Godwin’s Law, The Third Reich And Modern American Government

Can We Use Godwin’s Law to Compare America’s Federal Government to the Third Reich?

Have you heard the adage “In any online argument, sooner or later, someone will always bring up Hitler?”

If someone is like Adolf Hitler, then he’s a failed painter who was rejected from art school twice, drafted into the army, and groomed into a career in politics.

Mike Godwin understood our society’s change in response to the internet. In the 1990s, Mike Godwin even coined the rule:

In any online argument, someone will always bring up Adolf Hitler.

This rule above is Godwin’s Law.

Godwin’s Law turns a social media conversation into an argument or a never-ending flame war. Mike Godwin himself tells us in an interview with TIME Magazine:

It’s an inevitable consequence of free speech. He’d prefer it if people would stop and think before bringing up World War II analogies.

“STOP and THINK,” Mike Godwin says. In America, citizens have the right to say whatever they want but the right to free speech shouldn’t include ceaseless arguments where all one is doing is namedropping ruthless politicians.

When there is a justifiable reason to compare someone you know or a current politician to a member of the Nazi Party, then make sure your reasoning is defendable and logical. It can NEVER have emotional reasoning. The government is not run on emotion. Only Totalitarian States are governed by illogical dogmas.

How many times have you scrolled through your Social Media feeds, only to find an argument that ends or begins with “You’re a Nazi” or “You’re a Fascist”?

Seriously, how many arguments have you found?

The arguments where the words ‘Nazi’ and ‘Hitler’ are thrown around have only become more common since social media’s rise.

Once the word ‘Nazi,’ ‘Hitler,’ or ‘Fascist’ is said in an argument, all polite and intellectual discourse has gone away. As Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene said, “That’s a mean, nasty, dirty word. You know, Nazis were the National Socialist Party, just like the Democrats are now a national socialist party.”

Congresswoman Greene’s statement reminds us all that it is important to use your words wisely. Nazi is “a mean, nasty, dirty word,” and should never be used unless one can absolutely, positively back up their accusation with the indisputable FACTS (and EVIDENCE).

Hitler is the last name of a tyrannical political leader, who was rightly elected as Chancellor of Germany but who ran his country with favors, friendships, vengeful woes, and delegation.

Nazi and Fascist are two historic, politically-sensitive words that if used properly and not as “bomb drops” then actual conversations can occur and people might learn fascinating tidbits on history, politics, and economic systems. It is going to be difficult. American do love bombs, or more specifically, nuclear power. Otherwise, America would not have dropped two atomic bombs on Japan in Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. Although, it did end the war between the Americans and the Japanese.

There is nothing left to say unless one asks, “Why am I a Nazi?” or “Why am I like Hitler?” If these questions do come up, make sure to answer truthfully.

Let’s examine two statements. One was made by America’s current President and the other was made by a 20th-century Austrian-German genocidal dictator.

At the National & State Teacher of the Year Celebration, President Joe Biden said:

“There is no such thing as someone else’s child. No such thing as someone else’s child. Our nation’s children are all our children.”

And, in June 1933, Adolf Hitler said:

“If the older generation can not get accustomed to us, we shall take their children away from them and rear them as needful to the fatherland.”

Both statements are extremely similar in wording. Both advocate for children to be raised by the state, not their parents. Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton wrote a book titled It Takes a Village, where she reflects on “how children develop and what they need to succeed is inextricably entwined with the society in which they live and how well it sustains and supports their families and individuals.” How is a foster care system any better? Children without parents are lost and easier to manipulate.

Nazi Germany instituted the “Hitler Youth Group” and the “League of German Girls” for “Aryan” boys and girls still in grade school. By 1936, every “Aryan” child was to be either a part of the Hitler Youth or the League of German Girls. Joining an interest group was mandatory. Interest groups engage in changing public perceptions and organizing campaigns using subtle messages or more explicit forms of manipulation to garner the public to their own side.

In 1935, Trude Mohr, a leader for the League of German Girls Interest Group, said:

“Our people need a generation of girls that are healthy in body and mind, sure and decisive, proudly and confidently going forward … Such girls will then, by necessity, carry the values of National Socialism into the next generation as the mental bulwark of our people.”

The “mental bulwark of our people,” said Trude Mohr about the young adolescent and pre-teen girls living in Nazi Germany. Apparently, it did not matter if the Third Reich succeeded because the party members ensured the future of the Reich. They had taught their children the Nazi education curriculum. And, Nazi curricula ensured that the young people would be walking with blinders attuned only to see the angry, decrepit, and vile things about the world; all things that are reined in by totalitarian governments and the strength of the military.

The 1938 Nazi Teacher’s Manual:

“The schools should always follow life, never try to set the pace for life. Life precedes school. If schools follow the dictates of the Party, they will find their proper places.”

In response to the rise of Nazism, Dr. Schuster, a Geography teacher, explains his role in his school in 1938:

“I am trying through the teaching of geography to do everything in my power to give the boys knowledge and … judgment so that when, as they grow older, the Nazi fever dies down and it again becomes possible to offer some opposition, they may be prepared. There are four or five masters who are non-Nazis left in our school and we all work on the same plan. If we leave, Nazis will come in and there will be no honest teaching in the whole school.”

Not everyone in Germany was enthralled by the mysticism and politicalness of Nazism.

Some tried to work against it, to help their kids fight against the educational doctrines that required the youth to learn the knowledge necessary only for the service of people and the state. To serve the people and state was the Nazi motto for German Schoolchildren so a multiplicity of knowledge was forgotten among the Hitler Youth and League of German Girls.

The truth was not so much distorted but left out. Sometimes, even rewritten.

For example, the life and death of German nationalist Horst Wessel. Horst Wessel, a leader of the Black Reichswehr, was violently shot outside of a communist-owned club because of his apparent ties to Erna Janicke, a young prostitute. History textbooks described Horst Wessel as a “heroic, saintly figure of light, a man who sacrificed his life in the battle against evil” fighting to save a “reformed” prostitute from a communist rag. Wessel was “the exact mixture of ruffian and idealist that constitutes the armed Bohemian,” Horst Wessel was the perfect bully, the perfect ‘protector’ of Adolf Hitler. Perfect, because Horst Wessel completely changed the Nazi image because, between 1924-1929, almost every German regarded the Nazis as ruffians and clowns of no great importance. Apparently, Horst Wessel was a lyricist and musician as well because in 1930, Joseph Goebbels “discovered” the song The Flag Held High among Wessel’s personal belongings. Here is a picture of “the Perfect German:”

Taken from https://spartacus-educational.com/Horst_Wessel.htm

Said, in 1930’s Germany, “… such masterpieces of propaganda paid long dividends (Herzog 47),” when asked about how the NAZI Party got the Church on its side. Joseph Goebbels, Reich Minister of Propaganda & Public Enlightenment, is credited with saying:

“Repeat a lie often enough and it becomes the truth.”

Truth are FACTS that cannot be denied. How long until TRUTH is no longer FACTUAL but a believed accusation without EVIDENCE?

A law of propaganda. Propaganda is the dissemination of information or ideas with the intention of influencing or manipulating public opinion, often to promote a particular political agenda or ideology. In August 2022, President Biden met with Democratic Party donors, where he commented on America’s political parties:

“What we’re seeing now is either the beginning or the death knell of an extreme MAGA philosophy. It’s not just Trump, it’s the entire philosophy that underpins the—I’m going to say something: It’s like semi-fascism.”

A sub-headline of NBC’s article on President Joe Biden’s Soul of the Nation speech read:

“A President’s job is to speak aloud uncomfortable truths.”

In his Soul of the Nation speech, President Joe Biden referred to MAGA Republicans as “Semi-fascist.” Again, a president’s job is to speak out loud uncomfortable truths, not hard-worn opinions that no one disagrees upon.

When an entire nation believes an opinion to be true, then the nation has lost and the President must speak out loud on what is true–what is fact? And, that an opinion is only an accusation because it has NO research or evidence to back it up. More from President Biden:

“The MAGA Republicans don’t just threaten our personal rights and economic security,” President Joe Biden said. “They’re a threat to our very democracy. They refuse to accept the will of the people. They embrace political violence. They don’t believe in democracy.

“If Republicans win control of Congress, it won’t matter where you live: Women won’t have the right to choose anywhere. Anywhere.”

If this is not political pandering, then what is? President Biden literally does not give anyone a choice as he says, “If Republicans win control of Congress, women won’t have the right to choose anywhere.” How could President Biden get away with saying this?

If one was to translate President Joe Biden’s words without intellectual jargon, it would translate into, “Vote Democrat or Else!

FORMER FOX News Host Tucker Carlson, House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy, and New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu asked President Biden to apologize because the President’s rhetoric is “horribly inappropriate and insulting.” In response to President Biden’s reference to Republicans as Fascist, Governor Sununu responded back on CNN, on August 28, 2022:

“So, when we allow ourselves just to talk in these extremes, we polarize the country. We bring people – bring people further apart. If I remember, this was the guy, the candidate at the time … to be president that said he was going to bring everybody together. And then to call half of America fascists, come on…”

Governor Chris Sununu went on to condemn “extreme” rhetoric in both parties. Saying, “You can see elements of fascism and white supremacy all – in America. Let’s own that as Americans. There’s no doubt. And we can say that all the Democrats are Communists, they’re all ultra-socialist Communists that just want to bring down our free capitalistic market. That’s not true of Democrats either.”

Jason Stanley wrote in NBC’s Soul of the Nation article, “To Realize Democracy’s ideals, a nation must be transparent about where it has fallen short in the past.”

Let’s be honest about where the United States of America started and where it is now.