Focus Task p. 204
1. Young people were among the most fanatical supporters of the Nazi regime. Use pages 202-204 to write three paragraphs to explain why the Nazis were successful in winning them over. Include the following points:
a. Why the Nazis wanted to control young people
b. How they set about doing it
c. What the attractions of the youth movements were.
2. The Nazi regime was not successful in keeping the loyalty of all young people. Add a fourth paragraph to your essay to explain why some young people rejected the Nazi Youth movements.
First, the Nazis were successful in winning over the youth because they were able to control the youth. The Nazis wanted to control the youth because the children are Germany’s future, so whatever the children learn is what they will bring to the table in the future. Therefore, if the Nazis taught the children Nazi ideology Nazism would continue on into the future and hopefully make that pure Aryan race. The Nazis were able to control the youth because they are easily influenced. The children and young adults were so easily influenced that they would question their parents loyalty to Hitler and rat them out to the Nazis, they fully believed in Hitler, and they didn’t see anything wrong in the Nazi ideas. For example, in Source 32 where Hitler is making a speech in 1939 he said: “It is my great educative work I am beginning with the young. We older ones are used up. We are bearing the burden of a humiliating past. But my magnificent youngsters! Are there finer ones in the world? Look at these young men and boys! What material! With them I can make a new world.” This shows that Hitler and the Nazis new that in order for Germany to continue as Nazi Germany they would have to have control of the youth. Hitler odes this by glorifying them; by making the youth feel really important in Germany. Since the children felt important and were easily influenced the Nazis were able to control the youth in order to carry on Nazi ideology for the future.
Second, the Nazis were successful in winning over the youth because the Nazis surrounded the youth with their ideas and ideology. Since the youth were surrounded by their ideas, the ideas came into what the youth believed in because they’re easily influenced and believed anything that is told to them at school. For example, in Source 28 Dr. Robert Ley shows how controlling the Nazis were over the youth and how the Nazi influence was around them for their entire lives. Source 28 reads: “Our state as an educational state…It does not let a man go free from the cradle to the grave. We begin with the child when he is three years old. As soon as he begins to think, he is made to carry a little flag. Then follows school, the Hitler Youth, the storm troopers and military training. We don’t let him go, and when all that is done, comes the Labor Front, which takes possession of him again, and does not let him go till he dies, even if he does not like it.” Source 28 shows how controlling and influenced the youth were by the youth becoming followers beginning when they can think and until their dead, which shows that the Nazi influence completely surrounded the youth and the youth caved into the influences and sometimes didn’t have a choice. Therefore, the Nazis were successful in winning over the youth by controlling them and surrounding them by Nazi ideas to easily influence them.
Third, the Nazis were able to be successful in winning over the youth because of how attractive the youth movements were to the youth. For many boys and girls they were in awe and praised Hitler and the Nazi movement. Some of the attractions were the youth were promised they would get top ranking jobs once they finished school, but that didn’t happen after more and more generations graduated. However, Hitler was able to attract many youth as shown in Source 34, “Hitler looked over the stand, and I know he looked into my eyes, and he said: ‘You my boys are the standard bearers, you will inherit what we have created.’ From that moment there was not any doubt I was bound to Adolf Hitler and long after our defeat. Afterwards I told my friends that Hitler had looked into my eyes, but they all said: ‘No! It was my eyes he was looking into.’” Therefore, the children praised Hitler because of the supposed connection they had with him, and Hitler, like in Source 34, made them feel extremely special. As if the world, Germany, was in their hands and they had all of the control, which is a lot of power a youth has to deal with and may not fully think through it; which could be one reason why they didn’t question Nazi ideology and why the Nazis were successful in winning over the youth.
Some people rejected the Nazi Youth movements mainly because they didn’t like the Nazi control of their lives. There were two main youth groups that resisted Nazi control over them called the “Swing” Movement and the Edelweiss Pirates. The Swing Movement consisted of working-class teenagers that listened to Jazz, danced, accepted Jews into the club, and talked about and enjoyed sex. All were looked down upon and or banned by the Nazis. The Swing Movement rejected the Nazi Youth Movements because they enjoyed Jazz and dancing, which they couldn’t do under Nazi control. Not only were the Swing Movement resisting Nazi control, so were the Edelweiss Pirates. The Edelweiss Pirates were also mainly working-class teenagers who mocked and taunted Germany and the Hitler Youth. They would take lyrics of songs and change them to make fun of Germany, which the Nazis and the Hitler Youth did not appreciate at all. Their overall attitudes of the Edelweiss Pirates was freer, which the Hitler Youth didn’t like. One aspect the groups have in common against the Nazi Youth is the resistance against Nazi control, which was the main reason why Nazi Youth movements were rejected by some people.
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