Public Intellectuals and Impassioned Publics
The 2012 film Hannah Arendt depicts the struggle between passion and reason. Hannah Arendt’s safety is directly threatened because of her articles on the trial of Adolf Eichmann. The public saw her stance as being too sympathetic to Eichmann, since she describes him as ordinary and mediocre. The impassioned belief that Eichmann must be an evil, scary monster was not affirmed in her writing. Due to this, the public lashed out against her. The mentality was: if you don’t believe that Eichmann was a terrible, evil person, then you must be sympathizing with the Nazis, and thereby disowning your Jewish community. This stance was very understandable, due to the still-reeling public after the atrocities
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This hatred and admiration from different impassioned publics occurs simultaneously and separately. Every statement from public intellectuals is qualified through the beliefs and value spheres of these impassioned publics, and thus every statement made by intellectuals either helps further their ideas, or is against them and seen as wrong. Twitter and other social media outlets broadly show that the kinds of messages Hannah Arendt was receiving is not exclusive to her time or her situation. Public intellectuals receive death threats, hate-filled messages, angry rants, and general condescension from impassioned publics for all to see on Twitter, Facebook, and other platforms. Any comment made online can receive backlash because there are so many impassioned publics on any imaginable issue. Impassioned publics often instigate altercations with public intellectuals so that their public’s views can be spread to the large audience of internet-connected people. The altercation usually does nothing to resolve the conflict in question, but instead brings attention to the fact that there is a passionate group of people with different beliefs than the public intellectual. Then, the altercation itself can be commented upon and argued about. This type of altercation does not only occur regarding political statements, but also opinions on art, society, and
Irish Playwright, George Bernard Shaw, once said, “The worst sin toward our fellow creatures is not to hate them, but to be indifferent to them; that's the essence of inhumanity.” Inhumanity is mankind’s worse attribute. Every so often, ordinary humans are driven to the point were they have no choice but to think of themselves. One of the most famous example used today is the Holocaust. Elie Wiesel’s memoir Night demonstrates how fear is a debilitating force that causes people to lose sight of who they once were. After being forced into concentration camps, Elie was rudely awakened into reality. Traumatizing incidents such as Nazi persecution or even the mistreatment among fellow prisoners pushed Elie to realize the cruelty around him; Or even the wickedness Elie himself is capable of doing. This resulted in the loss of faith, innocence, and the close bonds with others.
In March 11, 1900 in a German town called Konitz the severed body parts of a human were discovered. Almost immediately, the blame fell on the Jewish. As Smith points out, anti-Semitism had been on a steady decline, and the anti-Semitics were looking for ways to revitalize the movement. The murder was an opportunity for anti-Semitics revive their movement. After the identity of the body was discovered to be Ernst Winter, the Staatsburgerzeitung, an anti-Semitic newspaper, printed several articles focusing on Konitz. Using unverified accounts from people in the town, it claimed that the murder was a ritual murder that had been carried out by the Jewish. The use of fear mongering was affective because the paper was a Berlin based paper so distribution was wide, and news of the murder traveled far. A crucial facet of the rise of anti-Semitism was due to anti-Semitic newspapers taking stories such as the Ernst Winter murder and using them to promote their cause. One of Smith’s sources, the Preuβische Jahrbṻcher, had a printed article written by Heinrich von Treitschke who was an historian; in which one of his quotes was “The Jews are our misfortune.” His article was what later spurred the German population’s turn from liberalism a...
...ses a threat of humiliation and maltreating from other individuals that can have a detrimental effect on their lives. A person can go from being a normal school student to a laughing stock on a popular social network or even trend from a emotionally stable individual to a deranged, depressed critter who now hides in the shadows of society hoping never to be revealed. The informative thought of the re-occurrence of public shaming throughout history from Bennett allows the reader to question if this is an issue that is perpetual and something that will never go away. Furthermore, the author conveys the idea that publicizing oneself can be a burden; the darkside of Internet fame. Wrapping up her article, Bennett portrays a warning to the reader stating, “Shame...will always be with you”(115). Harassment from Internet fame can alter a person's life-forever.
According to Welch, “The public’s reaction to anti-Semitic films reveals that propaganda had considerable success in persuading the population that a Jewish ‘problem’ existed, but equally that there was a limit to their tolerance of the type of virulently anti-Semitic propaganda to be found in films like Der Ewige Jude and publications like Der Stuermer.” Even after years of Nazi propaganda, even Goebbels wasn’t convinced that “such propaganda had persuaded Germans to condone open violence against
According to the Merriam-Webster online dictionary, a Mass of people is a large body of persons in a group. In Chapter 10 of Hannah Arendt’s novel, The Origins of Totalitarianism, Arendt broadly defines the term masses, as well as the mass individual. Before doing this, Arendt clearly distinguishes masses from classes and citizens. As Arendt notes, classes and citizens are part of a nation-state, which essentially represent themselves. Arendt claims that Totalitarianism movements are mass organizations of atomized isolated individuals. In this claim, there are many key features that define Totalitarianism as a political system.
Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil is a book about the Eichmann trials, written in Hannah Arendt's perspective. Hannah Arendt was a German-American political theorist, who was often labeled as a philosopher. During the trials she offered herself as a reporter for The New Yorker magazine. Arendt was a Jew, and an early refugee from Germany, making her uniquely qualified to cover the trial, but conversely created controversy among the Jewish community. Arendt received static from the public because she was a Jew defending the morals of a Nazi. Throughout the trial, Arendt composed her impressions of Eichmann and articulated her opinion of the defendant. Throughout the Report on the Banality of Evil, Arendt explores the allegations from a legal and moral perspective, claiming that Eichmann is not a monster or the radical evil, but rather, the "banal evil." Although Eichmann's actions were legally wrong, Arendt saw a moral indifference. She believed that the Eichmann's case posed a moral question, and the answer to it may not have been legally relevant
Americans have embraced debate since before we were a country. The idea that we would provide reasoned support for any position that we took is what made us different from the English king. Our love of debate came from the old country, and embedded itself in our culture as a defining value. Thus, it should not come as a surprise that the affinity for debate is still strong, and finds itself as a regular feature of the mainstream media. However, if Deborah Tannen of the New York Times is correct, our understanding of what it means to argue may be very different from what it once was; a “culture of critique” has developed within our media, and it relies on the exclusive opposition of two conflicting positions (Tannen). In her 1994 editorial, titled “The Triumph of the Yell”, Tannen claims that journalists, politicians and academics treat public discourse as an argument. Furthermore, she attempts to persuade her readers that this posturing of argument as a conflict leads to a battle, not a debate, and that we would be able to communicate the truth if this culture were not interfering. This paper will discuss the rhetorical strategies that Tannen utilizes, outline the support given in her editorial, and why her argument is less convincing than it should be.
“Der exige Jude”: Quellenkritische Analyse eines antisemititschen Propagandaf ilms, Institute Fur Wissenschaftlichen Film, Gottingen, 1995,p.134
People can have many different opinions depending on a topic, but what is truly difficult is getting a complete level of understanding from every opinion, or understanding the point of view of each opinion. Even accepting the points of view can be difficult for some people, who believe that their opinions are right. Luckily, people can learn about the other person’s frame of reference, and at the very least understand the topic or the person a little better. This particular topic is art, which is known for its multiple possible perceptions or its many different messages that it can send a person or group of people. In this way, people can learn more about the thought processes and feelings of others. Unfortunately, with differing opinions,
Arendt, Hannah. Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil. New York: Penguin, 2006.
Jews have perished because of their beliefs since the beginning of time but never have so many Jews been persecuted worldwide as they were in World War II. Anne Frank’s diary reaches a place within all of our hearts because it reminds us how easily the innocents can suffer. Sometimes we may choose to close our eyes or look the other way when unjustifiable things happen in our society and Anne’s tale reminds us that ignorance, in part, claimed her life. Sadly, her story is but one of many of those who died in the Holocaust and as with other Jews, her fate was determined by the country she lived in, her sex and her age.
Adolf Hitler’s power was at its’ apex, and everyone was too intimidated by his violence to speak up. In Hitler’s Nazi Germany, and Mussolini’s Fascist Italy, doing anything that could be remotely interpreted as treasonous, from buying from a Jewish vendor, to openly protesting, could have you killed. Many citizens knew that what their “leader” was doing was immoral and wrong. However, they had no other choice but to openly obey, and quietly discuss what to do to escape. These manipulative leaders knew exactly what to do to discourage their citizens from acting out, and inveighing against them. As a final assertion of his absolute, but ephemeral power, Hitler organized Kristallnacht, or “The Night of Broken Glass”, where his Nazi soldiers destroyed Jewish stores, ransacked and pilfered the shops’ goods, burned synagogues to the ground, and killed over 100 German Jewish citizens. After Kristallnacht, more Jewish aides began to surface, non-Jewish Germans willing to secretly risk their lives to defend the innocent. The Germans did not go as far as the Italians,
Anger and hatred can be produced with such little integrity it is frightening. Adolf Hitler’s work, Mein Kampf, is filled with such fury and abhorrence. Millions of people bought into his ideas without even stopping to question the validity of his work. Considering at this time many Germans were freezing, starving and suffering from a huge economic depression not much had to be said to get people on Hitler’s side. Hitler makes many false statements and provides no evidence to back many of them, he simply finds the Jews as something to blame Germany’s problems on. In Hitler’s work he also contradicts himself on numerous occasions. If people had stopped to think about what Mein Kampf was really saying these falsies and mistakes would have been noticed.
the book the author discusses her main views toward the actions of the Nazis and
The public sphere has been falsely represented as a virtual place where one can share and debate opinions; ...