Good lord, SAM. You said something sensible.
I respect what Hitler accomplished
- Thread starter oiram
- Start date
That's an assumption.
He might have stood there and thought, "well, the jig is up. No way am I going to get through this alive, and half the world has already made it quite clear what they think of my ideals... so why bother putting myself through the inevitable, to give them a show?" Bam.
Not entirely sure he was that sane by the end, but nonetheless, you don't know.
Hussein? You could see what he thought of his trial process, clear as day. He got caught living in a hole, and maybe he thought that was a bad move.
Getting caught, I mean.
And giving them the show.
Random thought. I'm surprised our conspiracy theorists here haven't yet raised the notion that the Americans found him in the house, dug a hole, put him in it for a couple of days to make him look like Charles Manson having a bad hair day and then dug him out for the cameras. Heh.
*blink*.... it's contagious, isn't it.
Having made your feelings so clear, do you think Kony would consider himself to be in the presence of a "genuine, fair court" were you there?
Why bother holding a trail for him? A nod towards consistency?
"Terribly sorry, old chap, you're as guilty as sin and we're going to do bad things to you. But we must keep up appearances, so take the oath, there's a good lad."
Not that I disagree with your feelings. Just saying don't stamp your motives for suicide on anyone else, or call it cowardice when their thoughts are far different to your own.
We love to place the worst of qualities on those whom we consider insane. It makes it easier, doesn't it.
That's the dumbest thing I have ever heard. If the Nazis had won, then Roosevelt "in chains and defeat" wasn't that right
As I said it is whoever is the victor that is right. Hitler was no more wrong than anyone else, unless you are saying that there is a correct opinion?
Yes there are correct opinions and yours isn't one of them.
He proved how easy it is to make people do evil. We can't really blame him though...I think that those people who supported him and financed all of his doings are the bigger evil of the two. As someone has already mentioned here, Hitler was in jail and wrote a book about his plans. And I'm pretty sure that everybody who supported him pretty much knew what this book was about. In spite of that knowledge they let him reach the top without real difficulty. He never hid his true intentions. He was blatantly open about it and in spite of that everyone joined his flow and the surrounding nations let him proceed with his plans until he started to attack them. Just proves that nobody f*cking cared about what he was doing until they got involved themselves.
As for whether it's okay to respect what Hitler accomplished. I don't think that someone whose main accomplishments were destruction, pain and death (etc.) is respect worthy. But that's up to you. I think he was a f*cking moron and I'm not convinced by all the claims about his above average intelligence either.
As for whether it's okay to respect what Hitler accomplished. I don't think that someone whose main accomplishments were destruction, pain and death (etc.) is respect worthy. But that's up to you. I think he was a f*cking moron and I'm not convinced by all the claims about his above average intelligence either.
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Laughable
Actually, sir, that is among the dumbest things I've ever heard.
We don't hear it much, but once in a while, someone will say something like, "If we didn't firebomb Dresden, we might all be speaking German." And the thing is that the best victory Hitler stood to win was in Europe. The thought of the Nazis crossing the ocean with a large army and occupying the United States is nothing short of hilarious. Germany is all of 137,858 m[sup]2[/sup] (357,000 km[sup]2[/sup]), which is slightly smaller than Montana (147,138 m[sup]2[/sup]; 381,087 km[sup]2[/sup]). In 1939, its population was 80.6 million. By contrast, the United States through WWII was 2,891,948 m[sup]2[/sup], and its 1940 population was 132,164,569. The thought that the Nazis could invade, win, and occupy the continental U.S. is laughable. To paraphrase Patrick Henry: "One hundred thirty million people, armed in the holy cause of liberty, and in such a country as that we possess, are invincible by any force which our enemy can send us."
The idea of Roosevelt in chains and defeat is ridiculous. At worst, he would have been humiliated in bringing home what remained of our forces with his tail between his legs.
Depends on the victory. If Hitler had won Europe and wished to indict Roosevelt or Truman, well, he would be welcome to try to enforce it.
We did Dreseden with conventional fire. And we also did Hiroshima and Nagasaki with atomic fire. If it came right down to it, we would have erased Germany from the map. Not that I, personally, like the idea of A-bombing anyone, but it's quite clear we were willing to do so, and if we thought we had to, we would have glassed Germany.
Yes, actually he was. And yes, actually there is. Even Hitler himself appealed to justice. Like everyone else, he appealed to an abstraction. And even more than most, his idea of what that abstraction equaled was simply wrong.
Norsefire said:
Actually, sir, that is among the dumbest things I've ever heard.
We don't hear it much, but once in a while, someone will say something like, "If we didn't firebomb Dresden, we might all be speaking German." And the thing is that the best victory Hitler stood to win was in Europe. The thought of the Nazis crossing the ocean with a large army and occupying the United States is nothing short of hilarious. Germany is all of 137,858 m[sup]2[/sup] (357,000 km[sup]2[/sup]), which is slightly smaller than Montana (147,138 m[sup]2[/sup]; 381,087 km[sup]2[/sup]). In 1939, its population was 80.6 million. By contrast, the United States through WWII was 2,891,948 m[sup]2[/sup], and its 1940 population was 132,164,569. The thought that the Nazis could invade, win, and occupy the continental U.S. is laughable. To paraphrase Patrick Henry: "One hundred thirty million people, armed in the holy cause of liberty, and in such a country as that we possess, are invincible by any force which our enemy can send us."
The idea of Roosevelt in chains and defeat is ridiculous. At worst, he would have been humiliated in bringing home what remained of our forces with his tail between his legs.
Depends on the victory. If Hitler had won Europe and wished to indict Roosevelt or Truman, well, he would be welcome to try to enforce it.
We did Dreseden with conventional fire. And we also did Hiroshima and Nagasaki with atomic fire. If it came right down to it, we would have erased Germany from the map. Not that I, personally, like the idea of A-bombing anyone, but it's quite clear we were willing to do so, and if we thought we had to, we would have glassed Germany.
Yes, actually he was. And yes, actually there is. Even Hitler himself appealed to justice. Like everyone else, he appealed to an abstraction. And even more than most, his idea of what that abstraction equaled was simply wrong.
Tiassa you miss the point. I don't care if the Germans lacked the capacity to beat the Americans, that wasn't the point. The point is IF they had won then it would be the Americans that are "evil and wrong". Hitler is no more wrong than anyone else, he simply lost.
And because of the might of the United States, Germany was wrong. It is as simple as that. Mere opinion is what the entire world of politics comes down to, and then it's up to whoever is strongest to enforce their opinion on everyone else.
Hitler wasn't evil or wrong............to himself. In his own eyes. It is only in yours.
If you cannot see such a simple point, then this debate is going no where; surely you understand the concept of opinion? You are free to think that what Hitler did and thought was wrong.........but that's your opinion.
And you are free to believe in justice, just like you are free to believe in God and the tooth fairy........but that's your belief, and in the end there is no objective justice, no matter how much your wishful thinking wants it to be so.
And because of the might of the United States, Germany was wrong. It is as simple as that. Mere opinion is what the entire world of politics comes down to, and then it's up to whoever is strongest to enforce their opinion on everyone else.
Hitler wasn't evil or wrong............to himself. In his own eyes. It is only in yours.
If you cannot see such a simple point, then this debate is going no where; surely you understand the concept of opinion? You are free to think that what Hitler did and thought was wrong.........but that's your opinion.
And you are free to believe in justice, just like you are free to believe in God and the tooth fairy........but that's your belief, and in the end there is no objective justice, no matter how much your wishful thinking wants it to be so.
To put on a show, at least
Psychologically, it amounts to the same thing. Why bother putting himself through the inevitable? Specifically to put on a show.
And, for the record, in pardoning the surviving members of the Haymarket Eight, Governor John P. Altgeld of Illinois noted a packed jury and the horrendous bias of the presiding judge, among other problems with the trials; Emma Goldman accuses that the judge himself said, "Not because you have caused the Haymarket bomb, but because you are Anarchists, you are on trial", and Altgeld noted in his pardon that, "page after page of the record contains insinuating remarks of the judge", and "the state's attorney often took his cue from the judge's remarks". Altgeld had decided all eight were innocent, but Michael Schwab, Samuel Fielden, and Oscar Neebe were the only ones remaining that could be saved.
Lingg did eventually kill himself, on the night before his execution. On November 11, 1887, August Spies, Albert Parsons, Adolph Fischer, and George Engel were led to the gallows. Before he died in a botched hanging, Spies told the assembled masses: "The time will come when our silence will be more powerful than the voices you strangle today!"
In 1887, Voltairine de Cleyre declared publicly of the Haymarket convicts, "They ought to be hanged!" In 1901, speaking at a memorial for the martyrs, she said,
It was the Haymarket atrocity that changed her mind. Because of that trial, she abandoned her belief "in the essential Justice of the American law and trial by jury". Perhaps Lingg should have stuck around. He botched his suicide, anyway, and suffered for six hours before passing. The sight of the Haymarket Martyrs twitching and suffering in the gallows said more to those assembled than any of the executed ever could with words.
Emma Goldman, in 1934, wrote of the trial and executions, "This judicial crime left an indelible mark on my mind and heart and sent me forth to acquaint myself with the ideal for which these men had died so heroically. I dedicated myself to their cause."
August Spies was right.
It doesn't really matter if Kony thinks it's fair. I'm an American, and in our prisons you can find plenty of people who say they were screwed by the courts. And some of them were. But most of them weren't. That's why I used the word "genuine". The point is to get it right. And when you have someone as guilty as Kony, there is even less excuse for botching the process than the no excuse that usually applies.
Propriety? Good faith? Because in my fucked up version of justice, everyone, no matter how guilty they actually are, deserves a fair trial? I'm an American; that principle is at the heart of our justice system, even if we do screw it up on a regular basis.
Again, being an American, I have no reason to demand that Kony testify. If he wants to, he will. If not, then he won't.
I believe in looking beyond the superficial. Psychologically speaking—
—is an ego defense, rationalization. In that sense, I'm not attributing to Hitler anything unique. Everyone rationalizes to some degree.
Actually, I consider insanity a mitigating factor. And, as I said, rationalization is common. Given that people have killed themselves over guilt for far lesser offenses—and, in some cases, imagined offenses—it doesn't seem so great a stretch. Indeed, I would go so far as to suggest that our revulsion toward the scale of Hitler's crimes distorts our perception of his human behavior.
_____________________
Notes:
Lingg, Louis. "Address to the Court". May 4, 1886. History Matters. HistoryMatters.gmu.edu. Accessed June 23, 2009. http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/45/
Altgeld, John P. "Reasons for Pardoning". June 26, 1893. University of Missouri at Kansas City. law.umkc.edu. Accessed June 23, 2009. http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/haymarket/pardon.html
Goldman, Emma. "The Psychology of Political Violence". Anarchism and Other Essays. 2nd rev. ed. New York & London: Mother Earth Publishing Association, 1911. Anarchy Archives. dwardmac.pitzer.edu. Accessed June 26, 2009. http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/Anarchist_Archives/goldman/aando/psychofpolvio.html
—————. "Was My Life Worth Living?" Harper's Monthly, v. CLXX. December, 1934. The Emma Goldman Papers. sunsite.berkeley.edu. Accessed June 26, 2009. http://sunsite.berkeley.edu/Goldman/Writings/Essays/lifework.html
Wikipedia. "Haymarket affair". Wikipedia.com. Accessed June 26, 2009. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haymarket_affair
International Anarchist Publishing Committee of America. "Introduction". Anarchism and American Traditions. 1932. Anarchy Archives. dwardmac.pitzer.edu. Accessed June 26, 2009. http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/Anarchist_Archives/bright/cleyre/amertrad.html
Heffner, Christopher L. Psychology 101. April 1, 2001. AllPsych Online. AllPsych.com. Accessed June 26, 2009. http://allpsych.com/psychology101/defenses.html
Meursalt said:
Psychologically, it amounts to the same thing. Why bother putting himself through the inevitable? Specifically to put on a show.
Court of Justice! With the same irony with which you have regarded my efforts to win in this “free land of America,” a livelihood such as humankind is worthy to enjoy, do you now, after condemning me to death, concede me the liberty of making a final speech.
I accept your concession; but it is only for the purpose of exposing the injustice, the calumnies and the outrages which have been heaped upon me.
You have accused me of murder, and convicted me: What proof have you brought that I am guilty?
In the first place, you have brought this fellow Seliger to testify against me. Him I have helped to make bombs, and you have further proven that with the assistance of another, I took those bombs to No. 58 Clybourn avenue, but what you have not proven—even with the assistance of your bought “squealer,” Seliger, who would appear to have acted such a prominent part in the affair—is that any of those bombs were taken to the haymarket.
A couple of chemists also, have been brought here as specialists, yet they could only state that the metal of which the haymarket bomb was made bore a certain resemblance to those bombs of mine, and your Mr. Ingham has vainly endeavored to deny that the bombs were quite different. He had to admit that there was a difference of a full half inch in their diameters, although he suppressed the fact that there was also a difference of a quarter of an inch in the thickness of the shell. This is the kind of evidence upon which you have convicted me.
It is not murder, however, of which you have convicted me. The judge has stated that much only this morning in his resume of the case, and Grinnell has repeatedly asserted that we were being tried not for murder, but for anarchy, so the condemnation is—that I am an anarchist! ....
(Louis Lingg)
I accept your concession; but it is only for the purpose of exposing the injustice, the calumnies and the outrages which have been heaped upon me.
You have accused me of murder, and convicted me: What proof have you brought that I am guilty?
In the first place, you have brought this fellow Seliger to testify against me. Him I have helped to make bombs, and you have further proven that with the assistance of another, I took those bombs to No. 58 Clybourn avenue, but what you have not proven—even with the assistance of your bought “squealer,” Seliger, who would appear to have acted such a prominent part in the affair—is that any of those bombs were taken to the haymarket.
A couple of chemists also, have been brought here as specialists, yet they could only state that the metal of which the haymarket bomb was made bore a certain resemblance to those bombs of mine, and your Mr. Ingham has vainly endeavored to deny that the bombs were quite different. He had to admit that there was a difference of a full half inch in their diameters, although he suppressed the fact that there was also a difference of a quarter of an inch in the thickness of the shell. This is the kind of evidence upon which you have convicted me.
It is not murder, however, of which you have convicted me. The judge has stated that much only this morning in his resume of the case, and Grinnell has repeatedly asserted that we were being tried not for murder, but for anarchy, so the condemnation is—that I am an anarchist! ....
(Louis Lingg)
And, for the record, in pardoning the surviving members of the Haymarket Eight, Governor John P. Altgeld of Illinois noted a packed jury and the horrendous bias of the presiding judge, among other problems with the trials; Emma Goldman accuses that the judge himself said, "Not because you have caused the Haymarket bomb, but because you are Anarchists, you are on trial", and Altgeld noted in his pardon that, "page after page of the record contains insinuating remarks of the judge", and "the state's attorney often took his cue from the judge's remarks". Altgeld had decided all eight were innocent, but Michael Schwab, Samuel Fielden, and Oscar Neebe were the only ones remaining that could be saved.
Lingg did eventually kill himself, on the night before his execution. On November 11, 1887, August Spies, Albert Parsons, Adolph Fischer, and George Engel were led to the gallows. Before he died in a botched hanging, Spies told the assembled masses: "The time will come when our silence will be more powerful than the voices you strangle today!"
In 1887, Voltairine de Cleyre declared publicly of the Haymarket convicts, "They ought to be hanged!" In 1901, speaking at a memorial for the martyrs, she said,
"For that ignorant, outrageous, blood-thirsty sentence I shall never forgive myself, though I know the dead men would have forgiven me, though I know those who loved them forgive me. But my own voice, as it sounded that night, will sound so in my ears 'til I die—a bitter reproach and a shame. I have only one word of extenuation for myself and the millions of others who did as I did that night—ignorance."
(IAPCA)
(IAPCA)
It was the Haymarket atrocity that changed her mind. Because of that trial, she abandoned her belief "in the essential Justice of the American law and trial by jury". Perhaps Lingg should have stuck around. He botched his suicide, anyway, and suffered for six hours before passing. The sight of the Haymarket Martyrs twitching and suffering in the gallows said more to those assembled than any of the executed ever could with words.
Emma Goldman, in 1934, wrote of the trial and executions, "This judicial crime left an indelible mark on my mind and heart and sent me forth to acquaint myself with the ideal for which these men had died so heroically. I dedicated myself to their cause."
August Spies was right.
It doesn't really matter if Kony thinks it's fair. I'm an American, and in our prisons you can find plenty of people who say they were screwed by the courts. And some of them were. But most of them weren't. That's why I used the word "genuine". The point is to get it right. And when you have someone as guilty as Kony, there is even less excuse for botching the process than the no excuse that usually applies.
Propriety? Good faith? Because in my fucked up version of justice, everyone, no matter how guilty they actually are, deserves a fair trial? I'm an American; that principle is at the heart of our justice system, even if we do screw it up on a regular basis.
Again, being an American, I have no reason to demand that Kony testify. If he wants to, he will. If not, then he won't.
I believe in looking beyond the superficial. Psychologically speaking—
"No way am I going to get through this alive, and half the world has already made it quite clear what they think of my ideals... so why bother putting myself through the inevitable, to give them a show?"
—is an ego defense, rationalization. In that sense, I'm not attributing to Hitler anything unique. Everyone rationalizes to some degree.
Actually, I consider insanity a mitigating factor. And, as I said, rationalization is common. Given that people have killed themselves over guilt for far lesser offenses—and, in some cases, imagined offenses—it doesn't seem so great a stretch. Indeed, I would go so far as to suggest that our revulsion toward the scale of Hitler's crimes distorts our perception of his human behavior.
_____________________
Notes:
Lingg, Louis. "Address to the Court". May 4, 1886. History Matters. HistoryMatters.gmu.edu. Accessed June 23, 2009. http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/45/
Altgeld, John P. "Reasons for Pardoning". June 26, 1893. University of Missouri at Kansas City. law.umkc.edu. Accessed June 23, 2009. http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/haymarket/pardon.html
Goldman, Emma. "The Psychology of Political Violence". Anarchism and Other Essays. 2nd rev. ed. New York & London: Mother Earth Publishing Association, 1911. Anarchy Archives. dwardmac.pitzer.edu. Accessed June 26, 2009. http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/Anarchist_Archives/goldman/aando/psychofpolvio.html
—————. "Was My Life Worth Living?" Harper's Monthly, v. CLXX. December, 1934. The Emma Goldman Papers. sunsite.berkeley.edu. Accessed June 26, 2009. http://sunsite.berkeley.edu/Goldman/Writings/Essays/lifework.html
Wikipedia. "Haymarket affair". Wikipedia.com. Accessed June 26, 2009. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haymarket_affair
International Anarchist Publishing Committee of America. "Introduction". Anarchism and American Traditions. 1932. Anarchy Archives. dwardmac.pitzer.edu. Accessed June 26, 2009. http://dwardmac.pitzer.edu/Anarchist_Archives/bright/cleyre/amertrad.html
Heffner, Christopher L. Psychology 101. April 1, 2001. AllPsych Online. AllPsych.com. Accessed June 26, 2009. http://allpsych.com/psychology101/defenses.html
(Insert Title Here)
Incorrect. Had Hitler won, the best outcome would have been inconclusive. To wit:
And you are free to your nihilistic abandonment of humanity, but that does not change the fact that human institutions consistently appeal to an idyll called "justice", no matter how much your wishful thinking wants it to be so.
Indeed, I find myself recalling an earlier post in our discussion:
And, yes, I'm aware of your response to that point. But I only come back to my opinion of that:
Don't take me wrongly here: I fully support your right to roll over and offer up. But such a surrender undermines anything else you have to say on the point of justice.
And nonetheless, the problem with your if is that it is entirely unrealistic. You might as well point out that if Equatorial Guinea conquered the United States ....
The might of the United States? Yeah, you're right. The resolve of the British had nothing to do with it. The French Resistance played no part. The Jews who fought in Lithuania and Poland didn't contribute a damn thing. And, most of all, the twenty-three million Soviet lives given to the war, the 13.7% of their population destroyed ... none of them are worth considering?
"He genuinly was efficient and intelligent," you wrote earlier in this thread. Yet he invited the United States to the dance. Just how smart was that?
It is also my opinion—and, frankly, I think a reasonable fact—that Hitler was a human being. You are the one who wishes to exempt him from human consideration.
To reiterate:
Your argument inherently proposes that sociopathy or psychopathy can establish propriety. After all, if Hitler wasn't evil or wrong to his own outlook, no wonder you disdain the notion of justice. But if someone whose socialization processes are so dangerously retarded as Hitler's would have to be in order to validate your argument is deemed capable of making value judgments? That's a difficult proposition in and of itself.
It is worth reiterating at this point that the late Dr. Hervey M. Cleckly, an American psychiatric pioneer who wrote the literary standard on psychopathy, cannot reconcile Hitler with the psychopath. Quite clearly there was something wrong with him, but perhaps it was simple, nihilistic despair.
Norsefire said:
Incorrect. Had Hitler won, the best outcome would have been inconclusive. To wit:
And you are free to your nihilistic abandonment of humanity, but that does not change the fact that human institutions consistently appeal to an idyll called "justice", no matter how much your wishful thinking wants it to be so.
Indeed, I find myself recalling an earlier post in our discussion:
That we have not yet realized that justice is no reason to surrender to tyranny and hatred.
Perhaps that is a fundamental difference between how you and I view the world.
Perhaps that is a fundamental difference between how you and I view the world.
And, yes, I'm aware of your response to that point. But I only come back to my opinion of that:
So maybe it's easier to just throw our hands up and say, "There is no justice." Perhaps it brings some ephemeral satisfaction to condemn our species to madness at best. But it is a surrender. It is a self-fulfillng prophecy: If we abandon the search for justice, we will never find it.
Don't take me wrongly here: I fully support your right to roll over and offer up. But such a surrender undermines anything else you have to say on the point of justice.
And nonetheless, the problem with your if is that it is entirely unrealistic. You might as well point out that if Equatorial Guinea conquered the United States ....
The might of the United States? Yeah, you're right. The resolve of the British had nothing to do with it. The French Resistance played no part. The Jews who fought in Lithuania and Poland didn't contribute a damn thing. And, most of all, the twenty-three million Soviet lives given to the war, the 13.7% of their population destroyed ... none of them are worth considering?
"He genuinly was efficient and intelligent," you wrote earlier in this thread. Yet he invited the United States to the dance. Just how smart was that?
It is also my opinion—and, frankly, I think a reasonable fact—that Hitler was a human being. You are the one who wishes to exempt him from human consideration.
To reiterate:
One of the keys to recognizing that antipathy toward Jews was originally political is to simply note that Hitler is an unusual figure in a certain regard: He was not part of the master race he appealed to. It would be a bit like the KKK having a Bengali man as its leader while going lynching and looting against blacks. Think of creation myths. Who the hell says, "In the beginning, God made those people over there, and favors them the most, and considers us of lower worth and priority."
There is always a possible romantic notion about any human being who does such evil things, that one day he woke up and realized the situation was out of hand, and in blind self-preservation pressed forward as the only direction he could figure to go. While it's easy enough to imagine that once upon a time, Ann Coulter wrote and said some really funny things, and one day realized her entire reputation was built on libel and bullshit, and thus decided the only thing she could do was keep going and see how far she could take it, the degree to which romantic tyranny can excuse itself by such an explanation is much smaller. Ann Coulter, to our knowledge, has never killed or ordered the killing of anyone. Hitler, on the other hand, presided over one of the most ghastly acts in human history. In terms of whether Hitler should be admired or respected for what he achieved, this depiction of the man would say no, because he was weak and foolish.
In the end, if he truly believed it was to the greater good, it was because he had no choice but to believe it. Still, though, if he genuinely believed it, he would not have fled into oblivion.
There is always a possible romantic notion about any human being who does such evil things, that one day he woke up and realized the situation was out of hand, and in blind self-preservation pressed forward as the only direction he could figure to go. While it's easy enough to imagine that once upon a time, Ann Coulter wrote and said some really funny things, and one day realized her entire reputation was built on libel and bullshit, and thus decided the only thing she could do was keep going and see how far she could take it, the degree to which romantic tyranny can excuse itself by such an explanation is much smaller. Ann Coulter, to our knowledge, has never killed or ordered the killing of anyone. Hitler, on the other hand, presided over one of the most ghastly acts in human history. In terms of whether Hitler should be admired or respected for what he achieved, this depiction of the man would say no, because he was weak and foolish.
In the end, if he truly believed it was to the greater good, it was because he had no choice but to believe it. Still, though, if he genuinely believed it, he would not have fled into oblivion.
Your argument inherently proposes that sociopathy or psychopathy can establish propriety. After all, if Hitler wasn't evil or wrong to his own outlook, no wonder you disdain the notion of justice. But if someone whose socialization processes are so dangerously retarded as Hitler's would have to be in order to validate your argument is deemed capable of making value judgments? That's a difficult proposition in and of itself.
It is worth reiterating at this point that the late Dr. Hervey M. Cleckly, an American psychiatric pioneer who wrote the literary standard on psychopathy, cannot reconcile Hitler with the psychopath. Quite clearly there was something wrong with him, but perhaps it was simple, nihilistic despair.
Had Hitler won, the outcome would've been a Nazi Empire. Nothing less. Whether or not this empire would have lasted is a question without an answer, although certainly the American empire will not last either, in the long run.
Nihilism? You mean "seeing the world for what it is"? That's nihilism.
And further of course there are institutions pursuing justice, I have no doubt. Justice, the concept of justice, is an important part of civilized society; you miss my point, once again. My point is that there is not OBJECTIVE justice, it's up to a matter of opinion and consensus. No one, though, is truly "right" or "wrong".
There is no objective justice. Perhaps I should've said that instead. There is no objective justice. There is our opinion on justice, where you have yours and I have mine. A simple matter, really.
My if merely was to show a point: the strongest is the one that determines justice. Thus, justice does exist.......as an opinion. That is a fact. Justice, like right and wrong, is an opinion, how can you possibly argue otherwise? It IS an opinion, no matter how popular.
Again you miss the point! Ok, the Soviets and the French and the British and all of them...................my point is the might of the Allied forces is all that made them "right".
Absolutely not. In fact, as a human he perfectly fits into my argument: he is an individual with a certain outlook, and you are also. Neither of you are more right or more wrong than the other, it's merely a matter of opinion.
Or, because he genuinly believed it was for the greater good. Just like I genuinly believed it would be for the 'greater good' if the Semitic race was elevated above all else (which I no longer believe, but that was my opinion at one time).
He saw the Jews and the situation mathematically: the Jews were a nuisance, a problem, and he simply wished to exterminate, to get rid of the problem in the most efficient manner possible, to achieve a desired outcome (i.e, the Nazi empire according to his vision). A simple matter, really.
Note: this is merely what he saw, and I'm not saying I agree with him.
We're all insane in our own right; what makes you any more "right" than he? And regardless, the man was calculated and intelligent. Thusly psychopathy has nothing to do with it, he was in fit enough mind to truly think about what he was doing, and he perceived himself as being right, similarly as the psychopaths of the US gov't believe themselves to be right.
In the end let me sum up my argument in one sentence: all justice is an opinion. And you can't argue against that.
I would say that one could be impressed by what he did but respect is a higher form of regard which implies you admire as well as being impressed.
If you don't admire his accomplishments I would say "respect" isn't the correct term.
Not necessarily.
In many cases, that would indeed be the point of enduring the trial. The final speech, the Great Justification of all an individual has done.
The chance to Speak in one's own defence. Perhaps, even, in the case of those who hold out no hope of redemption or pardon, the opportunity to leave a legacy in the form of words, in the hope that posterity is a little more sympathetic.
You address the point further, here:
Yes, they do.
A rationalisation, Tiassa, is merely an organisation (or re-organisation) of motive in order to make it more sympathetic to one's sense of self.
Such as the reduction of behaviours one finds abhorrent or alien into the category of "defence mechanisms".
Does the use of the word 'defence" seem in any way significant to you?
I could use the same argument. I could say that your insistence on attributing a motive you can understand upon someone else is a rationalisation in itself.
Therefore, you call it an "ego-defence", as though constructing a rationalisation with the purpose of self-justification is artificial... unless it happens to nest comfortably within your own understanding.
Did you mention irony?
Clearly, the concept of an individual who derives little in the sense of self worth or justification from sympathy or pity is alien to you.
In certain cases, the concept of a "fair trial" is ludicrous.
You are advocating the idea that if something does not or can not work reliably and consistently, it should at least give the appearance of doing so.
How comforting that must be.
Of course. You're going to hang him whether he testifies or not. The least the bastard could do is satisfy your curiosity, yes?
You know, I really wish that were true. With your command of language, (usual) organisation of thought and base intellect, you might come up with something truly significant.
Has it ever occurred to you that being a liberal demagogue is a rather limited ambition?
I should warn you that expanding the intellect is a dangerous thing to attempt, though. Ideals are toffee. Stretch them, and you'll find they never regain their former shape.
The true fight is not one for ideals, but to free yourself from them.
Which is, of course, an ideal in itself.
"It would appear my hypocrisy knows no bounds."
- Doc Holliday, "Tombstone".
Oh, now you get it?
To the original post:
No, it is not wrong to acknowledge any good Hitler may have accomplished. It would be childish and intellectually dishonest to pretend he did no good for his country.
But you have to then ask, could any of the good he did for Germany been done without that particular agenda? If not, then the good was an illusion, because it was doomed from the start.
No, it is not wrong to acknowledge any good Hitler may have accomplished. It would be childish and intellectually dishonest to pretend he did no good for his country.
But you have to then ask, could any of the good he did for Germany been done without that particular agenda? If not, then the good was an illusion, because it was doomed from the start.
"And further of course there are institutions pursuing justice, I have no doubt. Justice, the concept of justice, is an important part of civilized society; you miss my point, once again. My point is that there is not OBJECTIVE justice, it's up to a matter of opinion and consensus. No one, though, is truly "right" or "wrong"."
Right, there's no objective justice. Now to remain in that place all your life and refuse to create an ethical structure with which to make decisions is just plain lazy. If you really can't deal with debating subjective ethical points, then we'll just rephrase it another way: I agree with/prefer an ethical philosophy that does not slaughter millions of people as a matter of policy; apparently, you don't have an opinion on the matter.
Morality is subjective. That's why you should be fully capable of stating your subjective opinion like nearly everyone else on earth. Simply restating "it's subjective" is the same as saying "I don't want to think".
Right, there's no objective justice. Now to remain in that place all your life and refuse to create an ethical structure with which to make decisions is just plain lazy. If you really can't deal with debating subjective ethical points, then we'll just rephrase it another way: I agree with/prefer an ethical philosophy that does not slaughter millions of people as a matter of policy; apparently, you don't have an opinion on the matter.
Morality is subjective. That's why you should be fully capable of stating your subjective opinion like nearly everyone else on earth. Simply restating "it's subjective" is the same as saying "I don't want to think".
I state that it is "subjective" so that people like Tiassa don't go off arrogantly assuming they're right, because they really aren't. Yet they pretend they somehow are. And I'm not right either, it's merely my opinion.
And I do formulate my own opinions on the matter; here's my opinion: Hitler was a man of power. And Germany followed him. They were desperate, and he had great might. He simply saw the situation mathematically: the Jews were a burden that had to be eliminated in order to achieve a desired result. Quite simple, really.
Of course, it was monstrous but it was "for the greater good" from Hitler's point of view, and I am not here to judge the man.
And I do formulate my own opinions on the matter; here's my opinion: Hitler was a man of power. And Germany followed him. They were desperate, and he had great might. He simply saw the situation mathematically: the Jews were a burden that had to be eliminated in order to achieve a desired result. Quite simple, really.
Of course, it was monstrous but it was "for the greater good" from Hitler's point of view, and I am not here to judge the man.
I sometimes see this sort of absurdity out of those who don't study history, and don't understand war. The entirety of the populace is unimportant if neither the will nor the materiel to win exist - and the will of any indigenous population can be broken with the appropriate measures. Simply comparing population bases is not a useful measure; or else, Hitler should have been unable to hold the entirety of Europe even without interference from Britain, the United States and the Soviet Union.
And don't start on about the overwhelmingly useless French Resistance. It's embarrassing to read.
Pay attention to the issue if you're going to put on a chest-puffing pretense
Your argument implies that if only Germans had the will, they could have invaded and occupied the United States.
So pardon me while I laugh at your zeal for the superficial. After all, I sometimes see that sort of absurdity out of people who like to pretend they're smart and don't understand the question at hand.
GeoffP said:
Your argument implies that if only Germans had the will, they could have invaded and occupied the United States.
So pardon me while I laugh at your zeal for the superficial. After all, I sometimes see that sort of absurdity out of people who like to pretend they're smart and don't understand the question at hand.
No, Norsefire, you're missing my point. I agree with the nihilist premise and I agree that there is no reasonable solution to the brain-in-a-vat conundrum. There is no objective morality and there is no objective reality that we can access.
But just like science says "okay, well that's true and unfortunate but we'd like to get on making medicine and discovering the universe, so we're going to pretend that reality is more or less what we can measure and observe" the job of ethics - for those who are not religious and therefore can escape solipsism easily - is to find axioms which people can agree on and call these axioms "right" or "just" or whatever, or find some alternate non-axiom based system that we mere humans can attempt to agree on and then start figuring out how to live ethical lives. Basically, if one wants to be anything other than a useless lazy ass in the realm of ethics, one has to take the same approach as the scientists and say "okay, that's true, but now let's move on". Otherwise you're just wasting space.
But just like science says "okay, well that's true and unfortunate but we'd like to get on making medicine and discovering the universe, so we're going to pretend that reality is more or less what we can measure and observe" the job of ethics - for those who are not religious and therefore can escape solipsism easily - is to find axioms which people can agree on and call these axioms "right" or "just" or whatever, or find some alternate non-axiom based system that we mere humans can attempt to agree on and then start figuring out how to live ethical lives. Basically, if one wants to be anything other than a useless lazy ass in the realm of ethics, one has to take the same approach as the scientists and say "okay, that's true, but now let's move on". Otherwise you're just wasting space.
Except he didn't see it mathematically at all. I would completely disagree with your opinion! He was an extremely emotionally driven man by all accounts and the mass extermination of the jews was simply not necessary to create a wealthy and powerful nation. In fact, America built a much more powerful nation with the full help of the jews in many respects. His extreme racism was an aside that didn't help to fulfill the goals of a stronger Germany and may have distracted the leadership enough that they were off their game in the war.
Then you better take that picture of the thinker down, 'cause if you're just going to be a nihilist then you've resigned from philosophy and thought.