The Managerial Minority: Adolf Hitler on Woke 1.0
Austria 1910 to America 2024
The last time I read Mein Kampf I was maybe 15 years old,
like many an edgy child the prospect of a book written by the most evil man who’d ever lived was an irresistible temptation, and like almost every other edgy 15 year old by and large the whole thing flew over my head.
Adolf Hitler’s childhood in Pre-War Austria, his struggles in the Austrian capital of Vienna and subsequent war fighting and political organizing was completely outside my experience… And whilst looking back now I can see a lot of overlaps in our biography (prior to him enlisting), we were both raised in small monoethnic towns inof the once dominant ethnicity of large multiethnic conglomerates on the border of a more powerful more coherent empire far culturally closer to our ethnicity than the “diversifying” country of our birth. (Me: Canada and the US, Hitler: Austria and Germany), and both of us stepped out into the world expecting that high trust monoethnic culture to continue when we reached the city, only for it to suddenly and profoundly STOP…
But all of this was either in the future or well beyond the comprehension of 15 year old me.
So going back to read him on a whim, it was truly shocking just how completely he identified a phenomenon that I spent years trying to grapple with…
Adolf Hitler has one of the best explanations of Woke Politics and Social Justice anywhere in political theory.
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Presented below is maybe the most important excerpt of political philosophy no one ever reads. It is Adolf Hitler’s account of how he first rejected Social Democracy and became an Anti-Semite.
“What could turn someone so hateful!?” Every history teacher has cried. “What could have caused such a stirring of evil?”
He explains it! The entire section is 28 pages, you could read aloud in a single class! You don’t need exercises on projecting and psychoanalysis… The dude explained it.
He aptly describes how the faux impartiality of coordinated establishment media institutions are used to manufacture false cultural consensus and to demoralize and insult bourgeois and working class ethnic majorities (actual working class, not the euphemism for welfare recipients).
He beautifully describes the group rhetorical dynamics of left wing movements whereby dissent and political discussion is shouted down and the illusion of total consensus is created through social terror and the implicit threats. His description of a factory’s political discussions in 1910s Austria could be any university discussion class or common room in the “great Awokening” aside from the fact that Hitler encountered men willing to threaten violence, whereas now it’d be women threatening a discrimination complaint.
He describes how none of these discussions can actually advance because of the hidden external control over these “democratic” and “consensus” “Grassroots” organizations exercised via the ideological control and terror imposed by hidden networks of "intellectuals" and "thought leaders" who will deny any coordination and insist that the obviously astro-turfed "organic consensus" of the "movement" is truly self-creating… Right up until their secret meetings or email list is exposed and you can see them explicitly talking about the party line and message control, in a manner more blatant than the most conspiratorial and disillusioned rank and file Grassroots member could have imagined.
And from this Adolf Hitler develops his theory:
Specifically he explains how he came to see various left wing social and economic movements as barely concealed struggles for ethnic dominance, something which at 15 I would have read as profoundly uncharitable and mean spirited, but now is just plainly obvious given how explicitly American and European universalists, socialist, and progressives will now gladly tell you that ethnic conflict is core to their political program, and that the “brotherhood of man” is explicitly a brotherhood in arms against your ethnicity.
And of course he identifies “The Jews” as responcible for the whole thing.
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Now, does Hitler’s Anti-semitism preclude us taking his philosophy and political observations seriously?
Perhaps a better question: If Hitler’s Anti-semitism was wholly wrong… Why was it predictive and why did he succeed?
Usually when you have a wholly inaccurate political philosophy It doesn’t lead you to being in the decisive ideological position at the moment of crisis, and it certainly doesn’t lead you to being the most significant political leader of your century.
Most people who take a conspiratorial or antagonistic view of the world whether they blame lizard people or the FreeMasons, or whether their revisionist take is 21st century French Monarchism or US Sovereign Citizenship, ussually they wind up being blindsided by events and wind up eternal cranks…
Even when we can safely conclude that the main theory of an ideology is wholly false such as Marxist Economics (which do not work under any circumstances as 20th century “experiments” and Right wing economists have amply demonstrated), we must conclude something hidden within the recesses of Marxist-Leninism is actually a very important political if not economic insight, and that this accounts for their effectiveness and success at attaining absolute power even if they wielded it evilly.
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So if we are not to accept Hitler’s anti-semitism, but we accept that his theory was explanatory and effective… What is the accurate part of the theory? Why did he become Hitler? What truth is buried in there?
My explanation is that he was accurately assessing the situation, right down to the Jew stuff, but just not for the reason he thought.
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Assessing the same phenomenon the Marxist-Trotskyist turned Anti-communist James Burnham identified Leftist Ideology as weapon of class-warfare, however he is unique in that he identifies the class-warfare as NOT a class-war between the Bourgeoisie and the Working Class, and leftism NOT as a weapon of the working class, but rather he Identifies the class war as between the Bourgeoisie and what he identifies as “The Managerial Class”, and Leftism as the tool of this emergent class.
As the Bourgeoisie, the capital owning class, grew the managing of their increasingly complex industries and assets involved the hiring and elevation of educated skilled “Managers” to control and regulate the workings of the working class the bourgeoisie employed… This created a monster.
These “managers” secretly resented and hated the Bourgeoisie, despite being equally and often more educated than the Bourgeoisie and petty Bourgeois, they were still relegated to being subservient employees whilst the Bourgeois land, business, and property owners were truly free and without masters. And by the turn of the 20th century this class had expanded to be a potentially lethal political force, creating organizations, taking over the actual organic unions and advocacy groups of the true working class, and already attempting to infiltrate and expand government organizations and expand employment for more “Managers”.
If you’re wondering why I’m putting “managers” in scare quotes, it is because true management is amongst the first roles this class jettisons as they advance themselves. A manager by rights is a person put in direct hierarchical responsibility, either over physical assets or physical people. A Bourgeoise shop owner might hire or promote a Shop Manager for example who is in charge of the Store and the store’s employees while the shop owner is not present. This Manager actually Manages the store. If the employees get nothing done, or a problem arises, or the store burns down,.. The Shop Manager is directly responcible and accountable. They are hierarchically responcible for the employees and assets and accountable to the owner in a classic hierarchical pyramid.
Were this an army the Owner would be the General or King, and the Manager would be the junior officer or Lord over the soldiers.
The Managerial class does NOT LIKE being accountable, indeed their entire existence is the quest to avoid accountability and promote sideways into roles where they can never be held accountable for results. To Graduate from Managers to Bureaucrats, the same way smart officers in the US army now no longer desire a command of a Brigade or a ship (where one fire or disaster could sideline their career) but rather to disappear in safety onto some committee in the pentagon.
This is why I often refer to them as the Bureaucratic Class, since many of these people now have careers that veer from Academia, to think tanks, to some corporate committee, to a public sector body, to finally maybe at the end of their career being appointed the head of something… Without EVER having had a direct responsibility of management they could have ever been held responcible for failing.
And indeed we can see this is already quite advanced by Hitler’s time in Austria, his encounter with these “Managers” isn’t as his direct report superiors at his job, but rather n as the non-employee Democratic Socialist organizers of the Trade Unionists at his work, who not- being employees, don’t actually care about securing the best deals for the workers, nor getting them to work efficiently, but rather how they fit into the ecosystem of democratic socialist politics and keeping the workers desperate and politically programmed so that they can be maximumly wielded to socialist political ends.
As Burnham and subsequent analysts of Managerial theory have identified, the greatest enemy of the Manager is the organic capitalist transaction. Whether that be an employer/employee exchange, or a properly negotiated genuine union contract to advance the interest of the workers (non-political non-violent collective bargaining being perfectly compatible with free markets as a exercise in freedom of association), this is anathema to the manager as the goal of the Manager is to find and create unending problems which will always need an expanding (and promoting) number of highly paid university educated bureaucrats to “manage” the problem.
And this is why economies, productivity, and technological advancement have decayed wherever the managerial/bureaucratic class has gained power. And why their greatest enemy is the Bourgeois ownership class who are actually quite interested in and attached to the value of their capital property and to its productivity. The Manager/Bureaucrats are actively destructive to capital wherever they gain power, because of necessity the capital is not theirs, it is someone else’s or it is a common asset of the people whether that be public property, social trust, or mere functional efficient institutions. The way for a Manager/Bureaucrat to advance themselves, their allies, and their fortunes is to find something that works, and then to break it in such a manner that they capture its values.
Of course when the Bourgeoise OWN the assets and businesses, this has an extreme limit, the responcible business owner can go in and fire the entirety of them, and MAKE money for having done it… such as Elon did with 75% of the staff at Twitter. Likewise in an absolute Monarchy the managerial class in inherently limited… The monarch does not like to waste money on people who create problems and add no value (aside from a select group of favourites) so in absolute monarchies the managers struggle to gain power, but when the institution under question is a “Democracy” then no one has ownership control over anything, and the managers can run rampant.
Public School Teachers and school administrators are a classic example. In the 1950s the school system was remarkably effective, remarkably cheap, and remarkably responsive. Hundreds of thousands of 1 room schoolhouses dotted the country, more or less immediately answerable to superintendent, who answered to a county or township. These Schoolhouses then fed their students to high schools with entrance exams, who fed to universities and colleges with their own entrance exams… There was a major market mechanism and feedback loop whereby a school that failed its students would be immediately visible as such to parents viewing their child’s success or failure, and such a failing school would either fail, or fire and replace the teacher or teachers.
Then the Managerial class “Rationalized” the system, they amalgamated the hundreds of thousand of schoolhouses into thousands of large schools, now needing principals and entire sets of additional staff and administrators, none of whom can be fired except by the most obtuse mechanisms even if they aren’t unionized which almost all of them are. Intractable social issues were found such as racial inequality or children being born with mental disability (problems that can never be solved, only managed) and they were added to the schools mandate and parents ability to hold schools to their actual measurable achievable goals: Educating the promising educable children! That’s not only thrown by the wayside, it’s now been rendered racist and ableist to even suggest that the promising kids no longer learning latin or Plutarch might be treated as a failure. Likewise the suggestion discipline might be enforced against the ghetto students is racist, clearly the solution is not expelling the problem students (and thus depriving the system of the tax revenue associated with them) the solution is to spend thousands of dollars per student on Ipads! And to hire people to troubleshoot all the problems with those IPads, and to issue software contracts to companies that will fund “Digital Education” advocacy groups which hire former superintendents at high 6 figure salaries to advocate the necessity of those ipads.
And in general every cost has expanded, every result has diminished, the very safety of the students has diminished, the logistical challenge of getting kids to school has increased (they can’t walk anymore), the social capital of the region has been destroyed by the depersonalizing nature of the institution… But at every turn the accountability teachers and administrators can be held to have diminished, their opportunities for career advancement have increased, their “Professional development” opportunities (in work vacation days) have expanded, and the needs for ever more “educators” have expanded ensuring that all the previous ones need promoting to manage them.
“Why has the education system failed?” What are you talking about!? It’s one of the most efficient and cutting edge institutions in American life! No other institution so efficiently takes the money, opportunities, social capital, and basic safety of it’s supposed customers and owners and converts it to the wealth and status of the managerial class.
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This explanation of Burnham’s is very tidy, indeed it has now taken over both Libertarian and Conservative theory, J.D. Vance, Mark Andreesen, Peter Theil, Elon… many of the last greatest bourgeoise industrialists (actual owners who feel responcible for maintaining the value and attachments of their households businesses, and assets) and their political operatives have publically pumped Burnham’s “Managerial Revolution” as necessary for understanding the state of US institutional decay, and the nature of the US “Deep State”.
So then why did Hitler focus on the Jews? And why did he manage to identify the same phenomenon by doing so?
Because they were Jews. Or atleast they were in Austria.
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Notice how the Managerial Class attacks not just the already valued, already conceived, already on the balance books capital assets of the Bourgeois class, and it doesn’t isolated itself solely to the dollar denominated, official, already concieved economic transactions of workers and citizens… rather they expand the scope of the economic and political to find anything of value whereby they can create new problems and extract value.
It was not the role of schools to resolve racial inequality, indeed the prospect a 1 room schoolhouse could affect such a thing at all would seem laughable… But no sooner has the bureaucratization begun that not only does a unique administrator needs to be employed to manage the racial inequality, but now more need to employed to resolve the disciplinary “inequality” between the black and white students, and when those have pressured the teachers to allow light light violence and sexual assault, some horror will occur, and now full time “community security” and other non-police, police officers need to be employed in the school to prevent girls from being raped in the hallways or teachers burnt alive, as occurred at Franklin K. Lane in New York, and countless other schools across America.
I encourage you to read “Race War in HighSchool” it not only tells you WHAT happened during desegregation, it tells you it from the perspective of the Union Reps and bureaucrats who made it possible.
And in the midst of all of this the teacher’s union is not concerned with the safety of it’s members (damn the students) but in getting them a sufficiently generous compensation package for their members troubles, thus screwing the taxpaying parents double, not only are your daughters being beaten and raped because of failed desegregation schemes irrelevant to the core mission of educating children, you’re now paying additional taxes for the privilege.
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Now imagine if you were a Teacher in the middle of this? Imagine if you were witnessing this? Responsible for this? Imagine if you were a shop floor Union rep in the factory Hitler worked at and the union consistently refused any deal to help your workers avoid industrial accidents for some claimed better deal down the road, but really just to extract further political use from them?
Might you not resign in outrage?
Imagine if you were one of the police officers in Britain right now, being asked to arrest old ladies for posts on twitter, at the same time you’re being prevented from arresting sexual predators lest the force be accused of racism?
Might you quit?
Wouldn’t you feel responcible, not just for what could get you fired, but for the wider community and people whom you are part of and are actively degrading and damaging?
And wouldn’t you feel it less, if you weren’t part of that community?
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It is a truism on the left that “community policing”, “Inclusion”, “representation”, and “seeing their own people” (ie. Affirmative action) in schooling, governance, corporate leadership, and regular policing is VITALLY important, since ONLY members of a community are truly capable of caring about it’s interests…
Isn’t this implicitly a confession that these same minority “representatives” would in turn be in-capable of caring about the white majority community whom they are being entrusted with vastly more of the physical and psychic capital of?
Remember most minority groups have parallel institutions, their own community associations, often their own dispute resolution mechanisms, often their own schools!
And these groups, who are not nearly as dependent on functioning of a police service, school system, community asset, or government institution… they’re being put in charge of institutions, that since the managerial revolution have naturally incentivized predation, decay, and the violation of social trust… and their community’s share of the total social capital and potential value that can be extracted is a microscopic portion next to whitey’s, and they have redundancy anyway.
The Ideal member of the Managerial Class, the one who can best play its games, advance its interests, and extract value for it… is one who feels entirely removed from the consequences of the decay they inflict. One who feels no compunction or pangs of conscious. One who is able to look on the people losing real measurable value for some ethereal good such as “equality” or “the environment” with nothing but contempt and hatred for their loss.
The ideal member of the managerial class should be able to attend or host DEI meetings that waste company money and time actively damaging the camaraderie between workers, and not only feel no offense on behalf of the shareholders, their fellow employees, or the wider culture of the company, but actively revel in the fact that this is advancing their career, they got out of work for the day, and now they have new tools to pressure their superiors for privileges. They should identify with the “leader” of the DEI class and aspire to be such “change leader” themselves, and feel no attachment whatsoever to the functional institution, the community that exists around it, or the entrusted capital of people who’ve invested in that institution, and the cultural capital that the community has built in it.
Indeed They should be offended shareholders, employees, towns, and companies aren’t thanking them for giving them the opportunity to do the right thing, and surrender all their money and social functionality in spite of themselves!
In a word the ideal Manager is a foreigner. A Minority.
In leftist parlance: A Colonizer.
Both in the case of The lesser manager, the one who commits evil by omission, who keeps their head down and keeps serving the purposes of the perverse institution and even sorta still believing in it’s ideals, and The Greater Manager, the one who not only serves the machinery of Managerial class interests and bureaucracy for bureaucracy’s sake, but who can devise ever newer more shameless ways to create bloat, exacerbate problems, and advance their career irrespective of the consequences to their nominal customers or the public they nominally “serve”… Achieving either state, and advancing through that bureaucracy, and putting your committee or bosses’ interests first… All of that is served by NOT feeling kinship or responsibility to the people you are screwing over.
Even by the end of the 1960s, as White teachers resigned in disgust at the state of things and armed riots erupted around Franklin K. Lane, the New York City educational system found the same minority to fulfill that role:
“Of the system's 60,000 teachers more than two-thirds were Jewish”
-Race War in Highschool, Harad Saltzman
Indeed as hinted, this is traditional method of Colonial administration on a conquered or resisting people. When local police or officials refuse to partake in a crackdown or extractive policy out of loyalty to the communities they administer countless ancient and modern regimes have cycled in Foreign, or outsider forces to do to the locals what they will not do to themselves, whether the example that speaks to you is Ngo Dinh Diem bringing in American “Advisors” to suppress the population of South Vietnam… or whether the Analogy you like is the British employing Hessian troops against the Americans.
Of course it is not the Jewish population itself which is to blame for this, or at least not exclusively, but rather the very dynamic. Within 20 years of the time Hitler was writing Leftist factions would also employ Tartars, Latvians, Basques, Catalans, Georgians, Armenians, Italians, and countless other ethnicities as Managerial minorities to either attack or administer conquered territories.. And of course Right wing regimes would employ Cossacks, Galiciens, and other minorities as enforcers…
But whereas the right was concerned with ethnicities of reliable fighters, the left was concerned with finding reliable apparatchiks and bureaucrats. And they perfected their search and training of them.
One of the amazing phenomena I remember from university, something I couldn’t quite believe, was how quickly the woke were recruited and had the ideology downloaded into them.
Mixed race girls and immigrants, with not a political idea in them, from one week to the next would go from fairly normal high school graduates to fanatical activists with ethnic hatred in their core, a complete despisal of the civilization their white dads had built, a need to shout it from the rooftops. And somehow this ended in them getting everything they wanted instead of being completely humiliated.
At the time I thought this was some bizzare insane social movement from Tumbler… but while a social movement could explain 1-2 new rhetorical tricks or ideas, these people where showing up with what seemed like an entire playbook! They’d say the most insane things in a crowd, and in unison the crowd would turned on you if you stated how this was obviously false. They’d disrupt a class to insult and berate a fellow student in the most unprofessional bad faith manner, again for saying something which was not only obviously true, but genuinely inoffensive to any normal person…
Then instead of being disciplined or asked to leave, or expelled for so obviously violating the decorum and academic standards of a philosophy class… Instead the poor trapped normie would be forced to apologize, or HE might be the one expelled.
Why were they behaving like this? What possessed them to do this? How could they ever imagine this was appropriate? How did they know it would work…
Who taught them to do it?
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Contrary to the egalitarian, brotherhood of man claptrap, leftism has ALWAYS been an ethnic coalition of educated elite aspirants and criminals from non-majority anti-social ethnicities and identity categories, against the productive majority who identify with the social order, its functional capital stock, it’s legitimately organic capitalist exchanges, and it’s non-tangible social capital. In the 1910s Austria this might have been the Jews, in 1920s America this might have been Italian immigrants like Sacco and Vanzetti. In 1970s Canada this might have been the Quebecois, in 1980s Britain this might have been North Irish Catholics, or in the modern world this might be sexual minorities who in exchange for actively insulting you will demand affirmative action and hundreds of thousands of dollars in cosmetic surgery.
The remarkable thing is just how little the deep state, the left, the managerial class, the woke, etc. Now feel any need to conceal it.
Kamala Harris is a mixed Indian-Carib Black wine aunt with no children of her own Married to a Jewish entertainment lawyer who works on the taskforce for “Counter-AntiSemitism”, whose daughter via his first wife is a trans-activist and entertainment activist, and whose son via his first marriage is a hollywood entertainment executive, all directly involved in one way or another in activism for the Managerial Class or shaping of media to fit its political goals.
Not only are none of these people at all invested in either founding ethnicities of America, black or white, but all of them are somehow directly active in advocacy and political movements explicitly to “challenge” them and extract more money, social capital, and functionality of life from them, in favour of “Our Democracy” of unquestionable unaccountable unauditable government control.
No family so totally embodies the Managerial Minority ideal or the complete detachment and hostility to any of the interests of the functional productive private sector majority of the population. The real Americans. The volk.
And somehow the democratic party sees no problem with advertising that openly and explicitly as what it’s party stand for.
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So ya. These are my thoughts going back and reading the most controversial Right Wing thinker of all time in light of the currently most important right wing thinker of all time.
Of course I think “deconstructing the Administrative state” “draining the swamp” and crushing the Managerial class in favour of the old Bourgeoisie is a vastly better solution in the modern world than militarizing and fighting an apocalyptic 21st century war against the French and Joseph Stalin (not that those aren’t two enemies eternally worth fighting).
But ya, Contrary to everything we’ve been taught, I think the Right Wing equivalent of Marx, Lenin and Mao combined is an important citation to engage with, and an important thinker to be in conversation with, even if we might reject some or many of his conclusions, the fact of his success and historical importance points to core powerful insights buried in his theory and doctrine.
Below I have the full excerpt. “Adolf Hitler on Our Dem… Sorry, Social Democracy”:
Mein Kampf pg’s 37-65
What I knew of Social Democracy in my youth was exceed¬
ingly little and very inaccurate.
I was profoundly pleased that it should carry on the struggle
for universal suffrage and the secret ballot. For even then my
intelligence told me that this must help to weaken the Habsburg
regime which I so hated. In the conviction that the Austrian
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Mein Kampf
Empire could never be preserved except by victimizing its Ger¬
mans, but that even the price of a gradual Slavization of the
German element by no means provided a guaranty of an empire
really capable of survival, since the power of the Slavs to uphold
the state must be estimated as exceedingly dubious, I welcomed
every development which in my opinion would inevitably lead
to the collapse of this impossible state which condemned ten
million Germans to death. The more the linguistic Babel cor¬
roded and disorganized parliament, the closer drew the inevitable
hour of the disintegration of this Babylonian Empire, and with
it the hour of freedom for my German-Austrian people. Only in
this way could the Anschluss with the old mother country be
restored.
Consequently, this activity of the Social Democracy was not
displeasing to me. And the fact that it strove to improve the
living conditions of the worker, as, in my innocence, I was still
stupid enough to believe, likewise seemed to speak rather for it
than against it. What most repelled me was its hostile attitude
toward the struggle for the preservation of Germanism, its dis¬
graceful courting of the Slavic ‘ comrade/ who accepted this
declaration of love in so far as it was bound up with practical
concessions, but otherwise maintained a lofty and arrogant re¬
serve, thus giving the obtrusive beggars their deserved reward.
Thus, at the age of seventeen the word ‘ Marxism ’ was as yet
little known to me, while ‘Social Democracy’ and socialism
seemed to me identical concepts. Here again it required the fist
of Fate to open my eyes to this unprecedented betrayal of the
peoples.
Up to that time I had known the Social Democratic Party only
as an onlooker at a few mass demonstrations, without possessing
even the slightest insight into the mentality of its adherents or
the nature of its doctrine; but now, at one stroke, I came into
contact with the products of its education and ‘philosophy.’
And in a few months I obtained what might otherwise have re¬
quired decades: an understanding of a pestilential whore, 1 cloak-
1 ( PesthureJ Second edition has ‘Pestilenz
First Meeting With Social Democrats
39
ing herself as social virtue and brotherly love, from which I hope
humanity will rid this earth with the greatest dispatch, since
otherwise the earth might well become rid of humanity.
My first encounter with the Social Democrats occurred during
my employment as a building worker.
From the very beginning it was none too pleasant. My clothing
was still more or less in order, my speech cultivated, and my
manner reserved. I was still so busy with my own destiny that
I could not concern myself much with the people around me. I
looked for work only to avoid starvation, only to obtain an op¬
portunity of continuing my education, though ever so slowly.
Perhaps I would not have concerned myself at all with my new
environment if on the third or fourth day an event had not taken
place which forced me at once to take a position. I was asked to
join the organization.
My knowledge of trade-union organization was at that time
practically non-existent. I could not have proved that its exist¬
ence was either beneficial or harmful. When I was told that I
had to join, I refused. The reason I gave was that I did not un¬
derstand the matter, but that I would not let myself be forced
into anything. Perhaps my first reason accounts for my not being
thrown out at once. They may perhaps have hoped to convert
me or break down my resistance in a few days. In any event,
they had made a big mistake. At the end of two weeks I could
no longer have joined, even if I had wanted to. In these two
weeks I came to know the men around me more closely, and no
power in the world could have moved me to join an organization
whose members had meanwhile come to appear to me in so un¬
favorable a light.
During the first days I was irritable.
At noon some of the workers went to the near-by taverns while
others remained at the building site and ate a lunch which, as a rule,
was quite wretched. These were the married men whose wives
brought them their noonday soup in pathetic bowls. Toward
the end of the week their number always increased, why I did not
understand until later. On these occasions politics was discussed.
40
Mein Kampf
I drank my bottle of milk and ate my piece of bread somewhere
off to one side, and cautiously studied my new associates or re¬
flected on my miserable lot. Nevertheless, I heard more than
enough; and often it seemed to me that they purposely moved
closer to me, perhaps in order to make me take a position. In
any case, what I heard was of such a nature as to infuriate me in
the extreme. These men rejected everything: the nation as an
invention of the ‘ capitalistic ’ (how often was I forced to hear this
single word!) classes; the fatherland as an instrument of the
bourgeoisie for the exploitation of the working class; the authority
of law as a means for oppressing the proletariat; the school as an
institution for breeding slaves and slaveholders; religion as a
means for stultifying the people and making them easier to ex¬
ploit; morality as a symptom of stupid, sheeplike patience, etc.
There was absolutely nothing which was not drawn -through the
mud of a terrifying depth. 1
At first I tried to keep silent. But at length it became impos¬
sible. I began to take a position and to oppose them. But I was
forced to recognize that this was utterly hopeless until I possessed
certain definite knowledge of the controversial points. And so I
began to examine the sources from which they drew this sup¬
posed wisdom. I studied book after book, pamphlet after pam¬
phlet.
From then on our discussions at work were often very heated.
I argued back, from day to day better informed than my an¬
tagonists concerning their own knowledge, until one day they
made use of the weapon which most readily conquers reason:
terror and violence. A few of the spokesmen on the opposing side
forced me either to leave the building at once or be thrown off the
scaffolding. Since I was alone and resistance seemed hopeless, I
preferred, richer by one experience, to follow the former counsel.
I went away filled with disgust, but at the same time so agi¬
tated that it would have been utterly impossible for me to turn
my back on the whole business. No, after the first surge of in¬
dignation, my stubbornness regained the upper hand. I was
1 1 In den Kot einer entsetzlichen Tiefed
Social-Democratic Press
41
determined to go to work on another building in spite of my
experience. In this decision I was reinforced by Poverty which,
a few weeks later, after I had spent what little I had saved from
my wages, enfolded me in her heartless arms. I had to go back
whether I wanted to or not. The same old story began anew and
ended very much the same as the first time.
I wrestled with my innermost soul: are these people human,
worthy to belong to a great nation?
A painful question; for if it is answered in the affirmative, the
struggle for my nationality really ceases to be worth the hard¬
ships and sacrifices which the best of us have to make for the
sake of such scum; and if it is answered in the negative, our na¬
tion is pitifully poor in human beings.
On such days of reflection and cogitation, I pondered with
anxious concern on the masses of those no longer belonging to
their people and saw them swelling to the proportions of a
menacing army.
With what changed feeling I now gazed at the endless columns
of a mass demonstration of Viennese workers that took place one
day as they marched past four abreast! For nearly two hours I
stood there watching with bated breath the gigantic human
dragon slowly winding by. In oppressed anxiety, I finally left the
place and sauntered homeward. In a tobacco shop on the way 1
saw the Arbeiier-Zeitung , the central organ of the old Austrian
Social Democracy. It was available in a cheap people’s cafe, to
which I often went to read newspapers; but up to that time I had
not been able to bring myself to spend more than two minutes on
the miserable sheet, whose whole tone affected me like moral
vitriol. Depressed by the demonstration, I was driven on by an
inner voice to buy the sheet and read it carefully. That evening
I did so, fighting down the fury that rose up in me from time to
time at this concentrated solution of lies.
More than any theoretical literature, my daily reading of the
Social Democratic press enabled me to study the inner nature of
these thought-processes.
For what a difference between the glittering phrases about free-
42
Mein Kampf
dom, beauty, and dignity in the theoretical literature, the de¬
lusive welter of words seemingly expressing the most profound
and laborious wisdom, the loathsome humanitarian morality —
all this written with the incredible gall that comes with prophetic
certainty — and the brutal daily press, shunning no villainy,
employing every means of slander, lying with a virtuosity that
would bend iron beams, all in the name of this gospel of a new
humanity. The one is addressed to the simpletons of the middle,
not to mention the upper, educated, ‘ classes/ the other to the
masses.
For me immersion in the literature and press of this doctrine
and organization meant finding my way back to my own people.
What had seemed to me an unbridgable gulf became the source
of a greater love than ever before.
Only a fool can behold the work of this villainous poisoner and
still condemn the victim. The more independent I made myself
in the next few years, the clearer grew my perspective, hence my
insight into the inner causes of the Social Democratic successes.
I now understood the significance of the brutal demand that I
read only Red papers, attend only Red meetings, read only Red
books, etc. With plastic clarity I saw before my eyes the in¬
evitable result of this doctrine of intolerance.
The psyche of the great masses is not receptive to anything
that is half-hearted and weak.
Like the woman, whose psychic state is determined less by
grounds of abstract reason than by an indefinable emotional
longing for a force which will complement her nature, and who,
consequently, would rather bow to a strong man than dominate
a weakling, likewise the masses love a commander more than a
petitioner and feel inwardly more satisfied by a doctrine, tolerat¬
ing no other beside itself, than by the granting of liberalistic
freedom with which, as a rule, they can do little, and are prone
to feel that they have been abandoned. They are equally un¬
aware of their shameless spiritual terrorization and the hideous
abuse of their human freedom, for they absolutely fail to suspect
the inner insanity of the whole doctrine. All they see is the^ruth-
Social-Democratic Tactics
43
less force and brutality of its calculated manifestations, to which
they always submit in the end.
If Social Democracy is opposed by a doctrine of greater truth , but
equal brutality of methods , the latter will conquer , though this may
require the bitterest struggle.
Before two years had passed, the theory as well as the technical
methods of Social Democracy were clear to me.
I understood the infamous spiritual terror which this move¬
ment exerts, particularly on the bourgeoisie, which is neither
morally nor mentally equal to such attacks; at a given sign it
unleashes a veritable barrage of lies and slanders against what¬
ever adversary seems most dangerous, until the nerves of the at¬
tacked persons break down and, just to have peace again, they
sacrifice the hated individual.
However, the fools obtain no peace.
The game begins again and is repeated over and over until
fear of the mad dog results in suggestive paralysis.
Since the Social Democrats best know the value of force from
their own experience, they most violently attack those in whose
nature they detect any of this substance which is so rare. Con¬
versely, they praise every weakling on the opposing side, some¬
times cautiously, sometimes loudly, depending on the real or
supposed quality of his intelligence.
They fear an impotent, spineless genius less than a forceful
nature of moderate intelligence.
But with the greatest enthusiasm they commend weaklings in
both mind and force.
They know how to create the illusion that this is the only way
of preserving the peace, and at the same time, stealthily but
steadily, they conquer one position after another, sometimes by
silent blackmail, sometimes by actual theft, at moments when the
general attention is directed toward other matters, a,nd either
does not want to be disturbed or considers the matter too small
to raise a stir about, thus again irritating the vicious antagonist.
This is a tactic based on precise calculation of all human weak¬
nesses, and its result will lead to success with almost mathe-
44
Mein Kampf
matical certainty unless the opposing side learns to combat poison
gas with poison gas.
It is our duty to inform' all weaklings that this is a question of
to be or not to be.
I achieved an equal understanding of the importance of physi¬
cal terror toward the individual and the masses.
Here, too, the psychological effect can be calculated with pre¬
cision.
Terror at the place of employment , in the factory, in the meeting
hall , and on the occasion of mass demonstrations will always he suc¬
cessful unless opposed hy equal terror .
In this case, to be sure, the party will cry bloody murder;
though it has long despised all state authority, it will set up a
howling cry for that same authority and in most cases will
actually attain its goal amid the general confusion- it will find
some idiot of a higher official who, in the imbed! ic hope of
propitiating the feared adversary for later eventualities, will help
this world plague to break its opponent.
The impression made by such a success on the minds of the
great masses of supporters as well as opponents can only be
measured by those who know the soul of a people, not from
books, but from life. For while in the ranks of their supporters
the victory achieved seems a triumph of the justice of their own
cause, the defeated adversary in most cases despairs of the suc¬
cess of any further resistance.
The more familiar I became, principally with the methods of
physical terror, the more indulgent I grew toward all the hun¬
dreds of thousands who succumbed to it.
What makes me most indebted to that period of suffering is
that it alone gave back to me my people, taught me to distinguish
the victims from their seducers.
The results of this seduction can be designated only as victims.
For if I attempted to draw a few pictures from life, depicting the
essence of these ‘lowest’ classes, my picture would not be com¬
plete without the assurance that in these depths I also found
bright spots in the form of a rare willingness to make sacrifices.
Sins of the Bourgeoisie
45
of loyal comradeship, astonishing frugality, and modest reserve,
especially among the older workers. Even though these virtues
were steadily vanishing in the younger generation, if only through
the general effects of the big city, there were many, even among
the young men, whose healthy blood managed to dominate the
foul tricks of life. If in their political activity, these good, often
kind-hearted people nevertheless joined the mortal enemies of
our nationality, thus helping to cement their ranks, the reason
was that they neither understood nor could understand the base¬
ness of the new doctrine, and that no one else took the trouble to
bother about them, and finally that the social conditions were
stronger than any will to the contrary that may have been pres¬
ent. The poverty to which they sooner or later succumbed drove
them into the camp of the Social Democracy.
Since on innumerable occasions the bourgeoisie has in the clumsi¬
est and most immoral way opposed demands which were justified
from the universal human point of view , often without obtaining or
even justifiably expecting any profit from such an attitude, even the
most self-respecting worker was driven out of the trade-union or¬
ganization into political activity.
Millions of workers, I am sure, started out as enemies of the
Social Democratic Party in their innermost soul, but their re¬
sistance was overcome in a way which was sometimes utterly
insane; that is, when the bourgeois parties adopted a hostile at¬
titude toward every demand of a social character. Their simple,
narrow-minded rejection of all attempts to better working con¬
ditions, to introduce safety devices on machines, to prohibit child
labor and protect the woman, at least in the months when she was
bearing the future national comrade under her heart, contributed
to drive the masses into the net of Social Democracy which
gratefully snatched at every case of such a disgraceful attitude.
Never can our political bourgeoisie make good its sins in this
direction, for by resisting all attempts to do away with social
abuses, they sowed hatred and seemed to justify even the asser¬
tions of the mortal enemies of the entire nation, to the effect that
only the Social Democratic Party represented the interests of the
working people
46
Mein Kampf
Thus, to begin with, they created the moral basis for the actual
existence of the trade unions, the organization which has always
been the most effective pander to the political party.
In my Viennese years I was forced, whether I liked it or not, to
take a position on the trade unions.
Since I regarded them as an inseparable ingredient of the
Social Democratic Party as such, my decision was instantaneous
and — mistaken.
I flatly rejected them without thinking.
And in this infinitely important question, as in so many others,
Fate itself became my instructor.
The result was a reversal of my first judgment.
By my twentieth year I had learned to distinguish between a
union as a means of defending the general social rights of the
wage-earner, and obtaining better living conditions for him as an
individual, and the trade union as an instrument of the party in
the political class struggle.
The fact that Social Democracy understood the enormous im¬
portance of the trade-union movement assured it of this instru¬
ment and hence of success; the fact that the bourgeoisie were not
aware of this cost them their political position. They thought
they could stop a logical development by means of an impertinent
‘rejection/ but in reality they only forced it into illogical chan¬
nels. For to call the trade-union movement in itself unpatriotic
is nonsense and untrue to boot. Rather the contrary is true. If
trade-union activity strives and succeeds in bettering the lot of a
class which is one of the basic supports of the nation, its work is
not only not anti-patriotic or seditious, but ‘national’ in the
truest sense of the word. For in this way it helps to create the
social premises without which a general national education is
unthinkable. It wins the highest merit by eliminating social
cankers, attacking intellectual as well as physical infections, and
thus helping to contribute to the general health of the body
politic.
Consequently, the question of their necessity is really super¬
fluous.
The Trade-Union Question
47
As long as there are employers with little social understanding
or a deficient sense of justice and propriety, it is not only the
right but the duty of their employees, who certainly constitute a
part of our nationality, to protect the interests of the general
public against the greed and unreason of the individual; for the
preservation of loyalty and faith in a social group is just as much
to the interest of a nation as the preservation of the people’s
health.
Both of these are seriously menaced by unworthy employers
who do not feel themselves to be members of the national com¬
munity as a whole. From the disastrous effects of their greed or
ruthlessness grow profound evils for the future.
To eliminate the causes of such a development is to do a service
to the nation and in no sense the opposite.
Let no one say that every individual is free to draw the conse*
quences from an actual or supposed injustice; in other words, to
leave his job. No! This is shadow-boxing and must be regarded as
an attempt to divert attention. Either the elimination of bad,
unsocial conditions serves the interest of the nation or it does not.
If it does, the struggle against them must be carried on with
weapons which offer the hope of success. The individual worker,
however, is never in a position to defend himself against the
power of the great industrialist, for in such matters it cannot be
superior justice that conquers (if that were recognized, the whole
struggle would stop from lack of cause) — no, what matters here is
superior power. Otherwise the sense of justice alone would bring
the struggle to a fair conclusion, or, more accurately speaking,
the struggle could never arise.
No, if the unsocial or unworthy treatment of men calls for resist¬
ance, this struggle, as long as no legal judicial authorities have been
created for the elimination of these evils, can only be decided by
superior power. And this makes it obvious that the power of the
employer concentrated in a single person can only be countered by
the mass of employees banded imo a single person, if the possibility
of a victory is not to be renounced in advance.
Thus, trade-union organization can lead to a strengthening of
48
Mein Kampf
the social idea in its practical effects on daily life, and thereby to
an elimination of irritants which are constantly giving cause for
dissatisfaction and complaints.
If this is not the case, it is to a great extent the fault of those
who have been able to place obstacles in the path of any legal
regulation of social evils or thwart them by means of their politi¬
cal influence.
Proportionately as the political bourgeoisie did not understand,
or rather did not want to understand, the importance of trade-
union organization, and resisted it, the Social Democrats took
possession of the contested movement. Thus, far-sightedly it
created a firm foundation which on several critical occasions has
stood up when all other supports failed. In this way the intrinsic
purpose was gradually submerged, making place for new aims.
It never occurred to the Social Democrats to limit the move¬
ment they had thus captured to its original task.
No, that was far from their intention.
In a few decades the weapon for defending the social rights of
man had, in their experienced hands, become an instrument for
the destruction of the national economy. And they did not let
themselves be hindered in the least by the interests of the workers.
For in politics, as in other fields, the use of economic pressure
always permits blackmail, as long as the necessary unscrupulous¬
ness is present on the one side, and sufficient sheeplike patience
on the other.
Something which in this case was true of both sides.
# # #
By the turn of the century, the trade-union movement had
ceased to serve its former function. From year to year it had
entered more and more into the sphere of Social Democratic
politics and finally had no use except as a battering-ram in the
class struggle. Its purpose was to cause the collapse of the whole
arduously constructed economic edifice by persistent blows, thus,
POLITIZATION OF TRADE UNIONS
49
the more easily, after removing its economic foundations, to pre¬
pare the same lot for the edifice of state. Less and less attention
was paid to defending the real needs of the working class, and
finally political expediency made it seem undesirable to relieve
the social or cultural miseries of the broad masses at all, for other¬
wise there was a risk that these masses, satisfied in their desires,
could no longer be used forever as docile shock troops.
The leaders of the class struggle looked on this development
with such dark foreboding and dread that in the end they re¬
jected any really beneficial social betterment out of hand, and
actually attacked it with the greatest determination.
And they were never at a loss for an explanation of a line of
behavior which seemed so inexplicable.
By screwing the demands higher and higher, they made their
possible fulfillment seem so trivial and unimportant that they
were able at all times to tell the masses that they were dealing
with nothing but a diabolical attempt to weaken, if possible in
fact to paralyze, the offensive power of the working class in the
cheapest way, by such a ridiculous satisfaction of the most ele¬
mentary rights. In view of the great masses’ small capacity for
thought, we need not be surprised at the success of these
methods.
The bourgeois camp was indignant at this obvious insincerity
of Social Democratic tactics, but did not draw from it the slight¬
est inference with regard to their own conduct. The Social
Democrats’ fear of really raising the working class out of the
depths of their cultural and social misery should have inspired
the greatest exertions in this very direction, thus gradually
wresting the weapon from the hands of the advocates of the
class struggle.
This, however, was not done.
Instead of attacking and seizing the enemy’s position, the
bourgeoisie preferred to let themselves be pressed to the wall and
finally had recourse to utterly inadequate makeshifts, which re¬
mained ineffectual because they came too late, and, moreover,
were easy to reject because they were too insignificant. Thus,
50
Mein Kampf
in reality, everything remained as before, except that the dis¬
content was greater.
Like a menacing storm-cloud, the ‘free trade union’ hung, even
then, over the political horizon and the existence of the individual.
It was one of the most frightful instruments of terror against
the security and independence of the national economy, the
solidity of the state, and personal freedom.
And chiefly this was what made the concept of democracy a
sordid and ridiculous phrase, and held up brotherhood to ever¬
lasting scorn in the words: ‘And if our comrade you won’t be,
we’ll bash your head in — one, two, three!’
And that was how I became acquainted with this friend of
humanity. In the course of the years my view was broadened
and deepened, but I have had no need to change it.
JL JL JA,
TT vv' W
The greater insight I gathered into the external character of
Social Democracy, the greater became my longing to comprehend
the inner core of this doctrine.
The official party literature was not much use for this purpose.
In so far as it deals with economic questions, its assertions and
proofs are false; in so far as it treats of political aims, it lies.
Moreover, I was inwardly repelled by the new-fangled petti¬
fogging phraseology and the style in which it was written. With
an enormous expenditure of words, unclear in content or incom¬
prehensible as to meaning, they stammer an endless hodgepodge
of phrases purportedly as witty as in reality they are meaningless.
Only our decadent metropolitan bohemians can feel at home in
this maze of reasoning and cull an ‘inner experience’ from this
dung-heap of literary dadaism, supported by the proverbial
modesty of a section of our people who always detect profound
wisdom in what is most incomprehensible to them personally.
However, by balancing the theoretical untruth and nonsense of
this doctrine with the reality of the phenomenon, I gradually
obtained a clear picture of its intrinsic will.
The Jewish Question
5L
At such times I was overcome by gloomy foreboding and
malignant fear. Then I saw before me a doctrine, comprised of
egotism and hate, which can lead to victory pursuant to mathe¬
matical laws, but in so doing must put an end to humanity.
Meanwhile, I had learned to understand the connection be¬
tween this doctrine of destruction and the nature of a people of
which, up to that time, I had known next to nothing.
Only a knowledge of the Jews provides the key with which to com¬
prehend the inner, and consequently real , aims of Social Democracy,
The erroneous conceptions of the aim and meaning of this party
fall from our eyes like veils, once we come to know this people,
and from the fog and mist of social phrases rises the leering
grimace of Marxism.
* # #
Today it is difficult, if not impossible, for me to say when the
word * Jew’ first gave me ground for special thoughts. At home I
do not remember having heard the word during my father’s life¬
time. I believe that the old gentleman would have regarded any
special emphasis on this term as cultural backwardness. In the
course of his life he had arrived at more or less cosmopolitan
views which, despite his pronounced national sentiments, not
only remained intact, but also affected me to some extent.
Likewise at school I found no occasion which could have led
me to change this inherited picture.
At the Realschule, to be sure, I did meet one Jewish boy who
was treated by all of us with caution, but only because various
experiences had led us to doubt his discretion and we did not
particularly trust him; but neither I nor the others had any
thoughts on the matter.
Not until my fourteenth or fifteenth year did I begin to come
across the word ‘ Jew/ with any frequency, partly in connection
with political discussions. This filled me with a mild distaste, and
I could not rid myself of an unpleasant feeling that always came
52
Mein Kampf
over me whenever religious quarrels occurred in my presence.
At that time I did not think anything else of the question.
There were few Jews in Linz. In the course of the centuries
their outward appearance had become Europeanized and had
taken on a human look; in fact, I even took them for Germans.
The absurdity of this idea did not dawn on me because I saw no
distinguishing feature but the strange religion. The fact that
they had, as I believed, been persecuted on this account some¬
times almost turned my distaste at unfavorable remarks about
them into horror.
Thus far I did not so much as suspect the existence of an or¬
ganized opposition to the Jews.
Then I came to Vienna.
Preoccupied by the abundance of my impressions in the archi¬
tectural field, oppressed by the hardship of my own lot, I gained
at first no insight into the inner stratification of the people in this
gigantic city. Notwithstanding that Vienna in those days
counted nearly two hundred thousand Jews among its two million
inhabitants, I did not see them. In the first few weeks my eyes
and my senses were not equal to the flood of values and ideas.
Not until calm gradually returned and the agitated picture began
to clear did I look around me more carefully in my new world,
and then among other things I encountered the Jewish question.
I cannot maintain that the way in which I became acquainted
with them struck me as particularly pleasant. For the Jew was
still characterized for me by nothing but his religion, and there¬
fore, on grounds of human tolerance, I maintained my rejection
of religious attacks in this case as in others. Consequently, the
tone, particularly that of the Viennese anti-Semitic press, seemed
to me unworthy of the cultural tradition of a great nation. I was
oppressed by the memory of certain occurrences in the Middle
Ages, which I should not have liked to see repeated. Since the
newspapers in question did not enjoy an outstanding reputation
(the reason for this, at that time, I myself did not precisely know),
I regarded them more as the products of anger and envy than the
results of a principled, though perhaps mistaken, point of view.
The So-Called World Press
53
I was reinforced in this opinion by what seemed to me the far
more dignified form in which the really big papers answered all
these attacks, or, what seemed to me even more praiseworthy,
failed to mention them; in other words, simply killed them with
silence.
I zealously read the so-called world press (Neue Freie Presse y
Wiener Tageblatt, etc.) and was amazed at the scope of what they
offered their readers and the objectivity of individual articles. 1
respected the exalted tone, though the flamboyance of the style
sometimes caused me inner dissatisfaction, or even struck me
unpleasantly. Yet this may have been due to the rhythm of life
in the whole metropolis.
Since in those days I saw Vienna in that light, I thought my¬
self justified in accepting this explanation of mine as a valid ex¬
cuse.
But what sometimes repelled me was the undignified fashion in
which this press curried favor with the Court. There was scarcely
an event in the Hofburg which was not imparted to the readers
either with raptures of enthusiasm or plaintive emotion, and all
this to-do, particularly when it dealt with the 1 wisest monarch 3
of all time, almost reminded me of the mating cry of a mountain
cock.
To me the whole thing seemed artificial.
In my eyes it was a blemish upon liberal democracy.
To curry favor with this Court and in such indecent forms was
to sacrifice the dignity of the nation.
This was the first shadow to darken my intellectual relationship
with the ‘ big ’ Viennese press.
As I had always done before, I continued in Vienna to follow
events in Germany with ardent zeal, quite regardless whether
they were political or cultural. With pride and admiration, I
compared the rise of the Reich with the wasting away of the
Austrian state. If events in the field of foreign politics filled me,
by and large, with undivided joy, the less gratifying aspects of
internal life often aroused anxiety and gloom. The struggle
which at that time was being carried on against William II did
54
Mein Kampf
not meet with my approval. I regarded him not only as the
German Emperor, but first and foremost as the creator of a
German fleet. The restrictions of speech imposed on the Kaiser
by the Reichstag angered me greatly because they emanated
from a source which in my opinion really hadn’t a leg to stand on,
since in a single session these parliamentarian imbeciles gabbled
more nonsense than a whole dynasty of emperors, including its
very weakest numbers, could ever have done in centuries.
I was outraged that in a state where every idiot not only
claimed the right to criticize, but was given a seat in the Reichstag
and let loose upon the nation as a ‘lawgiver,’ the man who bore
the imperial crown had to take ‘reprimands’ from the greatest
babblers’ club of all time.
But I was even more indignant that the same Viennese press
which made the most obsequious bows to every rickety horse in
the Court, and flew into convulsions of joy if he accidentally
swished his tail, should, with supposed concern, yet, as it seemed
to me, ill-concealed majice, express its criticisms of the German
Kaiser. Of course it had no intention of interfering with condi¬
tions within the German Reich — oh, no, God forbid — but by
placing its finger, on these wounds in the friendliest way, it was
fulfilling the duty imposed by the spirit of the mutual alliance,
and, conversely, fulfilling the requirements of journalistic truth,
etc. And now it was poking *his finger around in the wound to
its heart’s content.
In such cases the blood rose to my head.
It was this which caused me little by little to view the big
papers with greater caution.
And on one such occasion I was forced to recognize that one of
the anti-Semitic papers, the Deutsches Volksblatt, behaved more
decently.
Another thing that got on my nerves was the loathsome cult
for France which the big press, even then, carried on. A man
couldn’t help feeling ashamed to be a German when he saw these
saccharine hymns of praise to the ‘great cultural nation.’ This
wretched licking of France’s boots more than once made me
Transformation into an Anti-Semite
55
throw down one of these ‘ world newspapers/ And on such oc¬
casions I sometimes picked up the Volksblatt , which, to be sure,
seemed to me much smaller, but in these matters somewhat
more appetizing. I was not in agreement with the sharp anti-
Semitic tone, but from time to time I read arguments which gave
me some food for thought.
At all events, these occasions slowly made me acquainted with
the man and the movement, which in those days guided Vienna’s
destinies: Dr. Karl Lueger 1 and the Christian Social Party.
When I arrived in Vienna, I was hostile to both of them.
The man and the movement seemed ‘ reactionary ’ in my eyes.
My common sense of justice, however, forced me to change this
judgment in proportion as I had occasion to become acquainted
with the man and his work; and slowly my fair judgment turned
to unconcealed admiration. Today, more than ever, I regard this
man as the greatest German mayor of all times.
How many of my basic principles were upset by this change
in my attitude toward the Christian Social movement!
My views with regard to anti-Semitism thus succumbed to the
passage of time, and this was my greatest transformation of all.
It cost me the greatest inner soul struggles, and only after
months of battle between my reason and my sentiments did my
reason begin to emerge victorious. Two years later, my senti¬
ment had followed my reason, and from then on became its most
loyal guardian and sentinel.
At the time of this bitter struggle between spiritual education
and cold reason, the visual instruction of the Vienna streets
had performed invaluable services. There came a time when I no
longer, as in the first days, wandered blindly through the mighty
city; now with open eyes I saw not only the buildings but also
the people.
1 Karl Lueger (1844-1910). In 1897, as a member of the anti-Semitic
Christian Social Party, he became mayor of Vienna and kept the post until
his death. At first opposed by the Court for his radical nationalism and
anti-Semitism, toward the end of his career he became more moderate and
was reconciled with the Emperor.
56
Mein Kampf
Once, as I was strolling through the Inner City, I suddenly
encountered an apparition in a black caftan and black hair locks.
Is this a Jew? was my first thought.
For, to be sure, they had not looked like that in Linz. I ob¬
served the man furtively and cautiously, but the longer I stared
at this foreign face, scrutinizing feature for feature, the more my
first question assumed a new form:
Is this a German?
As always in such cases, I now began to try to relieve my
doubts by books. For a few hellers I bought the first anti-Semitic
pamphlets of my life. Unfortunately, they all proceeded from
the supposition that in principle the reader knew or even under¬
stood the Jewish question to a certain degree. Besides, the tone
for the most part was such that doubts again, arose in me, due in
part to the dull and amazingly unscientific arguments favoring
the thesis.
I relapsed for weeks at a time, once even for months.
The whole thing seemed to me so monstrous, the accusations
so boundless, that, tormented by the fear of doing injustice, I
again became anxious and uncertain.
Yet I could no longer very well doubt that the objects of my
study were not Germans of a special religion, but a people in them¬
selves; for since I had begun to concern myself with this question
and to take cognizance of the Jews, Vienna appeared to me in a
different light than before. Wherever I went, I began to see Jews,
and the more I saw, the more sharply they became distinguished
in my eyes from the rest of humanity. Particularly the Inner
City and the districts north of the Danube Canal swarmed
with a people which even outwardly had lost all resemblance to
Germans.
And whatever doubts I may still have nourished were finally
dispelled by the attitude of a portion of the Jews themselves.
Among them there was a great movement, quite extensive in
Vienna, which came out sharply in confirmation of the national
character of the Jews: this was the Zionists.
It looked, to be sure, as though only a part of the Jews ap-
Transformation into an Anti-Semite
57
proved this viewpoint, while the great majority condemned and
inwardly rejected such a formulation. But when examined more
closely, this appearance dissolved itself into an unsavory vapor
of pretexts advanced for mere reasons of expedience, not to say
lies. For the so-called liberal Jews did not reject the Zionists as
non-Jews, but only as Jews with an impractical, perhaps even
dangerous, way of publicly avowing their Jewishness.
Intrinsically they remained unalterably of one piece.
In a short time this apparent struggle between Zionistic and
liberal Jews disgusted me; for it was false through and through,
founded on lies and scarcely in keeping with the moral elevation
and purity always claimed by this people.
The cleanliness of this people, moral and otherwise, I must say,
is a point in itself. By their very exterior you could tell that these
were no lovers of water, and, to your distress, you often knew it
with your eyes closed. Later I often grew sick to my stomach
from the smell of these caftan-wearers. Added to this, there was
their unclean dress and their generally unheroic appearance.
All this could scarcely be called very attractive; but it became
positively repulsive when, in addition to their physical uncleanli¬
ness, you discovered the moral stains on this ‘chosen people.’
In a short time I was made more thoughtful than ever by my
slowly rising insight into the type of activity carried on by the
Jews in certain fields.
Was there any form of filth or profligacy, particularly in cultu¬
ral life, without at least one Jew involved in it?
If you cut even cautiously into such an abscess, you found, like
a maggot in a rotting body, often dazzled by the sudden light —
a kike! 1
[Note by Kulak: "Kike" is almost certainly the wrong translation. Kike derives from "Kikel" the Yiddish word for circle since Jews at Ellis Island would sign with a circle instead of a cross. The word makes no sense outside a culture affected by Ellis Island. Assuming "Jiidlein" does have strong derogatory connotations (I could not confirm) the english insult "Heeb" would be more accurate]
What had to be reckoned heavily against the Jews in my eyes
was when I became acquainted with their activity in the press,
art, literature, and the theater. All the unctuous reassurances
helped little or nothing. It sufficed to look at a billboard, to study
1 Sowic man nur vorsichtig in eine solche Geschwulst hineinschnitt, fand
man , wic die Made im faidenden Leibe , oft ganz geblendet vo?n piotzlichen
Lichte, ein Jiidlein.
58
Mein Kampf
the names of the men behind the horrible trash they advertised,
to make you hard for a long time to come. This was pestilence,
spiritual pestilence, worse than the Black Death of olden times,
and the people was being infected with it! It goes without saying
that the lower the intellectual level of one of these art manu¬
facturers, the more unlimited his fertility will be, and the
scoundrel ends up like a garbage separator, splashing his filth in
the face of humanity. And bear in mind that there is no limit to
their number; bear in mind that for one Goethe Nature easily
can foist on the world ten thousand of these scribblers who poison
men’s souls like germ-carriers of the worse sort, on their fellow
men.
It was terrible, but not to be overlooked, that precisely the
Jew, in tremendous numbers, seemed chosen by Nature for this
shameful calling.
Is this why the Jews are called the ‘chosen people’?
I now began to examine carefully the names of all the creators
of unclean products in public artistic life. The result was less and
less favorable for my previous attitude toward the Jews. Regard¬
less how my sentiment might resist, my reason was forced to draw
its conclusions.
The fact that nine tenths of all literary filth, artistic trash, and
theatrical idiocy can be set to the account of a people, constituting
hardly one hundredth of all the country’s inhabitants, could
simply not be talked away; it was the plain truth.
And I now began to examine my beloved ‘world press’ from
this point of view.
And the deeper I probed, the more the object of my former
admiration shriveled. The style became more and more unbear¬
able; I could not help rejecting the content as inwardly shallow
and banal; the objectivity of exposition now seemed to me more
akin to lies than honest truth; and the writers were — Jews.
A thousand things which I had hardly seen before now struck
my notice, and others, which had previously given me food for
thought, I now learned to grasp and understand.
I now saw the liberal attitude of this press in a different light;
Transformation into an Anti-Semite
59
the lofty tone in which it answered attacks and its method of
killing them with silence now revealed itself to me as a trick as
clever as it was treacherous; the transfigured raptures of their
theatrical critics were always directed at Jewish writers, and their
disapproval never struck anyone but Germans. The gentle pin¬
pricks against William II revealed its methods by their persist¬
ency, and so did its commendation of French culture and civiliza¬
tion. The trashy content of the short story now appeared to me
as outright indecency, and in the language I detected the accents
of a foreign people; the sense of the whole thing was so obviously
hostile to Germanism that this could only have been intentional.
But who had an interest in this?
Was all this a mere accident?
Gradually I became uncertain.
The development was accelerated by insights which I gained
into a number of other matters. I am referring to the general view of
ethics and morals which was quite openly exhibited by a large part
of the Jews, and the practical application of which could be seen.
Here again the streets provided an object lesson of a sort
which was sometimes positively evil.
The relation of the Jews to prostitution and, even more, to the
white-slave traffic, could be studied in Vienna as perhaps in no
other city of Western Europe, with the possible exception of the
southern French ports. If you walked at night through the streets
and alleys of Leopoldstadt, 1 at every step you witnessed pro¬
ceedings which remained concealed from the majority of the
German people until the War gave the soldiers on the eastern
front occasion to see similar things, or, better expressed, forced
them to see them.
When thus for the first time I recognized the Jew as the cold-
hearted, shameless, and calculating director of this revolting vice
traffic in the scum of the big city, a cold shudder ran down my
back.
1 Second District of Vienna, separated from the main part of the city
by the Danube Canal. Formerly the ghetto, it still has a predominantly
Jewish population.
60
Mein Kampf
But then a flame flared up within me. I no longer avoided dis¬
cussion of the Jewish question; no, now I sought it. And when I
learned to look for the Jew in all branches of cultural and artistic
life and its various manifestations, I suddenly encountered him
in a place where I would least have expected to find him.
When I recognized the Jew as the leader of the Social Democ¬
racy, the scales dropped from my eyes. A long soul struggle had
reached its conclusion.
Even in my daily relations with my fellow workers, I ob¬
served the amazing adaptability with which they adopted dif¬
ferent positions on the same question, sometimes within an in¬
terval of a few days, sometimes in only a few hours. It was hard
for me to understand how people who, when spoken to alone,
possessed some sensible opinions, suddenly lost them as soon as
they came under the influence of the masses. It was often enough
to make one despair. When, after hours of argument, I was con¬
vinced that now at last I had broken the ice or cleared up some
absurdity, and was beginning to rejoice at my success, on the next
day to my disgust I had to begin all over again; it had all been in
vain. Like an eternal pendulum their opinions seemed to swing
back again and again to the old madness.
All this I could understand: that they were dissatisfied with
their lot and cursed the Fate which often struck them so harshly;
that they hated the employers who seemed to them the heartless
bailiffs of Fate; that they cursed the authorities who in their eyes
were without feeling for their situation; that they demonstrated
against food^ prices and carried their demands into the streets:
this much could be understood without recourse to reason. But
what inevitably remained incomprehensible was the boundless
hatred they heaped upon their own nationality, despising its
greatness, besmirching its history, and dragging its great men
into the gutter.
This struggle against their own species, their own clan, their
own homeland, was as senseless as it was incomprehensible. It
was unnatural.
It was possible to cure them temporarily of this vice, but only
The Jew as Leader of Social Democracy 61
for days or at most weeks. If later you met the man you thought
you had converted, he was just the same as before.
His old unnatural state had regained full possession of him.
# # #
I gradually became aware that the Social Democratic press was
directed predominantly by Jews; yet I did not attribute any
special significance to this circumstance, since conditions were
exactly the same in the other papers. Yet one fact seemed con¬
spicuous: there was not one paper with Jews working on it which
could have been regarded as truly national, according to my educa¬
tion and way of thinking.
I swallowed my disgust and tried to read this type of Marxist
press production, but my revulsion became so unlimited in so
doing that I endeavored to become more closely acquainted with
the men who manufactured these compendiums of knavery.
From the publisher down, they were all Jews.
I took all the Social Democratic pamphlets I could lay hands
on and sought the names of their authors: Jews. I noted the
names of the leaders; by far the greatest part were likewise mem¬
bers of the ‘chosen people/ whether they were representatives
in the Reichsrat or trade-union secretaries, the heads of organiza¬
tions or street agitators. It was always the same gruesome pic¬
ture. The names of the Austerlitzes, Davids, Adlers, Ellenbogens,
etc., will remain forever graven in my memory. One thing had
grown clear to me: the party with whose petty representatives I
had been carrying on the most violent struggle for months was, as
to leadership, almost exclusively in the hands of a foreign people;
for, to my deep and joyful satisfaction, I had at last come to the
conclusion that the Jew was no German.
Only now did I become thoroughly acquainted with the se¬
ducer of our people.
A single year of my sojourn in Vienna had sufficed to imbue
me with the conviction that no worker could be so stubborn that
62
j
Mein Kampe
he would not in the end succumb to better knowledge and better
explanations. Slowly I had become an expert in their own doc¬
trine and used it as a weapon in the struggle for my own profound
conviction.
Success almost always favored my side.
The great masses could be saved, if only with the gravest
sacrifice in time and patience.
But a Jew could never be parted from his opinions.
At that time I was still childish enough to try to make the
madness of their doctrine clear to them; in my little circle I talked
my tongue sore and my throat hoarse, thinking I would in¬
evitably succeed in convincing them how ruinous their Marxist
madness was; but what I accomplished was often the opposite.
It seemed as though their increased understanding of the destruc¬
tive effects of Social Democratic theories and their results only
reinforced their determination.
The more I argued with them, the better I came to know their
dialectic. First they counted on the stupidity of their adversary,
and then, when there was no other way out, they themselves
simply played stupid. If all this didn't help, they pretended not
to understand, or, if challenged, they changed the subject in a
hurry, quoted platitudes which, if you accepted them, they im¬
mediately related to entirely different matters, and then, if again
attacked, gave ground and pretended not to know exactly what
you were talking about. Whenever you tried to attack one of
these apostles, your hand closed on a jelly-like slime which
divided up and poured through your fingers, but in the next
moment collected again. But if you really struck one of these
fellows so telling a blow that, observed by the audience, he
couldn't help but agree, and if you believed that this had taken
you at least one step forward, your amazement was great the
next day. The Jew had not the slightest recollection of the day
before, he rattled off his same old nonsense as though nothing at
all had happened, and, if indignantly challenged, affected amaze¬
ment; he couldn't remember a thing, except that he had proved
the correctness of his assertions the previous day.
Study of the Foundations of Marxism
63
Sometimes I stood there thunderstruck.
I didn’t know what to be more amazed at: the agility of their
tongues or their virtuosity at lying.
Gradually I began to hate them.
All this had but one good side: that in proportion as the real
leaders or at least the disseminators of Social Democracy came
within my vision, my love for my people inevitably grew. For
who, in view of the diabolical craftiness of these seducers, could
damn the luckless victims? How hard it was, even for me, to get
the better of this race of dialectical liars! And how futile was such
success in dealing with people who twist the truth in your mouth,
who without so much as a blush disavow the word they have just
spoken, and in the very next minute take credit for it after
ail.
No. The better acquainted I became with the Jew, the more
forgiving I inevitably became toward the worker.
In my eyes the gravest fault was no longer with him, but with
all those who did not regard it as worth the trouble to have mercy
on him, with iron righteousness giving the son of the people his
just, deserts, and standing the seducer and corrupter up against
the wall.
Inspired by the experience of daily life, I now began to track
down the sources of the Marxist doctrine. Its effects had become
clear to me in individual cases; each day its success was apparent
to my attentive eyes, and, with some exercise of my imagination,
I was able to picture the consequences. The only remaining
question was whether the result of their action in its ultimate
form had existed in the mind’s eye of the creators, or whether
they themselves were the victims of an error.
I felt that both were possible.
In the one case it was the duty of every thinking man to force
himself to the forefront of the ill-starred movement, thus perhaps
averting catastrophe; in the other, however, the original founders
of this plague of the nations must have been veritable devils; for
only in the brain of a monster — not that of a man — could the
plan of an organization assume form and meaning, whose activity
64
Mein Kampf
must ultimately result in the collapse of human civilization and
the consequent devastation of the world.
In this case the only remaining hope was struggle, struggle
with all the weapons which the human spirit, reason, and will
can devise, regardless on which side of the scale Fate should lay
its blessing.
Thus I began to make myself familiar with the founders of this
doctrine, in order to study the foundations of the movement. If
I reached my goal more quickly than at first I had perhaps ven¬
tured to believe, it was thanks to my newly acquired, though at
that time not very profound, knowledge of the Jewish question.
This alone enabled me to draw a practical comparison between
the reality and the theoretical flim-flam of the founding fathers
of Social Democracy, since it taught me to understand the lan¬
guage of the Jewish people, who speak in order to conceal or at
least to veil their thoughts; their real aim is not therefore to be
found in the lines themselves, but slumbers well concealed be¬
tween them.
For me this was the time of the greatest spiritual upheaval I
have ever had to go through.
I had ceased to be a weak-kneed cosmopolitan and become an
anti-Semite.
Just once more — and this was the last time — fearful, op¬
pressive thoughts came to me in profound anguish.
When over long periods of human history I scrutinized the
activity of the Jewish people, suddenly there rose up in me the
fearful question whether inscrutable Destiny, perhaps for reasons
unknown to us poor mortals, did not with eternal and immutable
resolve, desire the final victory of this little nation.
Was it possible that the earth had been promised as a reward
to this people which lives only for this earth?
Have we an objective right to struggle for our self-preservation,
or is this justified only subjectively within ourselves?
As I delved more deeply into the teachings of Marxism and
thus in tranquil clarity submitted the deeds of the Jewish people
to contemplation, Fate itself gave me its answer.
Marxism as the Destroyer of Culture
65
The Jewish doctrine of Marxism rejects the aristocratic princi¬
ple of Nature and replaces the eternal privilege of power and
strength by the mass of numbers and their dead weight. Thus it
denies the value of personality in man, contests the significance
of nationality and race, and thereby withdraws from humanity
the premise of its existence and its culture. As a foundation of
the universe, this doctrine would bring about the end of any
order intellectually conceivable to man. And as, in this greatest
of all recognizable organisms, the result of an application of such
a law could only be chaos, on earth it could only be destruction
for the inhabitants of this planet.
If, with the help of his Marxist creed, the Jew is victorious over
the other peoples of the world, his crown will be the funeral wreath
of humanity and this planet will, as it did thousands^1 of years
ago, move through the ether devoid of men.
Eternal Nature inexorably avenges the infringement of her
commands.
Hence today I believe that I am acting in accordance with the
will of the Almighty Creator: by defending myself against the Jew t
I am fighting for the work of the Lord.
1 Changed to ‘ millions * in second edition.
Your passage about the managerial/bureaucratic class is brilliant and eerily appropos to current realities. I know a former senior US Navy Officer (and a capable one) who turned down ship command for the reasons you stated and in civilian life works for a congressionally funded think tank. Her refusal to take command followed several highly publicized collisions at sea in the mid 2010's. The Navy simply denied any organizational culpability and hung those skippers out to dry.
The Nazis were Socialists, it's in their name, so don't call Hitler right wing, or a counter to Marxism.
Yes, there are some very evil, powerful Jewish people. There are some very evil, powerful non Jewish people. Your admiration for Hitler, and blaming Jews as the problem is disturbing.
Where you are correct is the managerial and bureaucratic class. They don't solve problems, because if they did, they would become obsolete. They are parasites.