Hitler and the Nazi Darwinian Worldview (47 page)

6
Elizabeth D. Heineman, “Sexuality and Nazism: The Doubly Unspeakable?”
Journal of the History of Sexuality
, 11, No. 1 & 2 (January/April 2002): 22.

7
Dawidowicz, “The Failure of Himmler’s Positive Eugenics,” 43.

8
Thompson,“
Lebensborn
and the Eugenics Policy of the
Reichsführer-SS
,” 55.

9
George Victor,
Hitler: The Pathology of Evil
(Washington: Brassey’s, 1998), 173.

10
Victor,
Hitler: The Pathology of Evil
, 173.

11
John Cornwell,
Hitler’s Scientists: Science, War, and the Devil’s Pact
(New York: Viking, 2003), 174.

12
Jonathan Rose,
The Holocaust and the Book: Destruction and Preservation
(Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 2001).

13
Hillel and Henry,
Of Pure Blood
, 23.

14
Hillel and Henry,
Of Pure Blood
, 23.

15
Hillel and Henry,
Of Pure Blood
, 23.

16
Hillel and Henry,
Of Pure Blood
, 43.

17
Hillel and Henry,
Of Pure Blood
, 31.

18
Hillel and Henry,
Of Pure Blood
, 31.

19
Hillel and Henry,
Of Pure Blood
, 27.

20
Hillel and Henry,
Of Pure Blood
, 11.

21
Richard Weikart,
Hitler’s Ethic: The Nazi Pursuit of Evolutionary Progress
(New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2009), 133.

22
Hillel and Henry,
Of Pure Blood
, 18.

23
Hillel and Henry,
Of Pure Blood
, 25.

24
Hillel and Henry,
Of Pure Blood
, 25.

25
Hillel and Henry,
Of Pure Blood
, 25.

26
Hillel and Henry,
Of Pure Blood
, 12.

27
Richard Milner,
Darwin’s Universe: Evolution from A to Z
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 2009), 277.

28
Dawidowicz, “The Failure of Himmler’s Positive Eugenics,” 43.

29
John Grabowski,
Josef Mengele
(Farmington Hills: Lucent Books, 2004), 28.

30
Dawidowicz, “The Failure of Himmler’s Positive Eugenics,” 43.

31
Cited in Christopher Hutton,
Race and the Third Reich
(Cambridge: Polity, 2005), 212.

32
Cited in Dawidowicz, “The Failure of Himmler’s Positive Eugenics,” 43.

33
Hillel and Henry,
Of Pure Blood
, 28.

34
Hillel and Henry,
Of Pure Blood
, 28.

35
Hillel and Henry,
Of Pure Blood
, 28.

36
Hillel and Henry,
Of Pure Blood
, 28.

37
Hillel and Henry,
Of Pure Blood
, 28–29.

38
Hillel and Henry,
Of Pure Blood
, 28–29.

39
Hillel and Henry,
Of Pure Blood
, 28–29.

40
Hillel and Henry,
Of Pure Blood
, 30.

41
Hillel and Henry,
Of Pure Blood
, 48.

42
Cited in Weikart,
Hitler’s Ethic
, 175.

43
Case No. 8, Green Series.

44
Dawidowicz, “The Failure of Himmler’s Positive Eugenics,” 44.

45
Mitchell Geoffrey Bard, ed.,
The Complete History of the Holocaust
(San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 2001), 28.

46
Grabowski,
Josef Mengele
, 28.

47
Bernt Engelmann,
In Hitler’s Germany
(New York: Pantheon, 1986).

Darwinism in the biology textbooks of the Third Reich

INTRODUCTION
¹

T
he content of textbooks played a critical part in the goal of spreading Nazi ideology and Darwinian theory throughout Germany. This is indicated by a statement attributed to Hitler: “Let me control the textbooks and I will control the state.”
²
The Nazis ensured that Darwinism was taught in detail using textbooks and classrooms for the reason that ideas derived from “Darwinian theory became important truths in Hitler’s ideology.”
³
Furthermore, the Nazi government ensured that not only were all teachers and professors to be Darwinists, committed to “Hitler’s racial doctrines,” but also that all textbooks were revised to conform to this goal.
⁴

Nobel laureate Konrad Lorenz noted that “evolution not only supported the National Socialist worldview” but also the “fact that human beings” evolved from lower life forms. “The logical force” of evolution,

Lorenz insisted, would do more than anything to win over people to Nazi ideals. [Kiel University professor] Paul Brohmer came down closest to the thinking of Lorenz on the issue of evolution in biology instruction. He saw in Darwin’s work one of the greatest expressions of the human spirit. Brohmer thought it wholly inappropriate for biology teachers to treat Darwinism as false doctrine.
⁵

Because the idea that all life was part of a “Darwinian struggle for existence” was central to Nazi ideology, the battle for Darwinian indoctrination was “waged without end.” Consequently, German educators ensured that this ideology was openly taught in the schools and textbooks.
⁶
Because many teachers had a difficult time teaching the blunt Nazi survival of the fittest doctrine, German educators were forced to refine “Hitler’s crude militaristic and social Darwinist ideas and made them somewhat more palatable to the educated.”
⁷
They did this by requiring the teaching of a somewhat kinder, gentler Darwinism in the schools, but Darwinism just the same.
⁸
Furthermore, in intellectual circles