Nazi ideology encompassed antisemitic views that blamed Germans rather than Jews

Evidence

Until one or two decades ago it was common – not only among the lay public, but also among historians – to seek the explanation of the mass murder of European Jews in the long history of European antisemitism. Such an explanation required of course singling out German antisemitism as the most intense, merciless and murderous; it was after all in Germany where the monstrous plan of total annihilation of the whole race had been begotten and put in action. As we, however, remember from the second and third chapters, both the explanation and its corollary have been discredited by historical research. There was an evident dicontinuity between the traditional, pre-modern Jew-hatred and the modern exterminatory design indispensable for the perpetration of the Holocaust. As far as the function of popular feelings is concerned, the ever-growing volume of historical evidence proves beyond reasonable doubt an almost negative correlation between the ordinary and traditional, ‘neighbourly’, competition-based anti-Jewish sentiment, and the willingness to embrace the Nazi vision of total destruction and to partake of its implementation. — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 521 (#qualifies, via linked claim)

Examining neutral and critical sources in addition to official reports, Gordon has documented a widespread and growing approval of ‘ordinary Germans’ for the exclusion of Jews from positions of power, wealth and influence. The gradual disappearance of Jews from public life was either applauded or studiously overlooked. Unwillingness of the public to partake personally of the persecution of the Jews was, in short, combined with the readiness to go along with, or at least not to interfere with, the action of the State. ‘If most Germans were not fanatical or “paranoid” anti-Semites, they were “mild”, “latent”, or passive anti-Semites, for whom the Jews had become a “depersonalized”, abstract, and alien entity beyond human empathy and the “Jewish Question” a legitimate subject of state policy deserving solution.’ — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 221 (#qualifies, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Antisemitism acted as a catalyst for Nazi rule, world war, and genocide; Antisemitism was added to Pan-German program rather than foundational to it; Antisemitism among the lower middle class arose from fear of proletarianization (+4 more)

Related

• Antisemitism acted as a catalyst for Nazi rule, world war, and genocide (similarity 0.87)
• Traditional antisemitism negatively correlates with willingness to perpetrate genocide (similarity 0.86)
• Antisemitism was added to Pan-German program rather than foundational to it (similarity 0.85)
• Ordinary Germans approved state exclusion while avoiding personal persecution (similarity 0.84)
• Hitler’s rhetoric worked by dividing Germans into the worthy and the worthless (similarity 0.83)
• Intense Nazi indoctrination failed to override conventional, nonracial loyalties (similarity 0.82)
• Holocaust perpetrators were ordinary citizens acting without personal anti-Jewish resentment. (similarity 0.82)
• Goldhagen claimed anti-Semitism alone but sufficiently explains the Holocaust at every level (similarity 0.81)
• The Holocaust required neutralizing popular attitudes, not mobilizing them (similarity 0.81)
• Popular hatred was insufficient to drive the Holocaust (similarity 0.81)
• Majority ambivalence toward Jews, not indifference, enabled genocide (similarity 0.81)
• German popular antisemitism was weaker than in several other European countries. (similarity 0.81)
• The Holocaust fused antisemitism with social and political mechanisms of an entirely different character. (similarity 0.80)
• The commonsense antisemitism-explains-Holocaust causal link collapses under scrutiny. (similarity 0.80)
• Nazi hatred of Jews was uniquely irrational even among its genocides (similarity 0.80)

Broader Connections

• Traditional antisemitism negatively correlates with willingness to perpetrate genocide #qualifies (0.75) — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 521
• Ordinary Germans approved state exclusion while avoiding personal persecution #qualifies (0.72) — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 221