Philosophical Vegan Forum

I just finished watching this documentary series where each episode features one of Hitler's Henchmen. I have always been a history buff with a particular interest in WW2 but I never cease to be amazed. How could such a bunch of egocentric anusholes gain such enormous power and change the course of history for everyone? AND on the relative timescale of human history this all happened only yesterday.

The other question I continue to ask myself is why the Nazis were so ahead of their time concerning animal welfare. They didn't seem to care about anyone but themselves so why would they give a shit about animals?

It could have to do with their views on the natural order. They saw race mixing as a violation of that, and weakening the Aryan race. No such threat was perceived from non-human animals, and one of the virtues they believed of Aryans was kindness (or, you could say it made them feel better about themselves to support this token effort). They felt self preservation justified their war with other races and undesirables. Remember that initially they just wanted them out, the "final solution" was much later.

While Nazis were cruel, they did make some odd efforts to avoid cruelty and see themselves as the good guys, down to the designs of the concentration camps (as ridiculous as that was in retrospect) and the nature of their mass executions (telling them they were going for showers).

brimstoneSalad wrote: ↑Wed Sep 20, 2017 8:41 pm(telling them they were going for showers).

I think that was to make it easier for themselves.

The other thing that struck me is that these guys were not exactly prime examples of the "the superior race." None of them were blond. Göring was obese and Goebbels was short, ugly, and walked with a limp. When they invaded the Scandinavian countries they killed people who were a lot more superior than themselves, by their own description.

Jebus wrote: ↑Thu Sep 21, 2017 1:45 am The other thing that struck me is that these guys were not exactly prime examples of the "the superior race." None of them were blond. Göring was obese and Goebbels was short, ugly, and walked with a limp. When they invaded the Scandinavian countries they killed people who were a lot more superior than themselves, by their own description.

For their own good, of course!
Can't expect much consistency from people. I'm sure they all had excuses for themselves.