Showing posts with label Hitler. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Hitler. Show all posts
Friday, February 19, 2016
Wednesday, December 25, 2013
Swing Kids (German: Swingjugend)
The youth of the western world was celebrating the end of global economic depression and the approach of modern times during the 1930s and 40s with a riotous explosion of dance and music called Swing. However, in Germany a repressive fascist regime under Adolf Hitler tried to impose its iron will on the German people, and keep them isolated from any international movements that threatened to undermine Nazi philosophy. They were composed of 14 to 18-year-old boys and girls in high school, most of them middle or upper-class students, but with some apprentice workers as well
Similar conflicts arose when swing became more popular in other countries. In Germany it confronted the Nazi ideology and was forbidden by it. It was offensive to the Nazis because of its lyrics (that sometimes promoted free love and sexual permissiveness), but also because it was performed by African – American, as well as Jewish musicians. It was labeled as “nigger music” and “degenerate music.” That’s when The Swing Kids (German: Swingjugend) arrived. They were a group of jazz and Swing lovers in the 1930s, mostly concentrated in Hamburg and Berlin. The name Swing Kids or Swing Youth was a parody on the numerous “youth groups” in Nazism. They also took parody in their greeting “Swing Heil” which mocked the Nazi's “Sieg Heil.”
The female Swing Kids, meanwhile, wore long, flowing hair and penciled eyebrows, lipstick and nail polish. Naturally, the Nazis were scandalized by such wanton displays of Hollywood influenced degeneracy, as true German woman had a pure beauty and kept their hair in Heidi braids.
Hamburg was the hot spot, especially in terms of historical raids on swing youth, though Berlin, Frankfurt, and many other cities across all the countries of the Third Reich also had groups. Authorities and other citizens called the youth Swing-Heinis and Swingjugend — at first insults of a sort, but soon proudly adopted by the youth.In the beginning the Swing Kids were apolitical, but later, by the aggression of the Gestapo and Hitler Youth, they evolved into a non-violent refusal to the National-socialist culture (even though they were not an organized political opposition).
“(...) Our Youth must learn nothing else, but only to think like and act like Germans! We must get our boys into a Party organization at the age of 10, where they can be immersed for the very first time in the totality of pure German spirit. Then, after four years, they will be transferred from this Young Folk (Jungvolk) into the Hitler Youth (Hitlerjugend). — excerpt of Hitler’s speech at Reichenberg, December 2, 1938
Contemporary Nazi Reports and Measures regarding German Swing Youth.
The Nazi authorities considered the dance craze of the Swing scene a particular menace. Swing was viewed as a very dangerous foreign import, because it was rooted in immoral Black ”jungle music” with accompanying allusions to wild, indiscriminate sex. Even worse, as far as the Nazi officials were concerned, Swing was a deliberate product of Jewish media moguls in America that, if spread to Germany, could contaminate the blood of its own youth. Youngsters caught up in a possible invasion of Swing would revert to more primitive forms of African-inspired behavior.
Youth Resistance in Wartime Germany
Jazz music, with its high spirits, fun and originality, was viewed of as democratic. Moreover with its ”non-Aryan” roots Jazz was considered a product of the American lifestyle and was therefore frowned upon by the Nazi’s who found the Jazz music degenerating.
The ”Swing era” of the mid 30’s through to the end of the 40’s originated from America. Swing music was played as set arrangements in a big band. This had the effect of limiting improvisation, which also meant that the Afro-American influence was less apparent.
They would whistle swing songs and sometimes walk with one foot on the curb, the other on the street — a sort of limping swagger they called the “lotter step.” (Whistling Eddie Carroll’s “Harlem” was the way the Frankfurt swing youth hailed each other. Berliners switched from “Goody, Goody” to “Jeepers Creepers.” Liepzig had “Flat Foot Floogie.”) As they were teenagers, they of course made up new, obscene lyrics to many songs.
“Swing Kids Behind Barbed Wire”
Similar conflicts arose when swing became more popular in other countries. In Germany it confronted the Nazi ideology and was forbidden by it. It was offensive to the Nazis because of its lyrics (that sometimes promoted free love and sexual permissiveness), but also because it was performed by African – American, as well as Jewish musicians. It was labeled as “nigger music” and “degenerate music.” That’s when The Swing Kids (German: Swingjugend) arrived. They were a group of jazz and Swing lovers in the 1930s, mostly concentrated in Hamburg and Berlin. The name Swing Kids or Swing Youth was a parody on the numerous “youth groups” in Nazism. They also took parody in their greeting “Swing Heil” which mocked the Nazi's “Sieg Heil.”
The female Swing Kids, meanwhile, wore long, flowing hair and penciled eyebrows, lipstick and nail polish. Naturally, the Nazis were scandalized by such wanton displays of Hollywood influenced degeneracy, as true German woman had a pure beauty and kept their hair in Heidi braids.
“(...) Our Youth must learn nothing else, but only to think like and act like Germans! We must get our boys into a Party organization at the age of 10, where they can be immersed for the very first time in the totality of pure German spirit. Then, after four years, they will be transferred from this Young Folk (Jungvolk) into the Hitler Youth (Hitlerjugend). — excerpt of Hitler’s speech at Reichenberg, December 2, 1938
Contemporary Nazi Reports and Measures regarding German Swing Youth.
The Nazi authorities considered the dance craze of the Swing scene a particular menace. Swing was viewed as a very dangerous foreign import, because it was rooted in immoral Black ”jungle music” with accompanying allusions to wild, indiscriminate sex. Even worse, as far as the Nazi officials were concerned, Swing was a deliberate product of Jewish media moguls in America that, if spread to Germany, could contaminate the blood of its own youth. Youngsters caught up in a possible invasion of Swing would revert to more primitive forms of African-inspired behavior.
Youth Resistance in Wartime Germany
Jazz music, with its high spirits, fun and originality, was viewed of as democratic. Moreover with its ”non-Aryan” roots Jazz was considered a product of the American lifestyle and was therefore frowned upon by the Nazi’s who found the Jazz music degenerating.
The ”Swing era” of the mid 30’s through to the end of the 40’s originated from America. Swing music was played as set arrangements in a big band. This had the effect of limiting improvisation, which also meant that the Afro-American influence was less apparent.
They would whistle swing songs and sometimes walk with one foot on the curb, the other on the street — a sort of limping swagger they called the “lotter step.” (Whistling Eddie Carroll’s “Harlem” was the way the Frankfurt swing youth hailed each other. Berliners switched from “Goody, Goody” to “Jeepers Creepers.” Liepzig had “Flat Foot Floogie.”) As they were teenagers, they of course made up new, obscene lyrics to many songs.
“Swing Kids Behind Barbed Wire”
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
Chinese Reopen Debate Over Chairman Mao's Legacy
 Image via Wikipedia |
| 02/29/1972 |
Daily plans for the first three weeks and commentary about these plans at three grade levels: primary (K–2), middle (3–4), and upper (5–6)
As China prepares to mark the 90th anniversary of its Communist Party on July 1, there are signs of a new ideological struggle over former leader Mao Zedong's legacy.
It's been nearly 35 years since the death of Chairman Mao, and the official verdict is that Mao was 70 percent right and 30 percent wrong. That assessment is controversial, given the tens of millions of deaths Mao caused through economic mismanagement and political terror.
Now an 82-year-old reform-minded economist, Mao Yushi (no relation to the former leader), has reopened the debate over the chairman inside China. In a bold essay, he wrote that Chairman Mao should not be viewed as a god any longer.
"The three biggest murderers of the 20th century are Hitler, Stalin and Mao Zedong. That's commonly accepted among historians outside China, and Mao killed the most people. They're seen as representatives of evil," he told NPR. "But in China, Mao's portrait is still in Tiananmen Square. If China wants to develop further, it needs to distinguish between basic right and wrong."
Reformist Mao Yushi, 82, has caused a storm with his latest essay criticizing Chairman Mao. But he would welcome a court hearing. "It wouldn't be me on trial, it would be Chairman Mao on trial," he says.
The website's [Utopia]founder, Fan Jinggang, 34, also started a bookshop specializing in the works of Mao, as well as Cu ltural Revolution-era films and biographies of leaders like Hugo Chavez. Fan says Mao Yushi has gone too far.
"[Mao Yushi] represents those Western imperialist powers and China's landlord class that were chased out at the founding of new China," Fan says. "Their common trait is they oppose the People's Republic of China, and China's socialist system."
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