‘What You Need Is Your Head’
The movie “Forbidden” (1984) is based on the life of Maria von Maltzan, who risked her life as an activist in the German resistance against the Nazis. Born into a wealthy noble family, Maria von Maltzan took Jews into her home, fed and protected them, sometimes right under the noses of the Gestapo. Throughout the war, she helped dozens of Jews, German army deserters, and foreign forced labourers to escape to safety.My favourite scene is when the heroine (played by Jacqueline Bisset) speaks candidly to her friend Krista on Sept. 1, 1939, the day when Germany invaded Poland. The dialogue in this scene shows how people can easily fall under the spell of propaganda, believing something to be true because they have heard it so many times:
Maria: “Krista, why would a weak country like Poland attack us?”
Krista: “There have been these horrible stories for weeks in all the newspapers, atrocities by Poles against innocent Germans.”
Maria: “Why do you think our soldiers were crossing Berlin a few days ago, why do we have food rationing since last Monday? We’ve been getting ready for something. I can’t believe the Poles really started it.”
Krista: “Do you have inside information?”
Maria: “You don’t need inside information to work it out. What you need is your head.”
It is no coincidence that the person using her head is also the person who rejects Nazi propaganda and joins the resistance against a murderous tyranny. It is relevant and frightening that Krista’s first comment references what she has been told repeatedly by the media.
The advice to “use your head” has a universal application in resisting evil and fighting for justice. Evil always clothes itself in light and truth, seeking to deceive by pretending to be good. The most effective lies contain kernels of truth, often large ones. Tyrants who take away our rights and freedoms always point to some higher good that is difficult to disagree with: national security, the public interest, protecting the environment, stopping terrorism, saving lives, protecting public health, ensuring “safety,” etc.
Evil succeeds when good people refrain from thinking. Evil succeeded when millions of Germans took the lazy path of embracing claims that were supported by “experts” and “scientists.”
Lessons to Be Learned From National Socialism in Germany
Democracies are fragile. They can easily be replaced by dictatorial rule. A democracy can turn into a dictatorship almost overnight. Human rights, civil liberties, and constitutional freedoms can fade away slowly, and they can also disappear quickly. When taking away rights and freedoms from citizens, politicians always provide a pretext that sounds persuasive, like the common good, the public interest, public health, safety, national security, etc. Power-hungry politicians excel at fearmongering. Fear instills obedience in citizens, and a willingness to abandon their freedoms and rights. Politicians are skilled at using their ideology to provide people with a sense of meaning and purpose, and to provide them with opportunities to join a mission or crusade.The media serve as an effective propaganda machine for government, to create fear in people, undermine respect for individual rights and freedoms, and generate support for repressive government policies. Fear reduces our ability to think, reason, analyze, and question.
People become ruthlessly intolerant when convinced that they have “the science” on their side. Judges, lawyers, and law professors are not immune to propaganda. A dominant ideology can and does permeate every sphere of life and culture, including schools, universities, hospitals, the media, the legal system, etc.
Power-hungry politicians thrive on support from “experts” and “scientists” to implement their repressive policies with fewer hurdles. Parental rights stand in the way of ideologues who want to ensure that children are raised and educated “correctly” into the reigning ideology. Religious freedom also stands in the way of ideologues exercising the total control they wish to exercise.
Lawyers, judges, law professors, and law societies are as likely to embrace fear and a popular ideology as the rest of the population. The legal system is not immune to corruption by ideology. Like scientists, academics, doctors and other professionals, lawyers and judges are quite capable of legitimizing human rights violations and implementing the policies of repressive regimes.
There are probably more lessons to be learned from Nazi Germany (and from other totalitarian regimes), but the above provides a good starting point.
