The origin of the wrong idea that the nazis were lefties
       |           

Welcome, Guest. Please login or register.
Did you miss your activation email?
March 29, 2024, 05:07:42 AM
News: Election Simulator 2.0 Released. Senate/Gubernatorial maps, proportional electoral votes, and more - Read more

  Talk Elections
  General Politics
  Political Debate (Moderator: Torie)
  The origin of the wrong idea that the nazis were lefties
« previous next »
Pages: [1] 2 3
Author Topic: The origin of the wrong idea that the nazis were lefties  (Read 5174 times)
buritobr
YaBB God
*****
Posts: 3,606


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« on: August 16, 2017, 08:53:16 PM »

As far as I know, the first person who started this bad idea that national socialism was left-wing was Ludwig von Mises. He worked in the fascist Austrian government, but when nazism became a disaster, it became better for the right to throw nazism to the left.
Logged
Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee
North Carolina Yankee
Moderators
Atlas Institution
*****
Posts: 54,123
United States


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #1 on: August 16, 2017, 09:44:28 PM »

The funny thing about ideology is that all you have to do is redefine the metrics for right and left to re-label anyone you want. This is especially true for libertarians and those who have come into politics seeing everything as right versus left based on who supports big government and who supports limited government. This creates all manner of ill conceived groupings and explanations of historical events from the Nazis being left wing to the theory that the major parties in the US flipped at some defined date.

Adenauer used to claim the SDP was the heirs to Prussian Militarism and Nazism because it was statist.

It is rather difficult to separate factual historical analysis from one's own political bias. Marxists are the worst offenders of this, because they engage in extensive amounts of historical revisionism to make everything about class. While at the same time Marxists at least consider class elements and if you don't consider select historical events through that perspective you will neither understand conservatism, nor will you understand Germany.

Nazism combined several elements that were definitely conservative/reactionary policies in the context of German history. They were certainly militaristic (Prussian Militarism is hundreds of years old), they were economic nationalists (this dates from the 1830's and 1840's with the likes of Frederich List), they were anti-communist, and they sought to co-opt socialism as a means to facilitate power for a ruling elite (Bismarck's playbook through and through).

The classification of Nazism as left wing stems from classifying them based on their support for state control and growth in power of the state. It focuses 100% on what, defines said "what" as an "other" (this case, left wing) and then ignores the who, why and how of an event and therefore misses the target.
Logged
SoLongAtlas
VirginiaModerate
Jr. Member
***
Posts: 1,219
United States
Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #2 on: August 17, 2017, 08:22:57 AM »

Hitler named it the National Socialist Party in part to tick off and confuse the other socialist and communist parties in Germany at the time and pick off more of their voters. They were a far right party but emphasized the re-invigoration piece during the Wiemar years and then focused on nationalism of war industries and/or collusion with them and other industries in the pre-war and war years.

So some leftist ideas but mostly right, the darkest econ ideas of the Nazis weren't even that left but more dark, slave labor, camps, forced servitude, etc. That doesn't really fit in with any ideology except barbarianism.
Logged
RINO Tom
Atlas Icon
*****
Posts: 17,002
United States


Political Matrix
E: 2.45, S: -0.52

Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #3 on: August 17, 2017, 03:38:31 PM »

The origin of the idea that Nazis were "lefties" ironically comes from the same logic that some progressives have used to try to claim Republicans like Lincoln as one of their own, LOL.  Big government and government activism, of course, is obviously neither "left" nor "right" in and of itself.
Logged
All Along The Watchtower
Progressive Realist
Atlas Icon
*****
Posts: 15,426
United States


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #4 on: August 19, 2017, 10:50:06 AM »

National Socialists. Duh.
Logged
Santander
Atlas Star
*****
Posts: 27,854
United Kingdom


Political Matrix
E: 4.00, S: 2.61


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #5 on: August 19, 2017, 07:16:56 PM »
« Edited: August 19, 2017, 07:18:27 PM by Santander »

Also convenient for "movement conservatives" like Glenn Beck, Mark Levin, and many other Reaganites to pretend National Socialism is a left-wing ideology so that they and their fans don't have to clean their own house. Meanwhile, they puff out their chests and lecture Muslims on TV and radio about how they need to do more to take care of the Islamic terrorism problem.
Logged
rob in cal
Jr. Member
***
Posts: 1,978
Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #6 on: August 19, 2017, 07:40:56 PM »

  Does anyone know much about how the Nazi regime impacted taxation rates and the existing health care system that they took over from the Weimar Republic regimes?  As far as I can tell its not as if they were rampaging free market libertarians, but neither did they nationalize businesses, farms or factories.
Logged
7,052,770
Harry
Atlas Superstar
*****
Posts: 35,222
Ukraine


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #7 on: August 20, 2017, 08:54:45 AM »


This. People make this argument all the time.
Logged
🦀🎂🦀🎂
CrabCake
Atlas Icon
*****
Posts: 19,192
Kiribati


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #8 on: August 22, 2017, 05:29:06 AM »

I think a lot of people are unable to divorce conservatism in a general sense with the Reaginite/Thatcherite consensus on conservatism.
Logged
vanguard96
Jr. Member
***
Posts: 754
United States


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #9 on: August 22, 2017, 12:55:27 PM »

As far as I know, the first person who started this bad idea that national socialism was left-wing was Ludwig von Mises. He worked in the fascist Austrian government, but when nazism became a disaster, it became better for the right to throw nazism to the left.

Most Nazis were originally socialists. They were national - not international. All are authoritarian.

Hitler wanted all the socialist goodies - central bank, government schools, nationalized (de-facto) of key industries, and the destruction of capitalism.

There are MANY MANY quotes on this subject. Mises and Hayek just popularized it at a time which frankly was very hostile to laissez faire capitalism.

At the end of the day Hitler, Lenin, Stalin were closer than many think and Mises was one of the few advocates of liberalism (classical 18th and 19th century version) and capitalism at a time when so many were either socialist or nationalist. It was a dire time for the world and the 1930's in the US and UK was a very red decade. It is telling that Mises, a Jew himself is considered a fascist.
 
Logged
HisGrace
Junior Chimp
*****
Posts: 5,496
United States


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #10 on: August 22, 2017, 01:16:02 PM »

"Classic" fascism was its own thing, not conservative or liberal, left or right wing. On economics they would probably be considered centrist/third way in Europe and left of center in America. They were socially authoritarian, but it was a revolutionary ideology that wanted to rebuild society, so it's by definition not conservative. Nor is it liberal since they didn't support open discourse and individuals making their own decisions with logic. Most the "fascists" marching around today probably have pretty right wing views, though.
Logged
Filuwaúrdjan
Realpolitik
Atlas Institution
*****
Posts: 67,609
United Kingdom


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #11 on: August 22, 2017, 01:18:48 PM »
« Edited: August 22, 2017, 01:20:31 PM by Filuwaúrdjan »

Most Nazis were originally socialists.

No they were not. Nazism developed out of the Völkisch movement and to the extent that senior Nazis were previously political at all it was generally in that direction (even if sometimes only very vaguely). You'll find one or two exceptions here or there, but then that's how politics is. Stop repeating garbage pseudo-history, thnx.
Logged
vanguard96
Jr. Member
***
Posts: 754
United States


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #12 on: August 25, 2017, 01:31:16 PM »

Quotes from Hitler - per the Libertarian Republic:

Hitler may have publicly denounced Marxism, because of his war against the hated Soviet Union, but privately he always admitted that he was at heart a left-winger. He once said to Otto Wagener that the problem with the politicians of the Weimar Republic was that they “had never even read Marx.”

He believed that the problem of German Communists was that they didn’t understand the difference between principles and tactics. He referred to them as mere pamphleteers, whereas “I have put into practice what these peddlers and pen pushers have timidly begun.”

He stated plainly that “the whole of National Socialism” was based on Marx.

If we are socialists, then we must definitely be anti-semites – and the opposite, in that case, is Materialism and Mammonism, which we seek to oppose.” “How, as a socialist, can you not be an anti-semite?

We must “find and travel the road from individualism to socialism without revolution”.

"Why need we trouble to socialize banks and factories? We socialize human beings.”

“We are socialists, we are enemies of today’s capitalistic economic system for the exploitation of the economically weak, with its unfair salaries, with its unseemly evaluation of a human being according to wealth and property instead of responsibility and performance, and we are all determined to destroy this system under all conditions” 1927

"What Marxism, Leninism and Stalinism failed to accomplish we shall be in a position to achieve.”

Also planks of the National Socialist party:
11. That all unearned income, and all income that does not arise from work, be abolished.

12. Since every war imposes on the people fearful sacrifices in blood and treasure, all personal profit arising from the war must be regarded as treason to the people. We therefore demand the total confiscation of all war profits.

13. We demand the nationalization of all trusts.

14. We demand profit-sharing in large industries.

15. We demand a generous increase in old-age pensions.

25. In order to carry out this program we demand: the creation of a strong central authority in the State, the unconditional authority by the political central parliament of the whole State and all its organizations

Even though he did not like the Communists and did not care for the Soviet Union he was thoroughly socialist, an unorthodox one but one that had different tactics to achieve many of the same goals.

Naturally a socialist will blanch at it but when you see it in black and white it is harder to spin it...

Rip down those Lenin and Che statues - they are no heroes.
Logged
Kingpoleon
Atlas Star
*****
Posts: 22,144
United States


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #13 on: August 25, 2017, 02:58:12 PM »

Strasserism is left wing, undoubtedly so. Röhm and the Strasser brothers co-opted the devoted communist and radical socialist followers. Nazism, however, is either right wing or a "Third Position," depending up on the validity of spectrum and horse shoe theory in general.
Logged
MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!
Kalwejt
Atlas Institution
*****
Posts: 57,380


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #14 on: August 25, 2017, 05:13:33 PM »

Hitler named it the National Socialist Party in part to tick off and confuse the other socialist and communist parties in Germany at the time and pick off more of their voters. They were a far right party but emphasized the re-invigoration piece during the Wiemar years and then focused on nationalism of war industries and/or collusion with them and other industries in the pre-war and war years.

So some leftist ideas but mostly right, the darkest econ ideas of the Nazis weren't even that left but more dark, slave labor, camps, forced servitude, etc. That doesn't really fit in with any ideology except barbarianism.

Yes, it wasn't really uncommon for minor far-right parties at the time NSDAP was still forming to use terms "socialist", "revolutionary" or "working", trying to capitalize on increased left-wing sentiments post WWI.

Putting everything else aside, there were elements within the NSDAP that were clearly to the left economically, with a very anti-capitalist zeal. I'm talking about those element that were purged in 1934. After Hitler allied himself with plutocrats, and then made up with Reichswehr generals, there was nothing remotely "left-wing" to speak of.

People tend to sometimes confuse big spending, something Nazis did, with "left-wing" ideology. It's idiotic simplification.
Logged
vanguard96
Jr. Member
***
Posts: 754
United States


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #15 on: August 26, 2017, 02:28:50 PM »

Hitler named it the National Socialist Party in part to tick off and confuse the other socialist and communist parties in Germany at the time and pick off more of their voters. They were a far right party but emphasized the re-invigoration piece during the Wiemar years and then focused on nationalism of war industries and/or collusion with them and other industries in the pre-war and war years.

So some leftist ideas but mostly right, the darkest econ ideas of the Nazis weren't even that left but more dark, slave labor, camps, forced servitude, etc. That doesn't really fit in with any ideology except barbarianism.

Yes, it wasn't really uncommon for minor far-right parties at the time NSDAP was still forming to use terms "socialist", "revolutionary" or "working", trying to capitalize on increased left-wing sentiments post WWI.

Putting everything else aside, there were elements within the NSDAP that were clearly to the left economically, with a very anti-capitalist zeal. I'm talking about those element that were purged in 1934. After Hitler allied himself with plutocrats, and then made up with Reichswehr generals, there was nothing remotely "left-wing" to speak of.

People tend to sometimes confuse big spending, something Nazis did, with "left-wing" ideology. It's idiotic simplification.

Good to acknowledge the origins were left wing economically - a number of the quotes are from the 20's and early 30's...

This is a lot of what Hayek and Mises mention the strong origins from socialism and not disagreeing with the ideals of Marx & Lenin just the methods.

Definitely statism and anti-free markets. Anti-liberal (in terms of individual rights classical liberalism) in its outlook.

If one wasn't a power player or did not fall in line with their direction then extremely harsh terms would be applied.

For example Auto Union and Mercedes  in the mid 30s were de facto nationalized brands.

Hitler himself in 1933 was announcing car programs.
The racing program which developed some of the world's fastest cars (268 mph top speed) was a government project.

They also used forced labor of concentration camp and POW to make military vehicles much like the Soviet use of Japanese POWs in Siberia from 1945-50 to build railroads.
Logged
Vosem
Atlas Icon
*****
Posts: 15,625
United States


Political Matrix
E: 8.13, S: -6.09

Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #16 on: August 26, 2017, 02:43:25 PM »

Neo-Nazism, which has many differences from actual Nazism as it was practiced, is quite definitely far-right. Actual Nazism, like all long-extinct ideologies, does not fit neatly into our modern classifications and depending on how you draw the spectrum can quite logically be defined as left-wing. (This is all complicated by the actual Nazi Party being a party of power, for whom quite inherently matters of ideology are blurred anyway.)
Logged
Filuwaúrdjan
Realpolitik
Atlas Institution
*****
Posts: 67,609
United Kingdom


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #17 on: August 26, 2017, 07:31:35 PM »

These grotesque dishonesties come up often enough that...

Urgh, not this sh!t again. I can't be bothered to write anything new, so I'll just use a search function to find some old posts on the subject:

Given what happend to actual Socialists under the Nazi regime (here's a random example), I do find the interwebs-tendency to scream that Hitler-Was-A-Socialist to be in astonishingly bad taste.

Oh for God's sake. No.

This issue seems to be raised on the forum a couple of times every year and I'm now tired of bothering to refute it in any detail, so I'll just note a couple of points:

1. No credible historian of the twentieth century believes that the Nazi regime in general or Hitler in particular were 'left-wing' in any respect. This includes some rather right-wing economic historians who specialise in aspects of Nazi economic policy, so this is not an example of a notoriously lefty profession closing ranks.

2. Nazi economic policy was geared entirely towards rearmament (which was achieved via an extraordinarily complicated form of fraud) and not towards any remotely left-wing (however defined) objective. Contrary to what is frequently asserted, the standard of living for the working class in Germany actually declined during the pre-war Nazi period as wages were kept under tight control by means of... well... authoritarian rule.

3. German industrialists (most of them) did remarkably well out of the Nazi regime and this was intentional (more so, in some ways, than in contemporary economies). The examples of Krupp and IG Farben are well known, but they were merely extreme examples of a more general pattern. The close relationship between capital and the regime was good for both of them; as profits soared, so did corporate contributions to the Nazi Party (why, yes. This was a rather corrupt regime).

4. A Trade Union controlled by the government is not a Trade Union.

Fundamentally, you can only argue that 'Hitler was economically left wing' if you define 'economically left wing' as 'prepared to intervene in the economy in order to make it grow'. Which is absurd.

Nazi underlying ideology = virulent nationalism/militarism, an especially nasty take on popular racial theories, anti-semitism (part of the former but enough of an issue, obviously, to deserve a mention on its own) and anti-socialism, combined with weird fetishes regarding leaders, action, and so on. Everything else was window dressing or a cynical attempt to win support (both electorally and in terms of powerful individuals and interest groups). If you think Hitler or any other leading Nazi gave a sh!t about whatever drivel the party adopted as its platform in its early years, then you should probably avoid further comment on the issue. Because there is just a little bit of a consensus over this.

Arguing that state intervention in the economy = Socialism isn't very clever. It means that you have to (for example) count all mainstream political parties and institutions in Europe between about 1945 (1940 or so in the case of Britain) and about 1973 or so as Socialist. Even more absurdly, it means that you have to count all European states before the rise of laissez faire as Socialist. And I think that would be a step into lunacy too far even for you.

Now, the sad thing about the internets is that these arguments are so common that you can just...

And it's worth noting how pro-business the Nazi regime was in reality. Somewhere, deep within my pile of box files, I've a little chart comparing donations to the NSDAP from IG Farben (a company critical to the implementation of the Final Solution, as it happens) with IG Farben's profits. I will eventually find it and post it here - makes for interesting reading.

Because the Nazis = Socialist canard isn't worth wasting much time dismissing. No one (no one honest anyway) with a basic knowledge of early 20th century German history takes it seriously.

(for the record, IG Farben was a German chemical giant, the largest company in Europe (some of the time), a major financial donor to the Nazi regime (and as the companies profits went up, so did donations), a major user of slave labour and the manufacturer of Zyklon B. It was broken up (more or less) by the Allies at the end of the War. Krupp is another well-known example of a big company doing well out of the Nazis).

I mean, there's more but I can't be bothered to dig it up right now.

But I repeat my comment about bad taste.

Conclusion: fyck off and read a few books on the subject.

I would like to stress particularly this point: fyck off and read a few books on the subject. Because, honestly, you people are staggeringly ignorant.
Logged
Filuwaúrdjan
Realpolitik
Atlas Institution
*****
Posts: 67,609
United Kingdom


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #18 on: August 26, 2017, 07:33:38 PM »

I note that there has been no response to this very specific refutation:

Most Nazis were originally socialists.

No they were not. Nazism developed out of the Völkisch movement and to the extent that senior Nazis were previously political at all it was generally in that direction (even if sometimes only very vaguely). You'll find one or two exceptions here or there, but then that's how politics is. Stop repeating garbage pseudo-history, thnx.
Logged
AtorBoltox
Sr. Member
****
Posts: 2,984


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #19 on: August 27, 2017, 12:44:21 AM »

I note that there has been no response to this very specific refutation:

Most Nazis were originally socialists.

No they were not. Nazism developed out of the Völkisch movement and to the extent that senior Nazis were previously political at all it was generally in that direction (even if sometimes only very vaguely). You'll find one or two exceptions here or there, but then that's how politics is. Stop repeating garbage pseudo-history, thnx.
Probably because people who are ignorant enough to believe Nazis are socialists also have no idea what the Volkisch movement is
Logged
vanguard96
Jr. Member
***
Posts: 754
United States


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #20 on: August 27, 2017, 09:04:26 AM »

Leftist economic garbage nonetheless and had the commies had their way still millions would have died - maybe not the same mix but a horror of state control no doubt.
Logged
vanguard96
Jr. Member
***
Posts: 754
United States


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #21 on: August 27, 2017, 12:13:58 PM »

Per Joseph Bederansky and quoted: "Large segments of the Nazi Party staunchly supported its official socialist, revolutionary, and anti-capitalist positions and expected both a social and an economic revolution when the party gained power in 1933. Many of the million members of the Sturmabteilung (SA) were committed to the party's official socialist program."

Regardless of the nationalist populist origin of Volkisch, economically and in terms of the value of the collective over the individual and the common good were socialist in orientation.
Logged
FEMA Camp Administrator
Cathcon
Atlas Star
*****
Posts: 27,284
United States


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #22 on: August 27, 2017, 12:37:59 PM »

the value of the collective over the individual and the common good were socialist in orientation.

This concept well predates socialism.
Logged
parochial boy
parochial_boy
Junior Chimp
*****
Posts: 5,114


Political Matrix
E: -8.38, S: -6.78

Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #23 on: August 27, 2017, 05:06:48 PM »

the value of the collective over the individual and the common good were socialist in orientation.

This concept well predates socialism.

TIL Confucius was a socialist. Among other luminaries of historical leftism.
Logged
Kingpoleon
Atlas Star
*****
Posts: 22,144
United States


Show only this user's posts in this thread
« Reply #24 on: August 27, 2017, 09:02:51 PM »

Hitler named it the National Socialist Party in part to tick off and confuse the other socialist and communist parties in Germany at the time and pick off more of their voters. They were a far right party but emphasized the re-invigoration piece during the Wiemar years and then focused on nationalism of war industries and/or collusion with them and other industries in the pre-war and war years.

So some leftist ideas but mostly right, the darkest econ ideas of the Nazis weren't even that left but more dark, slave labor, camps, forced servitude, etc. That doesn't really fit in with any ideology except barbarianism.

Yes, it wasn't really uncommon for minor far-right parties at the time NSDAP was still forming to use terms "socialist", "revolutionary" or "working", trying to capitalize on increased left-wing sentiments post WWI.

Putting everything else aside, there were elements within the NSDAP that were clearly to the left economically, with a very anti-capitalist zeal. I'm talking about those element that were purged in 1934. After Hitler allied himself with plutocrats, and then made up with Reichswehr generals, there was nothing remotely "left-wing" to speak of.

People tend to sometimes confuse big spending, something Nazis did, with "left-wing" ideology. It's idiotic simplification.
Um... Himmler was a follower of Röhm, and Goebbels was an advocate of Strasserism. Alfred Rosenberg, the Heydrich brothers, and many others were considered to have ties to the Strasser brothers.
Logged
Pages: [1] 2 3  
« previous next »
Jump to:  


Login with username, password and session length

Terms of Service - DMCA Agent and Policy - Privacy Policy and Cookies

Powered by SMF 1.1.21 | SMF © 2015, Simple Machines

Page created in 0.067 seconds with 12 queries.