Eden, the construction of a perfect utopia in spacetime reality, whatever -- is almost entirely beside the point. That's the PR angle designed to smokescreen the reality that is actually taking place, to give it an ersatz "justification." At this level of description of the problem, you are looking at pure B.S....

The only way to justify such a scheme of things is on the basis of power: We might say "species" power. For Hitler's theory of racial superiority rested on the consensus of a "favored species," determining the fate of the lesser-favored species effectively at its whim. The notion of "survival of the fittest" excuse was paramount, even if shall we say not evident from first principles.

Hitler thought his destiny was, among other things, to free Germany of the Jews. This, he thought, would be good for public morals (ridding the Reich of syphilis and porn), the economy, and the purity of Aryan blood. Why did this platform win elections in Germany? I claim it had a lot more to do with Martin Luther than Darwin. In fact, I bet you can't find a single snti-Semitic statement from Darwin, but there are plenty from Luther.

452 posted on 09/24/2006 8:07:16 PM PDT by Virginia-American (What do you call an honest creationist? An evolutionist.)
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To: Virginia-American

When I first found FR someone told me that if I followed a thread long enough eventually a mention of Hitler would appear regardless of the actual topic. I guess they were right.


457 posted on 09/24/2006 8:11:48 PM PDT by SoldierDad (Proud Father of an American Soldier)
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To: Virginia-American

Note that Hitler, Rosemberg, etc., also were against Gypsies, Slavs, Homosexuals, and other supposedly lower forms of life.


477 posted on 09/24/2006 8:23:52 PM PDT by Doctor Stochastic (Vegetabilisch = chaotisch ist der Charakter der Modernen. - Friedrich Schlegel)
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To: Virginia-American
You must first examine Luthern's supposed anti-semitic remarks in light of what else was going on at the time.

Once you do that you may apply a simple test ~ was he referring to the hierarchy of the Catholic church as "Jews" or was he referring to "Jews" as "Jews"?

You'll quickly find that Luther, like many other Protestant reformers, found themselves living in little countries where the head of state had a brother, sister, or other close relative in a religious order, or maybe even had a relative who was of high rank in the hierarchy.

In those cases they could find their heads lopped off for speaking ill of their local prince's family.

Sometimes the local ruler was of 2 or more minds about the Reformation, so it was best to speak ill of "Jews" (even if there were none in the kingdom) than to risk serious political problems.

In particular where a reformer speaks ill of the way Jews conduct the mass, I'd be leery of pronouncing such a statement as "antisemitic" ~ more likely it's political.

480 posted on 09/24/2006 8:27:04 PM PDT by muawiyah
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To: Virginia-American
Oh, yeah, Luther rarely gave any sermons in the 1930s, so you'll have to be satisfied with Hitler as the primary source of anti-semitic literature during that period.

We must also note that Hitler didn't think highly of Lutherans anyway, and he, himself, was not a Lutheran.

482 posted on 09/24/2006 8:28:35 PM PDT by muawiyah
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