(no subject)
Alan Bullock in summation of the similarities of Hitler and Stalin in regards to personal lives and their views of humanity:
"Stalin and Hilter were materialists not only in their dismissal of religion but in their insesitivity to humanity as well. The only human begins who existed for them were themselves. The rest of the human race was seen either as instrument with which to accomplish their purposes or as obstacles to be eliminated. They regarded life solely in terms of politics and power: everything else - human relationships and emotions, knowledge, beliefs, the arts, history, science - was of value only in so far as it could be exploited for political purposes.
Both men were remarkable only for the roles they assumed. Outside of those, their private lives were insignificant and impoverished. And each of the roles was consecrated to a vision of a world which, however great the differences between them, was equally inhuman - worlds in which whole populations could be uprooted and moved about; whole classes could be eiminated, races enslaved or exterminated; millions of lives sacrificed in war and even in time of peace; individual men and women dwarfed by the scale of monolithic structures - state, Volk, party, army, giant industrial complexes, collective farms, labour and concentration camps - into which they were organized."
I love the images the last paragraph invokes. I often try to conceptualise the sheer scale of the deaths, buildings, destruction that was caused and fail to. It's always great when you read history that really leaves that impression on you.
"Stalin and Hilter were materialists not only in their dismissal of religion but in their insesitivity to humanity as well. The only human begins who existed for them were themselves. The rest of the human race was seen either as instrument with which to accomplish their purposes or as obstacles to be eliminated. They regarded life solely in terms of politics and power: everything else - human relationships and emotions, knowledge, beliefs, the arts, history, science - was of value only in so far as it could be exploited for political purposes.
Both men were remarkable only for the roles they assumed. Outside of those, their private lives were insignificant and impoverished. And each of the roles was consecrated to a vision of a world which, however great the differences between them, was equally inhuman - worlds in which whole populations could be uprooted and moved about; whole classes could be eiminated, races enslaved or exterminated; millions of lives sacrificed in war and even in time of peace; individual men and women dwarfed by the scale of monolithic structures - state, Volk, party, army, giant industrial complexes, collective farms, labour and concentration camps - into which they were organized."
I love the images the last paragraph invokes. I often try to conceptualise the sheer scale of the deaths, buildings, destruction that was caused and fail to. It's always great when you read history that really leaves that impression on you.