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dry_soup
blululu
I never realized that the crowded theater of the idiom refers to WWI and shouting fire means opposing the draft. The metaphorical argument is much less compelling when the crowded theater is actually on fire!
nerdponx
White mentions a few times that Holmes' dubious contributions to Court precedent have since been obsoleted. What specifically changed?
lettergram
There’s a Wikipedia on this apparently (to my surprise)
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shouting_fire_in_a_crowded_t...
_dain_
Brandenburg v Ohio
narrator
The supreme court case Schenck v. United States said at the time that speech discouraging people from being drafted was prohibited.
LgWoodenBadger
The Supreme Court has made many awful rulings with respect to the first amendment.
Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire is another one.
Just astoundingly awful
ttfkam
Conflating wealth with speech is another recent SCOTUS boondoggle.
• Citizens United v. FEC • Speechnow.org v. FEC • McCutcheon v. FEC
Corporate personhood with rights afforded to actual citizens but separate from actual citizens laid the groundwork for a whole mosaic of wrongheaded schools of thought.
"Amoral, effectively immortal fictional entities can be created at will with the rights and privileges of ordinary citizens. What could go wrong?"
gruez
>Corporate personhood with rights afforded to actual citizens but separate from actual citizens laid the groundwork for a whole mosaic of wrongheaded schools of thought.
>"Amoral, effectively immortal fictional entities can be created at will with the rights and privileges of ordinary citizens. What could go wrong?"
You realize that the "immortal fictional entities" you speak of are just groups of "ordinary citizens", right? That's the logic behind the Citizens United ruling, ie. that ordinary citizens don't lose their free speech rights when they band together (either as a corporation or a labor union).
Maursault
> The Supreme Court has made many awful rulings with respect to the first amendment.
I am astounded you'd bother to qualify that "with respect to the First Amendment." They've made stacks of awful rulings, period. Some of their greatest hits: Dred Scott v. Sanford; Plessy v. Ferguson; Hammer v. Dagenhart; Bush v. Gore; Kelo v. City of New London; DC v. Heller; Dobbs v. Jackson.
The Supreme Court is supposed to be above politics but time and again proves it's a vehicle of partisan politics, and one megalomanic sociopath can slant the Court for decades.
narrator
DC v. Heller is a great opinion to read for us Constitutional Law nerds though. Scalia really put the historical scholarship work in on that one digging up all that 1776 history. It is a very long and detailed treatise.
If you are a gun control fanatic, I could see where that one would rub you the wrong way, but it was a fantastic piece of legal scholarship.
DuskStar
I'd personally put US v. Miller on the list instead of DC v. Heller.
Wickard v. Filburn deserves a mention too.
DrFunke
>The Supreme Court is supposed to be above politics
Huh? The purpose of SCOTUS is very much partisan politics and always has been. It's actually the nature of the job.
refurb
The Supreme Court is made up of humans, so I’m somewhat shocked when people are surprised they aren’t perfect.
rayiner
What’s wrong with Bush v. Gore?
lr4444lr
Not arguing that, but I don't think any subsequent case has ever been judged by any court where the prevailing opinion cited Chaplinsky.
2OEH8eoCRo0
Put another way- it was speech telling people to break the law.
klplotx
FYI, Schenck v. United States was overturned in 1969 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schenck_v._United_States):
"In 1969, Schenck was largely overturned by Brandenburg v. Ohio, which limited the scope of banned speech to that which would be directed to and likely to incite imminent lawless action (e.g. a riot)."
So we can tell other people to avoid the draft now, even in a dry bureaucratic sense. In real life of course the draft is slavery and immoral, as Ayn Rand and many others have pointed out.
3a2d29
> the draft is slavery and immoral
I agree with this, but I also think this is such a “peace time” opinion.
If, for example, the nazis were at risk of invading the American homeland, would you want to wait until they are here and volunteers start coming in?
Again, I agree the draft is immoral, but so is war.
EDIT: for an even better example you should look up what the Japanese did to most civilians in WWII and really ask yourself if a draft to avoid that at home is bad.
blululu
Not even. The pamphlet in question opposed the draft by peaceful and legal means and further asserted that conscription is in violation of the 13th amendment. He was simply telling people that the law is unfair and unconstitutional. He didn’t even tell people to break it per se.
rdevsrex
Well that was the whole point of the Declaration of Independence. From the British viewpoint it was breaking the law of the land. So clearly it's a very American tradition to rebel against unjust authority.
kadoban
Shooting the British has a lot of American tradition. You're still going to prison if you start shooting everyone with a funny accent.
dontbenebby
The thing that amuses to me is a lot of the laws and rhetoric around these matters presume a draft. But we haven't had that for years.
Instead, you had folks who signed up for the national guard thinking they'd just screw around with fancy guns in the woods 2 weeks a year absolutely apoplectic they might actually be put in harm's way.
I remember still being a teenager in Appalachia and being made to feel like you're a hair shy of an agent of foreign power if you suggested the best way to "support the troops" was to say no illegal wars of aggression that put them in harm's way instead of slap a yellow ribbon magnet your car and say let's bomb Iran too.
You haven't truly lived until you tell some aggressive moron wh very purposefully signed up for the infantry because they wanted to kill people of color in an illegal oil war that you don't give a single solitary fuck what they think, you don't thank them for their so called service and that many Marines died at Okinawa died for your right to say that, and that if they don't get their hands out of their pockets and step back you're going to invoke stand your ground and call their wing commander or whoever the fuck is in charge of them to collect the body.
(Many, many folks sing a song about the constitution but break down when you use it for anything other than greasing the wheels of the military industrial complex, and it's DIGUSTING.)
pjc50
Always interesting to see how certain kinds of political speech were never really protected by the First Amendment.
And to remember that WW1 was ended, in part, by labour action: the October Revolution in Russia, and the Kiel Mutiny in Germany.
The full speech is here: https://genius.com/Eugene-v-debs-anti-war-speech-annotated
MarkMarine
I find his speech to the court, knowing full well he was headed to jail for the crime of speaking out against the war, more powerful.
He left half the members of the court, the people who later convicted him, in tears.
Full speech here: http://www.emersonkent.com/speeches/address_to_the_court.htm
cdmckay
And yet they still sent him to die in prison
MarkMarine
“While there is a lower class, I am in it. While there is a criminal element, I am of it. While there is a soul in prison, I am not free.”
I think to hear him tell it, he was already in prison.
shadowgovt
He didn't die in prison.
simfree
They could have done a jury nullification.
AlbertCory
> WW1 was ended, in part, by labour action: the October Revolution in Russia, and the Kiel Mutiny in Germany
"in part" saves you there. Otherwise it's nonsense.
WW1 was certainly not ended by the October Revolution. If anything, it made the war 10x worse, by freeing German troops for Ludendorff's 1918 offensive, which almost succeeded.
The Kiel Mutiny? Maybe accelerated the end by a few days. The Germans were already seeking an Armistice.
> certain kinds of political speech were never really protected
Adams and Wilson were indeed villains here. Lincoln suspended *habeas corpus." Roosevelt sent Japanese-Americans to the internment camps.
philistine
Using in part is perfectly fine because for the Russians, the war was completely ended due to labour action. They owe their war's end to that.
Was it the right decision, or did it end up losing more lives in the long term? Whole other discussion.
AlbertCory
Leaving aside the toll of Communism over its 72 years:
There was a Russian Civil War, which we don't hear much about. So the war hadn't really ended for them. There was also a war between Russia and Poland.
I looked some for a total of "WW I casualties by year" table but didn't find one; only "casualties by country." The significance would be "giant German offensive; therefore giant casualties."
In any case, I don't think there's much of a case for the hypothesis "Russian Revolution saved lives."
undefined
Spooky23
There’s always a reactionary push to silence people for their own good.
John Adams kicked it off, and Woodrow Wilson’s craven politics represented a moment where the country could have moved in an awful direction.
It’s unfortunate that we live in an era where many people have mastered the art of mass manipulation. We’re in an era where we’re vulnerable to the same sort of grinding warfare that WW1 became, and the information landscape is a barren one full of propaganda and junk.
MisterMower
Woodrow Wilson was the worst president in US history. If I had a time machine, I would go back in time to kill Wilson, not Hitler. Hitler would be a no name artist if it weren’t for Wilson completely fucking up WWI and the peace thereafter.
Fun fact: Wilson resegregated the entire federal government and even went so far as to show a KKK propaganda film at the White House. The guy was a rabid racist.
Additionally, Wilson had a stroke that left him blind and paralyzed in 1919 and for the remainder of his presidency his second wife and doctor manipulated him so heavily that there is serious debate as to who actually was in control of the White House during those years. Some historians call Edith Wilson, his second wife, America’s first female president the manipulation was so effective.
smsm42
The Constitution can work only if the society allows it to work. If the SCOTUS judges are willing to concoct arguments saying "this political speech is so bad we must ban it at all costs" and the society lets them - then there's no magic Constitution Man to jump out of shadows and stop them.
> by labour action: the October Revolution in Russia
Calling Russian revolution a "labour action" is like calling WWI "a brawl between some German and British lads". Technically, part of it fits this description, but one can't but notice it doesn't exactly paint the correct picture. Also, Russian revolution didn't really end the war - rather, Russia was losing badly, which in part led to the regime collapse, which made Russia sign the peace and get out of the war which it could no longer fight. The war didn't end by it though.
enkid
You're ignoring the Russian Civil War, which killed millions more. It's not like the October Revolution was a clean stop to the violence. And even after the end of the Civil War, the political violence didn't end.
anon291
Using examples of terrible decisions in order to justify continuing to make bad decisions is a terrible way to govern.
est31
> And to remember that WW1 was ended, in part, by labour action: the October Revolution in Russia, and the Kiel Mutiny in Germany.
I don't know much about Russia, Germany certainly has given Lenin a train ticket so that he could participate in that revolution, because they thought that it would help their interests. But for Germany, the theory that Germany lost the war because of the revolution is the so called "Dolchstoßlegende", a right wing conspiracy theory. Germany has already lost the war before that revolution. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stab-in-the-back_myth
Vespasian
Yes and the mutiny did happen in part because the German navy planned for a Last-Hurrah-Suicide mission to "die an honorful death"
The sailors were not cool with that and decided to not be killed on the final stretch of a pointless war
That was the final straw and was used to kick of the revolution. The monarchy already had lost most of its authority by that point.
lostlogin
> Germany certainly has given Lenin a train ticket
This was fascinating and amazingly conniving.
The Churchill quote, saying Lenin was smuggled back into Russia "in a sealed truck like a plague bacillus" is quite the imagery.
Lenin on the Train by Catherine Merridale covers it well.
compiskey
If you read the Founders writings justifying the first amendment you’d read it’s origins were rooted in fear members of Congress would be shot during periods of open debate.
It was not until the last 60-70 years the “zeitgeist” changed such that free speech was considered a freedom for all the government could not intrude upon.
backworsestasi
Back then they had state level and federal level defense councils. People would get reported to the authorities for all sorts of things. If you didn't donate to the red cross you would get on the list.
They also would instruct the pastors of churches to disseminate messages and those that didn't were on the list as well. This is before mass communications took hold. Most folks got their news through word of mouth or gatherings.
humanrebar
What about newspapers? They weren't invented in the 1930s.
Revolutionary War propaganda famously included various pamphlets, editorials, and self-published periodicals (Thomas Paine, The Federalist Papers, etc.).
itdependson99th
Good point. I guess that depends on the literacy rate. I don't know how hight it was during WWI.
butliteracyrate
I guess that depends on the literacy rate around 1900.
blululu
It was high. America is historically one of the more educated countries. During the civil war literacy among native born whites was over 90%. By WWI I believe it was over 95%, and by WWII it was nearly universal among native born adults.
beebmam
He also ran for president from prison (and lost). Might be relevant in the next few years.
perihelions
Democracy overrules the status quo of criminal law. That's a deeply admirable principle, and principled people shouldn't abandon that principle -- the supremacy of democracy -- on mere expedience. Democracy decides what is a crime and what is not, and can boldly overrule the law with a mere vote.
Incidentally, the incoming president of Brazil is also an ex-con.
pessimizer
> Incidentally, the incoming president of Brazil is also an ex-con.
The incoming president of Brazil had his convictions thrown out because the process was fraudulent. IIRC election regulators went after Bolsanaro for calling Lula an ex-con.
That aside, I don't think enough people explicitly hold popular sovereignty (expressed as democracy) over the rule of law. Law that isn't subject to popular sovereignty is obviously subject to some other kind of soverign. You shouldn't be jailing people who have a reasonable chance of being elected as the head of the executive, because if the public would elect them, the public doesn't think that they should be jailed.
ch4s3
This always feels funny to me, like sure Lula’s conviction was thrown out but I’ve never seen any compelling explanation for the apartment he was convicted of accepting as a bribe.
quickthrower2
I agree but your argument isn’t convincing because people are convicted by juries presented with evidence not public opinion.
A better argument is that it is a check/balance against laws that are not democratic putting people in prison that provide a good opposition the current president.
tshaddox
What about other requirements for office and limitations, like the age and citizenship requirement and term limits for President of the United States? Should “democracy overrule” those too?
armchairhacker
Yes
Honestly I the existing and proposed age limits (e.g. that you can't serve as President over 80) are addressing symptoms of a deeper problem. If your country's population wants to elect a senile 90 year-old or dumb 18 year-old or Russian traitor, your democracy is deeply flawed. A law preventing the people from doing so won't save them, as they can just elect someone else incompetent. If voters know what they're doing we shouldn't need requirements for people to run for office.
perihelions
You got me there. The questionable aspects of 18th-century political sociology fundamentally *refute* the moral arguments in favor of democracy, in the same way diagonalization arguments refute theorems in computability theory. It's ironclad math.
Synaesthesia
IMO they should, there's no need for these laws to be cast in stone and never change.
pessimizer
Presidential term limits in the US were only instituted as a reaction against a president (FDR) who was very popular among voters, but far less popular with the Chamber of Commerce.
The Chamber of Commerce tried earlier to specifically institute a term limit for FDR, but it didn't work out: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_Plot
ahtihn
Democracy can overrule those, there's a defined process for it.
yucky
Democracy is mob rule. When one says that democracy decides what is a crime and what is not, one is then defending a long history of lynchings, miscegenation, slavery, forced medical procedures, Jim Crow laws and much much more.
deadpannini
Will any downvoters comment? I think democracy is the best option we have, but ignoring its weaknesses and checkered history isn't constructive.
The current democracy-worship afoot in the US ignores the fact that almost every progressive aspect of the US state sprang from a counter-majoritarian institution: Roe and Brown, plus the administrative implementation of civil rights law.
xorcist
One of the pillars of democracy is a functioning juridical system, separate from the political.
Writing the law may be part of the popularity contest, but upholding the law most certainly is not.
retrac
it's possible for a candidate to run from prison in Westminster-style parliamentary systems. The fact that a candidate is imprisoned should not inhibit the electors from expressing their choice. Though once elected, they face certain practical barriers to assuming office.
anikan_vader
For example, the IRA member Bobby Sands was elected to the UK parliament while in prison during his (subsequently fatal) hunger strike. Parliament then immediately passed a law banning people from running for parliament from jail.
Of course, the UK is a monarchy, not a republic, so its relevance to the subject at hand is somewhat dubious.
perihelions
- "Though once elected, they face certain practical barriers to assuming office"
Then they're democratic in name only. If the previous leader has the effective, practical ability to fuck with the transfer of power, it ain't democracy.
Spooky23
I’m sure many Americans will soon become ardent supporters or opposers of this position.
mushbino
He still got 3.4% of the vote. That's pretty amazing, especially from prison.
rektide
I havent opened it yet but the book American Midnight came highly highly recommended, which covers this time period & this event.
A power hungry intolerant federal government mandating War-fervor & jingoism, suppressing all outside voices (largely liberal & progressive), clamping down on how people think & what they say. passing the Sedition Act & charging many under these wartime powers, before it's repeal.
This book supposedly makes quite the case for this being one of thr darkest times in America. Excited scared/sad to start reading it.
nopenopenopeno
I keep a portrait of the great Eugene Debs on my mantle for the purpose of encouraging people to ask me about him.
:)
xmonkee
o7
aizyuval
War is the worst, and yet it serms to be so common and often “The only choice” (allegedly. As it was in WW1).
It’s a viscous cycle. It sucks.
gpm
I think it's quite rare that war is the only viable choice for both sides, but probably reasonably frequently the case that war is the only viable choice for one side. Sort of like how many crimes require both a victim and a perpetrator, but only one side is making the choice.
It's also the case that in many modern wars both sides will claim to be the side with no choice though. Also that having entered a war by choice doesn't necessarily imply that it's still possible to exit the war by choice.
concordDance
> but probably reasonably frequently the case that war is the only viable choice for one side
I think this is untrue... unless your invaders are the assyrians, surrender and losing the war isn't really that bad. Even the Mongols would just collect some extra taxes.
aizyuval
Interesting. Though, I meant that it always seems like the only choice which makes it viable.
nicbou
It's not just the only choice, but a phenomenon that eventually gets a mind of its own. There is a point in almost every war where both sides regret the escalation, but are powerless to stop the war as the time tables have been set, the troops mobilised, the ultimatums issued. And the belligerents, deeply invested in the outcome, cannot stop the war before the cataclysmic defeat of one side.
The inevitability of war beyond a certain point is a terrifying prospect.
lostlogin
It is thick, but wilfully. I think you (or autocorrect) mean vicious.
EGreg
Libertarians and Anarchists used to be Socialists in the 19th and early 20th century. Everyone from Kropotkin and Bakunin to Oscar Wilde. And likewise, socialists like Eugene Debbs had correctly pointed out that the governments and political class send you to war while they themselves don’t go.
Many socialists said the same thing during WW1. Why should the working class people fight each other? Turn the guns on your masters etc.
Would be nice to post links here to European versions of this.
Today’s libertarians view modern wars with the same skepticism. Are they really necessary, and if so, can our governments have a referendum by their people before starting one?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Soul_of_Man_Under_Socialis...
geofft
The link seems to be down, but this is the speech itself: https://www.marxists.org/archive/debs/works/1918/canton.htm
nonrandomstring
Public opinion and conflict seem to have a complex relation and predictable phases that follow the seasons of war.
Before the show starts, jingoism is emergent and it ought to be illegal to rattle sabres and call for blood where peace is still possible. That changes quickly, there is a definite threshold.
Once the game is on, one has to move with the crowd. To not support the war is demoralising, treacherous even. And this rises as the first body bags come home and mothers weep.
In the middle phase, people are stoic and quiet. Soldiers have "a job to do" and we must "grin and bear it".
Without swift victory, then comes the point of fatigue and economic pain. Too many dead children on the TV. But the protestors are in a minority and need great courage to point the way to an exit. That's when tactical silencing of dissent can happen. The idea that opposing the war is the same as siding with the enemy comes to the fore.
As the tide turns, even millions on the streets (Vietnam, Iraq), or the advice of generals (Afghanistan) cannot overcome the pride of miscalculating leaders. But at that point public opinion has passed the threshold the other way.
By the end it is shameful to still support a lost war (and sometimes, depending on the cost, even a victorious one).
Long before it ended WWI was universally seen as "insane" by all sides.
Perhaps my historical education is wanting, but only the second world war seems to have a clear narrative of victory over evil, with a constancy of support for Allied triumph which I think even the exhausted Germans and Japanese felt toward the end. That "just war" model is wheeled out and is still active apropos Ukraine.
nicbou
WW2 as a just war is only true to an extent. To an Indian, an Arab or an African, it was not a war of liberation.
Let's not forget that Britain worried about the loss of its colonies, that the Soviet Union started and ended the war as an invader, that France was as worried about the socialists at home as they were about the Nazis at the border, that Paris was liberated by colonial troops, but it's the Europeans who got a parade on the Champs Elysées, that everyone bombed civilians, that victors made immoral concessions in preparation for the next war, that the faith of entire nations was decided on a napkin in Potsdam.
War is messy. Geopolitics are rarely a history of good guys and bad guys.
justatdotin
> only the second world war seems to have a clear narrative of victory over evil
I thought you were being ironic up to here.
nonrandomstring
Hope I'm not misunderstanding your comment and over-egging the reply.
Irony isn't a particularly useful concept when dealing with speech on the internet, which is fragmented and in ambiguous contexts.
And it goes against HN guidelines to proffer the most generous and sincere writing/interpretation possible.
There's a difference between irony and sarcasm, prevalent here, and both definitions are largely abused or misunderstood these days.
Look for words like "seemed", which invokes the concept of appearance and therefore implicitly casts doubt on appearances.
What I am conveying here, by "narrative" (story/account) is that as a mature person, with some experience of the matters, I have many reservations about the way things were told to me growing up by "authority" figures from my past.
That's not really irony. More of a sceptical tone. Sceptical about the whole way that "war narratives" and public opinion is spun.
lettergram
spamizbad
I can’t speak to Japan, but your account of Germany leaves out some major details.
Germany was allowed heavy industry after the war, but defaulted on its reparation payment in 1923. France and Belgium thought Germany was holding out on them, and decided to “confiscate” (by occupying with soldiers) German industry.
This was pretty agregious, but Germany responded by the government asking workers to passively resist, more or less triggering a general strike, with the government printing money to cover the wages of all the striking workers. Naturally, if only a few workers are still making things, but the government is paying everyone their salary, it should be no surprise that this triggered hyperinflation.
I don’t know what you mean about “the west” pushing its ideology on Germany when Germany itself is part of that intellectual and cultural group. In fact, the Weimar Republic was culturally quite rich, and relatively progressive compared to other western nations. Unless you’re talking about how the Nazis took inspiration from the segregation in the United States, but I don’t think the US was particularly interested in exporting it.
dmix
If you dig deep into the origins of Nazi ideology (this book is a good source [1]) it’s obvious 99% of it came from historical European sources and regional issues. Often German thinkers but also across Europe (including France and Italy). There was enough local cultural and economic anxieties to draw from.
The Germans using America’s racial conflicts was usually mentioned in passing for analogy or for propaganda purposes. But it was hardly the ideological source of the antisemitism, German border fears, anti-Russia, and Lebensraum.
It’s trendy to compare America to 1930s Germany. But trying to spin the ideological origin of Nazi thought as being inspired by fringes of the US shows a severe lack of historical research. There was more than enough cultural sources at home in Germany.
[1] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/319473.The_Coming_of_the...
nonrandomstring
Thanks for thoughtful comments.
I do read widely and appreciate your suggestion. What do you recommend as the must-read, accessible and honest and intelligent account of civilian life in Germany during that period. Thanks.
undefined
lettergram
Rather than giving specifics I’d try to focus on popular (translated) speeches from the time from Germany, Russia, France, UK, US. Read old news papers if you can as well (there are archives online). That’ll give you more of a “heart beat” of what’s going on.
The geopolitics of the time I developed from reading probably a hundred or so books on it. When you get a history book they have citations, go through those and find a few to read. You’ll get closer to the source material.
Sorry for being “loose” in my particulars of recommendations. I really do think for understanding civilian life newspapers might be the best basis (it’s most of the original source material).
lostlogin
I’m not the OP but like reading about the interwar period, particularly in Russia. You really can’t view The Second World War in isolation, as it was directly related to World War One, particular in Germany and Russia. It was utter chaos politically and following any thread though the period is very complicated. It isn’t really about Germany, but gives an idea of the complexity of the era and of German politics, Lenin on the Train by Catherine Merridale is a good read.
TaylorAlexander
I thought I would also suggest the Iron Dice podcast and specifically the “fight for the republic” numbered series episodes, which cover the power struggle in Germany between WW1 and WW2: https://www.theirondice.com/
skorpeon87
> Similarly, the US cut off oil and resources to Japan.
The US ""cut off"" oil to Japan by having possession of the Philiphines, which was situated directly between Japan and the Dutch East Indes. The Dutch East Indes had the oil, the Dutch didn't want to sell it to Japan, and Japan intended to take it by force so they could fuel their conquest of China. The American-occupied Philippines were between the two, so Japanese military leadership decided to eliminate the American Navy first.
Japan were not victims in this. It was their imperial ambition that did them in.
troad
This post is repugnant, and wrong as a matter of historical fact. You’re brazenly attempting to whitewash the monstrous crimes of Nazi Germany. I’ve never seen “Lost Cause of the Third Reich” historiography, and I’d never expect to see it on HN.
WW2 was an imperial war of aggression waged by a revanchist fascist state that felt entitled to land that other people were already living on, and resources other people already owned - a problem they attempted to solve by simply murdering all of them.
Boxed in? Boxed in by what, exactly? The inconvenient existence of the Czechs and Poles? Germany somehow manages to be far richer today than it was in 1933 - and it does this with less land / resources, and the overbearing influence of the Anglo-Saxon culture you openly deride. If Germany today can resist going on to murder millions of people for land and resources, it’s unclear to me why the larger and more resource-filled Germany of 1933 couldn’t similarly restrain itself. (Hint: because WW2 had nothing at all to do with any justifiable need for resources, but instead the jingoistic ambitions of a culture that saw itself as the master race, deserving of a place atop all others, and seething at its failure to secure the privileges it felt it was owed by reason of its own racial supremacy.)
Worst of all is your casual suggestion that Germany would be better off if it had retained more of its pre-1945 culture. I struggle to put this in any other way, but you’re saying you wish Germany today was culturally more like Nazi Germany, and I honestly don’t know what to say to that. As someone who would have been murdered for about three different reasons by the refined bearers of pre-1945 German culture, I have some choice words in mind.
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Ken White (of "Popehat" twitter fame) has a great article explaining how this and similar court cases during the first world war are the origin of the (poor) "fire in a crowded theater" argument against certain kinds of free speech:
https://www.popehat.com/2012/09/19/three-generations-of-a-ha...