Controlling Thought: War Propaganda in Nazi Germany and Contemporary America
The parallels between the propaganda tactics of contemporary America and Nazi Germany are too obvious to go undocumented. For the purposes of this paper, “propaganda” will be understood as any attempt of a government to control and/or change the attitudes of its citizens. From this liberal definition, I will analyze the relationship between Nazi Germany and contemporary America with respect to various methods of propagating government interests. As suggested by Hermann Goering, Minister of Economics and Commander-in-chief of the air force of Nazi Germany, the successful propaganda techniques will be compared with respect to denunciation of the peacemakers, glorification of patriotism, and instillation of fear. Also, deemphasizing the significance of the international community, glorifying military might, creating detention centers for the blamed, and devaluing the loss of life will be explained through the lens of propaganda. All of these methods were successful in gaining wide-spread public support for aggressive military action in Nazi Germany and are successful also in contemporary America. There is a formula for effective war propaganda. Both the Nazi party and the Bush administration used and do use the same, successful, war propaganda techniques.
Hitler did not start out as a successful propagandist. He admits to his early failures of effectively publicizing Nazi ideals in a favorable light. However, he did notice the advantages of successful propaganda early on. “Ever since I have been scrutinizing political events, I have taken a tremendous interest in propagandist activity.”[1] After learning about politi...
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[1] Hitler, Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chapter 6
[2] Hitler, Mein Kampf, Vol. 1, Chapter 6
[3] G.M. Gilbert, Nuremberg Diaries.
[4] Office of the Press Secretary News Release
[5] Overy, p231.
[6] Hitler, Vol. 1, Chapter 6
[7] Shore, p85.
[8] Churchill, p55.
[9] Langer.
[10] Lichtblau
[11] Lichtblau
Susan Brewer brilliantly illustrates the historical facts of American government propagating violence. Scrutinizing the Philippine War, World War I, World War II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War and the Iraq War the reader discovers an eerily Orwellian government manipulating her citizens instead of educating them. Brewer states, a "propaganda campaign seeks to disguise a paradoxical message: war is not a time for citizens to have an informed debate and make up their own minds even as they fight in the name of freedom to do just that." pg. 7 The Presidents of the United States and their administrations use propaganda, generation, after generation to enter into foreign wars for profit by manipulating the truth, which it is unnecessary for our government to do to her people.
During WW1, the Americans had influenced the war by propaganda. Propaganda is when you spread rumors to influence society. Propaganda was used to affect Germany, Great Britain, and the United States. In Germany propaganda was used to give the soldiers morals and people with false information that was sent by balloons or planes. In America propaganda was used to persuade other Americans to join the war against Germany. In Great Britain, propaganda was meant to convince men into joining the war and for people to save food for the war effort.
Words and images were silent weapons used by all governments involved during World War II. Wars are generally fought between soldiers, but the different ideologies often meet on the battlefield as well. The support of the people is crucial during these times since general knowledge of strength relies on numbers. Propaganda targets people’s emotions and feelings and changes people’s perception about a particular idea, people, or situation. Propaganda goes hand in hand with the art of persuasion and convincing; these tools can control and manipulate the collective minds of a massive amount of its audience.
During World War II propaganda was ubiquitous. It consisted of a wide range of carriers including leaflets, radio, television, and most importantly posters. Posters were used based on their appeal: they were colorful, creative, concise, and mentally stimulating. Posters often portrayed the artist's views on the war. They demonstrated the artist concern for the war, their hopes for the war, and reflected the way enemies were envisioned. Posters also show a nations political status: they reflect a nations allies and enemies, how the nation saw itself, and its greatest hopes and fears of the war.
The year was 1939; the Nazi party, led by Adolf Hitler, was in power and Europe was in a state of distress and soon the whole world would be involved in a war that would devastate mankind for generations to come. World War II involved many great nations of the world, such as the Axis Powers: Germany, Italy, and Japan; and the Allied Powers: France, Britain, and Russia. On December 7, 1941, America would join the Allies after Japan attacked Hawaii’s coast at Pearl Harbor, Oahu. The war was a terrible fight; however, the fight wasn’t just fought on land, air, or water. There was a more subtle fight being fought by the Axis and Allied government’s movie makers and poster designers. These men and women played an important role in drawing up certain beliefs about their enemies and the war by spreading these types of thoughts to their fellow citizens to bring some type of unity for their nation. These psychological soldiers tried to promote a love for their country through the power of propaganda.
In every war, from the First World War to the present day in Iraq, military propaganda has been used intensely. Military propaganda is the most effective type of propaganda, because it touches the viewers emotionally. During the Second World War, many pictures of the Jewish concentration camps were shown as propaganda. The primary reason United States went to war was to strike down the dictatorship of Hitler. There were also many economic benefits of United States' involvement in the war. According to senior economist Richard Schumann, the jobs created to support the war itself was able to get United States out of the Great Depression (Schumann). In a propagandist's view, none of these reasons could fire up the citizens as much as documentaries and pictures of suffering people. The view of these gave them an urge to be liberators of these poor souls half way around the world. Even though the scenes of the propaganda were true, they were shown in a way that held its viewers liable if they did not respond.
Hummel, William and Huntress, Keith. The Analysis of Propaganda. New York: William Sloane Associates, 1949
Propaganda posters were used by most countries involved in WWII to persuade their citizens to support patriotism and nationalism in their country. Most countries also used propaganda to persuade their citizens to support their cause and join their armed forces. The Allied Powers used propaganda to persuade their individual countries that winning the war was the only “road to justice”. Most of the propaganda posters distributed by the Axis Powers were aimed towards winning the war and supporting the beliefs of the Nazis. Most of the propaganda posters from WWII were used to recruit for the war, support the war, or spread the racial views of their country.
The Nazis are infamous for their heavy use of propaganda during their reign in the Third Reich, they used many means of propaganda such as posters, cartoons, radio, film, etc. The German citizens’ constant exposure to all of this propaganda from all directions had a deep psychological and psychoanalytical impact on them, it redefined their identity and who they were as well as what they thought of the world around them. Nazi propaganda often had deep symbolic meaning usually associated with anti-semitism and German nationalism, these elements were already present in the minds of the majority of Germans so it wasn’t hard for Adolf Hitler and the rest of the Nazi party to further provoke and enrage the emotions of people concerning these things, they merely had to tap into these pre disposed emotions in a way that would have the most favourable psychological impact for the Nazis. Some of the opinions and mindsets that German citizens had may have been there even before the Nazis came into power and made it seemed like they were brainwashing people with their propaganda, but with what justification can it be said that Nazi propaganda had a psychological and psychoanalytic impact on the German population to a great extent, rather than it being the work of pre set psychological states of mind of people due to the Treaty of Versailles, the Great Depression, Hyperinflation, and other sources which may have led the German population to support and hold anti-semitistic and nationalistic ideologies.
Samsung is Apple’s biggest competition when it comes to phones especially between Apple’s iPhone 5s to Samsung’s Galaxy S4. They are both very popular among consumers, but they are differently different from each other. It is an endless debate on which one is better, but it really comes down to which one is better for you as a consumer. There are good and bad issues with both phones such as with the Galaxy S4, the TouchWiz Ul remains a clumsy construction and lacks overarching design language, but the good thing about t...
There are five potential sources of jurisdiction of English courts regarding the insolvency of companies , namely the European Union (EU) Insolvency Regulation 2000 (EC Insolvency Regulation), the UNCITRAL Model Law on Cross-Border Insolvency as embodied in Sch.1 to the Cross-Border Insolvency Regulations 2006 (Model Law), the Insolvency Act 1986, the Banking Act 2009 in relation to banks, and the common law conflict of laws rules governing the insolvency of companies.
" Propaganda in Nazi Germany. HistoryLearningSite, n.d. - HistoryLearningSite, Web. The Web. The Web. 05
Welch, David. "Propaganda." New Dictionary of the History of Ideas. Ed. Maryanne Cline Horowitz. Vol. 5. Detroit: Charles Scribner's Sons, 2005. 1916-1923. Student Resources in Context. Web. 31 Mar. 2014.
Introductory Paragraph: Propaganda is a tool of influence that Adolph Hitler used to abuse the German population by brainwashing them and completely deteriorating an entire race. How does one person get the beliefs of an entire country? Hitler put Joseph Goebbels in charge of the propaganda movement. Goebbels controlled every element of propaganda, there were many varieties of Nazi Propaganda. Propaganda was also being used as a tool to gain the support of the German population for the war, and supporting their government. The Jew’s were the targeted race and were completely pulverized by the Nazi’s. Hitler not only tried to destroy an entire race, he gained complete control of an entire country.
At the beginning, virtual reality try to make people understand that itself has the ability for a great medium, new entertainment and also very powerful type of art (Bates, 1991). Besides, according to Encyclopedia of Virtual Environments, 2006, they defined the virtual reality is a human-computer interface in which the computer creates a sensory-immersing environment that interactively responds to and is controlled by the behavior of the user. Virtual reality is popular in many areas such as education, architecture and entertainment. The most noticeable in virtual reality is in entertainment application. Through the idea that was presented by Ivan Sutherland, 1965, virtual reality can mimic our real life to make the world look real, sound real, feel real and realistically to the viewer’s actions. Virtual reality can immerse in 3D visual world (Jessica, 2002). Virtual reality with the computer can simulate the three dimensional image and environment. It can be seen real when it is interact with physical way by person that using electric equipment like gloves and helmet. Example of the game is kinect for xbox 360 that we can use our body to become the controller. Kinect sensor also can track our movement such as jump or dance. Besides that, it is like we can explore the game world like mountain, a long river and big aquarium. In addition we are allowed to choose which avatar we want. The movement of the avatar is the same as we do because the avatar can detect the movement of the real person through sensor.