this post was submitted on 18 Mar 2025
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What's the historical context? Like is Nazi Germany copying the restrictions put on after WW1?
Nazis got a lot of their ideas from the US, including lebensraum from Manifest Destiny.
Also the popularity of eugenics began in the US. You even read about it in The Great Gatsby.
It began in England. Out of Darwinism. Once people had to accept that the Ancient Greek philosophies of “the ideal form” couldn’t exist. (Because of evolution, everything is always evolving) But you could use Darwin and Mendel and genetics to engineer the biology you preferred.
Also, unlimited executive power for the top dog
That doesn't seem right. Expansionism started way before that.
Hitler explicitly referred to US expansionism when discussing lebensraum.
A U.S. Supreme Court case on sterilization was cited by the defense at the Nuremberg Trials: Buck v. Bell.
And where did the Romans get it from? Egypt? I guess it couldn’t have been China, because they were also doing their own version of this several thousand miles away.
The Romans were very open to having foreigners become citizens. Especially in the context of their time period.
And enslaving a significant chunk of those foreigners, too.
And enslaving a significant chunk of their own folks too.
The Nazis praised the US's "scientific" approach to racism and eugenics.
Measuring people's heads; IQ tests served in a person's non-native language and relied on specific knowledge of American culture; Plain old racist rhetoric like calling people "dangerous", "criminals" with no evidence. (Sound familiar?)
Anything to prove that black and foreign people were inferior and should be exploited, in a classic "we know the answer and we must cherry pick the data to reach that conclusion".
A lot of these tools were taken up by the Nazis for their persecution of Jews, and now they're coming right back around.
This is an educated meme.
Hitler sent a certain Dr Mengele to study at the Carnegie Institution to learn about the 'Nordic Race'.
Why is it always the philanthropists?
they become philanthropists to assuage their guilt?
That is giving them too much credit.
It is no more than a cover for doing more horrible things.