Nazi Ideology

Ideologies are meant to unify people, motivate them toward a certain direction, and most importantly, ideologies serve as a justification system—allowing people to rationalize their own actions and the political system. Ideologies certainly have the potential to promote and carry out genocide, however, particular ideologies are predisposed to genocidal acts. For instance, Nazi ideology was the powerful force behind the genocide, but more notably, the Nazi ideology was prone to genocidal acts. Nazism had three distinct components along with the six uses of ideology that were combined together to promote genocide. The three distinct components used were anti-Semitism, nationalism, and their core foundation Führerprinzip, which was the leadership

The German culture had been impregnated with lethal, evil views of the Jewish people long before Hitler took power in 1933. This culture had been engulfed with ideologies that were already predisposed to genocidal acts. Even though Hitler’s reign of terror was a giant contributor to one of the worst genocides in history, the ideology had already built the fire—Hitler just lit the match. The eliminationist ideology that the Nazis had been taught gave them justification. They believed that the extermination of the Jewish people was right because it was for the protection of their people. These murderers were motivated by ideology that resulted from conformity. Although many scholars believe that antisemitism was not as popular as Goldhagen had claimed it to be, there was still a connection between the ideology and the horrific genocide that ensued. Waller explains, “it is clear that most Germans did not share the fanatical antisemitism… it is just as clear, however that their indifference, manifested in a national conspiracy of silence, provided the autonomy for the regime to implement genocidal policies” (Waller, 2007). The main ideology that allowed for the genocide to take place was nationalism; the German people wanted to protect their civilization and thrive once more. Moreover, the German people did not have to have the same obsessive antisemitism as Hitler, but they did all strongly hate the Jewish population and that was all it