Understanding Naziism and Fascism for purposes of Roleplay in City of Heroes and City of Villains.
I've noticed a somewhat disturbing trend in the last few weeks as more player villains are created and existing storylines from the game are revisited in order to provide source material for player characters. This problem extends beyond the Rogue Islands to Paragon City, especially as heroes try to roleplay against the Council (or Fifth Column) as enemies.
Many players are really confusing the difference between Nazis and Fascists. They are often misquoting, misrepresenting, or not really understanding the agendas of those groups, or the agenda of the groups historically in opposition to them.
I am only a casual student of history, but I thought that I would share a bit of my knowledge and research with other players in order to enhance their roleplay experience.
If you're a roleplayer, don't let me discourage you from roleplaying however you want to. I offer this as a clarification of real-world history. Your character's history or the history of "City of Heroes and Villains" world may be significantly different than this history.
Please understand that I'm going to very frankly discuss two of the worst, most monstrous regimes in the history of mankind. I do not support those belief they espoused, nor would I encourage anyone else to. Racism and Totalitarianism are repugnant and evil in all their forms.
Whatever else you read here, please remember the following:
Regardless of the slant you've heard from news, grandparents, great-grandparents, or politicians, neither Naziism nor Fascism were primarily opposed to Democracy, Federalism, nor Capitalism. If anything, they embraced Capitalism. First and foremost, the Nazis and Fascists hated Socialists and Communists.
Most people remember that Nazi Germany's largest sin was the Holocaust against the Jews. Remember that this was the personal agenda of Adolph Hitler, precipitated by a relatively small number of powerful people. It was popular to an extent. The Jews made easy scapegoats to a public prepared to demonize them. It was not, however, the major feature of either Naziism or Fascism.
Hitler and Anti-Semitism:
In the aftermath of the 'Great War', World War I, Germany was a broken country. As part of the Treaty of Versailles, which marked the end of the war, Germany was forced to accept total responsibility for the war despite the fact that it really started because of tensions in what is now Yugoslavia and Serbia-Montenegro. Germany attempted to use the war as an excuse for a landgrab and this behavior was severely punished by the victor nations.
Germany was also experiencing the ravages of the Great Depression. Unemployment, homelessness, and poverty were very common. As a consequence, corruption, prostitution, and other crime was rampant.
A young man who fought in the war, Adolph Hitler, was very, very bitter about these circumstances. His country had been crushed, and, as history would show, Adolph Hitler was particularly unstable. Before he began military service, he couldn't stay in school and was frequently homeless.
Adolph began to subscribe to the theories of a certain Lanz Liebenfels, who was a notorious racist anti-semite (he hated Jews). Adolph easily made the mental leap between blaming his own and his country's problems on real world events and started blaming them on Jewish people, who were stereotypically portrayed as shrewd, greedy businessmen.
He, like many others at the time, also acquired the very fervent belief that Liberals and Socialists had betrayed Germany by surrendering in the war.
Moussolini vs. the Communists:
About this same time, Benito Moussolini was gaining popularity in Italy. Italy wasn't doing quite as bad as Germany in the Great Depression, but it was suffering. Italy hadn't done well in the Great War and was split by ideological debate. Many people felt like civil war was looming. It wasn't pretty.
Fascists wanted a strong central government to take control of everything in the country. They were very pro-war. They wanted to make the other countries deal with them in an equitable fashion and seize resources outside Italy. Socialists wanted more control in the hands of labor unions and the common people. They had had enough of war. It only served to make the rich richer by sacrificing the lives of poor soldiers.
Benito Mussolini was one of the editors of an anti-socialist newspaper, He had actually been a Socialist leader before, but switched sides. He felt especially betrayed that Italy had entered WWI on the side of Britain and France-- France being *very* socialist compared to other European nations.
After the war, he organized a militia of war veterans to terrorize the country, attacking Communists and Socialists in particular. He helped break labor strikes, which made him popular with the Industrialists and farmers. Italy's very liberal government at the time couldn't really do anything to stop him. Benito was very charismatic and very popular.
Eventually, he organized what he called a 'March on Rome' and cowed the King of Italy into declaring him Prime Minister.
Benito's new government was based on the premise that the elite should rule. The elite in business, knowledge, military, culture, and religion should reign over everyone else.
This was immensely popular. Those who had time and weren't busy working around the clock to care for their families really liked this idea. It meant that the rich and wealthy were powerful and stayed powerful.
Fascism was *not* a system of oppression, nor did it particularly attack any given race of people. Jews certainly weren't popular, but everyone in Europe wanted to pick on the Jews.
Instead, Fascism was the [censored] child of Aristocracy and Capitalism-- Corporatism, rather. Those in power had a right to live at the expense of those less wealthy.
Fascism *was* diametrically opposed to Communism. The whole of Europe had recently watched two extremely bloody Socialist revolutions over a relatively short period. First, the peasants of France rose up and slaughtered the Nobility and the Rich in that country in massive numbers. Just before the war, the Russians had also very violently slain most of their nobility and rich and adopted a Communist government.
This terrified people. The poor commoners could revolt, steal everything you owned, and then kill you and your family.
Benito still had his newspaper and was truly excellent at spreading propaganda. Even those in Italy who *were* poor commoners were worried about Communism.
Mussolini understood that information is power. He instituted strict censorship laws so that he could control what the people of Italy heard and knew. He also altered the way elections were run so that he would always be in power. He and his cronies began to popularize the idea of 'Il Duce' -- Benito as a godlike man who was so far above other people that they could always trust him to rule the country.
Hitler vs. The Socialists
One of Hitler's last duties as a member of the German Army was to fight against socialist uprisings in and around Germany, particularly in Bavaria. He was assigned by his superiors to infiltrate the German Worker's Party, a Socialist labor union. He continued this infiltration even after he was no longer part of the military.
Despite his instability, Hitler was, like many madmen, very charismatic. He said and did the things that sane men would only dream about. He maneuvered his way to absolute control of the Worker's Party through lawsuits, cronyism, and threats of violence.
Hitler was voted in as 'Leader' or 'Fuhrer' of the Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei -- The Germany National Socialist Worker's Party-- by its members, approximately 550 of them. He had effectively subverted the largest socialist organization in the country. It's detractors, including Socialists and those opposed to Hitler, abbreviated Nationalsozialistische Arbeiterpartei to 'Nazi Party'. It was a play on 'Sozi', which was the derogatory word of choice to describe Socialists.
Hitler went berserk with power almost immediately, trying to bend the entire Bavarian region to his will. He preached against Jews and incidentally about the evils of Liberalism and Socialism. He and his friends admired Mussolini and attempted a 'March on Berlin'. After a short spate of violence, Hitler managed to get several of his friends shot, injured, killed, and most definitely arrested by the German Army. He himself was arrested for Treason, and dictated the infamous racist manuscript 'Mein Kampf' while in prison.
Hitler was considered relatively harmless and was released from prison fairly early. (Isn't that rather sad?) Because it was no longer really a 'Socialist' organization, the Nazi Party had almost completely evaporated in his absence. Hitler tried to rebuild it as an almost entirely racist organization devoted to oppressing Jews. This didn't work very well. Instead, once again, he adopted the view and ideas espoused by Mussolini and rebuilt it as a much more Fascist organization that directly opposed the very Liberal German government of the time. Hitler's obsessive hatred of Jews dovetailed fairly easily with his new Fascist message. Stealing another play from Mussolini's book, he began to do his best to spread his message to poor farmers, war veterans, and laborers.
Like the lower-class Italians, the lower-class Germans swallowed Fascism hook, line, and sinker, even though they were really those Fascism targeted as its enemies. With Hitler's charisma and propaganda at work, they even bought into an unhealthy amount of his racism.
More and more Nazis were being elected to the German Parliament and the government was growing more and more unstable despite the fact that the country was starting to recover from losses from World War I and the Great Depression.
Eventually, in order to keep the government from dissolving altogether, the Parliament voted to appoint Adolph Hitler, as leader of the Nazi Party, to be leader of the government. He was sworn in as Chancellor in 1933.
(It's often said that people should remember that Hitler was elected. This is not strictly speaking true. He was only elected in a parliamentary sense.)
His new government began instigating Fascist controls almost immediately, building up the same kind of censorship and propaganda network that had proven so successful for Mussolini. Socialists of any kind were given the boot (or blade) and Hitler restarted his own personal campaign against Jews.
Hitler and the Nazi party focused on a series of public works, such as highway construction and bridge building. They also espoused fervent religious belief and participation. Hitler implemented conservative policies that encouraged men to be 'Breadwinners' and women to be involved in family and religion. Jews, homosexuals, socialists and other undesireables were to be excluded from Germany's glorious future.
Adolph and Benito 2-Gether-4-Ever
Hitler and the Nazi Party's control over German society quickly grew to be almost complete.
In 1936 Mussolini met with Hitler and suggested an alliance between the Italy and Germany. Hitler gladly agreed to become part of the 'Steel Axis'. Hitler had already begun to flex his new military power, and Mussolini had been building his up all along. They reinforced each others' ideas and ambitions.
Fascism and Naziism were about to make life very, very difficult for the great majority of Europeans, and even Americans and Asians. To those outside Europe 'Fascist' was a word for 'Totalitarian Aggressor' and 'Nazi' meant '[censored]-hater'.
Even after Hitler and Mussolini were gone, Naziism and Fascism lived on. Naziism lost most of its Fascist backing and became primarily a racist movement. Fascism merely lost its name. It's spread far and wide under the guises of 'Corporatism' and 'Fundamentalist Religion'.
Even many modern Americans, Asians, and Europeans embrace the ideals of Fascism, although they would never dream of calling it by that name. To certain sectors of our society, Fascism remains very attractive, just as in Mussolini's day. It means that the elite in business, knowledge, religion, the military, and politics control the country.
Summary
Naziism
Proponent of:
- Censorship
- Information Control
- Religious Belief
- Racism
- Sexism
- Industrialism
- Expansionism
Opponent of:
- Jewish or Hebrew heritage or faith
- Socialism, Communism, or Marxism in any form.
- Liberalism in any form
Fascism
Proponent of:
- Censorship
- Information Control
- Religious Belief
- Industrialism
- Corporatism
- Expansionism
Opponent of:
- Labor Unions
- Socialism, Communism, or Marxism is any form.
- Liberalism in any form.
Roleplaying with or against Nazis:
A 'typical' Nazi character is going to be defined far more by his sense of patriotism than an obsessive hatred of Jews or Hebrew culture. He will be loyal to Hitler-era Germany or Hitler's dream of an Aryan-dominated empire. He will probably act derisively towards Jews, or any other non-white race for that matter. If he affects a religion, it will probably be Christianity. A 'good' Nazi believes in the power and righteousness of a military-dominated state. Any sort of behavior considered immoral by very conservative standards will be strictly taboo, such as homosexuality, prostitution, or pornography, (Of course these behaviors will still be wide spread... just secret and shameful to talk about.)
Many Nazis will also be quite sexist. Women are not meant to work outside the home according to Nazi doctrine. They are meant to be submerged in the '3 Ks' -- Kitchen, Kinder, Kurche. If women are not cooking for their men, they should be taking care of the children, or active in the church.
'Good' Nazis trust the state. They will immediately report any sign of 'prohibited' behavior to an authority figure. 'Prohibited' behavior will include any kind of immorality, non-Christian religious activities, any kind of labor union or Socialist activities, and any kind of non-state-sanctioned speech, such as illegal newspapers or radio broadcasts.
Roleplaying with or against Fascists:
Like Nazis, a 'typical' Fascist is going to be concerned much more by patriotism and nationalism than any other feature. This may be expressed as loyalty to Mussolini's government, or to a modern government dominated by very conservative interests or religious interests. A Fascist will be slightly more Libertarian than a Nazi. He will still believe in the power of the state, but will expect less involvement with his personal life. Fascists certainly aren't immune to racism or anti-semitism by any means, but it probably won't be one of their primary concerns.
A Fascist's primary concerns would be any kind of labor union, any kind of socialist or communist activity, and preserving strict distinctions between upper and lower classes. Any given fascist will imagine himself as part of the upper class despite his actual status. The 'real' upper classes will be captains of industry, prominent religious leaders, politicians, and police and military officials. Cronyism is a given in any situation.
A Fascist is also going to be fairly concerned with squelching crime, organized or not, and any kind of rebellious or seditious activity, since they threaten the status-quo. News or radio that is not controlled by the state would be strictly prohibited.
Fascists will also oppose any kind of social reform as unnecessary, unethical, or immoral.
Supporters of Mussolini's government would almost certainly espouse Roman Catholic beliefs.
In summary, please let me remind everyone reading this that ANY extreme form of government or system of laws can be used to oppress people. This is especially true if racism, religious discrimination, or really any of kind of inequality is present. Fascism and Naziism represent one end of a spectrum-- the extreme end of the bell curve, if you will. The majority of the people who supported these movements were not monsters themselves-- although their leaders could certainly be characterized that way. They were 'normal' people who were caught up in a monstrous movement.
I'm protanopic, like I said, but it's not like the unaltered and the protanopia filter look the same. Basically, it's like running through the filter twice for folks like me. WhatColor tells me it's fairly accurate, though, as far as I can tell. The colors it tells me for the Protanopia filter that the colors more or less are what I think I see on the unaltered version... If that even makes sense. o_o;