Comment on The ones and zeros and tens
Glide@lemmy.ca 3 weeks agoYeah, you gave me the benefit of the doubt and I appreciate it, but I want to say clearly that Hitler was anything but a genius. He had a penchant for sticking his nose into professions that he had no business involving himself in, and making decisions that he had no background in, education on, or understanding of. Like Trump, he was a narcissist who thought he knew best just because he is who he is, and was not self-aware to let the professionals work.
Perhaps eloquent was the wrong word, as I wrongly assume Mein Kampf was his words, when in reality it was likely the words of his editor, followed by a translator. Instead, I would say that when you hear him speak, Hitler’s voice is powerful. I cannot the same for Trump. One feels like a commanding leader, and the other feels like a toddler throwing a tantrum, though they were both, ultimately, the latter.
Also, just so it’s on the record, I read Mein Kampf as part of a minor in history. This was not personal interest, though it is an incredibly interesting text. It was fascinating to discover he devoted ~2.5 chapters to the importance of the same kind of simple, yet powerful finger-pointing rhetoric used by right-wing ideologists to this day. I joking say it’s one of the earliest texts on meme theory, and it’s only half a joke.
Oh yeah I won’t pretend he didn’t move crowds to coalesce around the Nazi philosophy, he was obviously popular enough to pack stadiums.
Hitler and Goebbels, hell the whole Nazi party, we’re really good at the propaganda game. I’d say they really were one of the early pioneers of the use of mass media to steer people into alternate reality. Much like how we see social media being taken advantage of today.
Schadrach@lemmy.sdf.org 3 weeks ago
I still find it funny that just a few years ago a feminist social work journal called Affilia published an article that was essentially a rewrite of a section of Mein Kampf in terms of sex and with some “fashionable buzzwords” included under the title “Our Struggle Is My Struggle: Solidarity Feminism as an Intersectional Reply to Neoliberal and Choice Feminism.” Especially since the bit is spelled out right in the title (for anyone who doesn’t know, “Mein Kampf” literally translates as “My Struggle”). It was part of the grievance studies affair.