In The Escape from Freedom (1941), Fromm explores the reasons that make man "give up his freedom to dictators, turning himself into a small cog in the machine: not a free man, but a well-fed and well-dressed automaton."
.png){kind=small}
Article Editor: Yan Beygelzimer, Dr.Sc., Professor.
Cover photo - Wikimedia Commons
Reference : Erich Fromm (German: Erich Fromm, March 23, 1900 - March 18, 1980) - an outstanding German sociologist, philosopher, social psychologist, psychoanalyst. He made a deep analysis of the psychology of Nazism. After Hitler came to power in 1933, Fromm moved first to Geneva and then in 1934 to New York, USA.
Excerpts from the book
(according to the publication by Open Road Media, USA. Highlights in the text are made by the editor)
1 ***
... The crucial difficulty with which we are confronted lies in the fact that the development of man’s intellectual capacities has far outstripped the development of his emotions. Man’s brain lives in the twentieth century; the heart of most men lives still in the Stone Age.
2 ***
How can mankind save itself from destroying itself by this discrepancy between intellectualtechnical overmaturity and emotional backwardness? As far as I can see there is only one answer: the increasing awareness of the most essential facts of our social existence, an awareness sufficient to prevent us from committing irreparable follies, and to raise to some small extent our capacity for objectivity and reason. We can not hope to overcome most follies of the heart and their detrimental influence on our imagination and thought in one generation; maybe it will take a thousand years until man has lifted himself from a pre-human history of hundreds of thousands of years. At this crucial moment, however, a modicum of increased insight—objectivity—can make the difference between life and death for the human race.
3 ***
At first many found comfort in the thought that the victory of the authoritarian system was due to the madness of a few individuals and that their madness would lead to their downfall in due time... In the years that have elapsed since, the fallacy of these arguments has become apparent. We have been compelled to recognize that millions in Germany were as eager to surrender their freedom as their fathers were to fight for it; that instead of wanting freedom, they sought for ways of escape from it; that other millions were indifferent and did not believe the defense of freedom to be worth fighting and dying for.
4 ***
... The crisis of democracy is not a peculiarly Italian or German problem, but one confronting every modern state. Nor does it matter which symbols the enemies of human freedom choose: freedom is not less endangered if attacked in the name of anti-Fascism than in that of outright Fascism.
5 ***
The essence of the authoritarian character has been described as the simultaneous presence of sadistic and masochistic drives. Sadism was understood as aiming at unrestricted power over another person more or less mixed with destructiveness; masochism as aiming at dissolving oneself in an overwhelmingly strong power and participating in its strength and glory. Both the sadistic and the masochistic trends are caused by the inability of the isolated individual to stand alone and his need for a symbiotic relationship that overcomes this aloneness.
6 ***
Sadistic tendencies for obvious reasons are usually less conscious and more rationalized than the socially more harmless masochistic trends. Often they are entirely covered up by reaction formations of over-goodness or over-concern for others. Some of the most frequent rationalizations are the following: “I rule over you because I know what is best for you, and in your own interest you should follow me without opposition.” Or, “I am so wonderful and unique, that I have a right to expect that other people become dependent on me.” Another rationalization which often covers the exploiting tendencies is: “I have done so much for you, and now I am entitled to take from you what. I want.” The more aggressive kind of sadistic impulse finds its most frequent rationalization in two forms: “I have been hurt by others and my wish to hurt them is nothing but retaliation,” or, “By striking first I am defending myself or my friends against the danger of being hurt.”
7 ***
The last rationalization for his sadism, his justification of it as a defense against attacks of others, finds manifold expressions in Hitler’s writings. He and the German people are always the ones who are innocent and the enemies are sadistic brutes. A great deal of this propaganda consists of deliberate, conscious lies. Partly, however, it has the same emotional “sincerity” which paranoid accusations have. These accusations always have the function of a defense against being found out with regard to one’s own sadism or destructiveness. They run according to the formula: It is you who have sadistic intention. Therefore I am innocent. With Hitler this defensive mechanism is irrational to the extreme, since he accuses his enemies of the very things he quite frankly admits to be his own aims.
8 ***
In considering the psychological basis for the success of Nazism this differentiation has to be made at the outset: one part of the population bowed to the Nazi regime without any strong resistance, but also without becoming admirers of the Nazi ideology and political practice. Another part was deeply attracted to the new ideology and fanatically attached to those who proclaimed it.
9 ***
In contrast to the negative or resigned attitude of the working class and of the liberal and Catholic bourgeoisie, the Nazi ideology was ardently greeted by the lower strata of the middle class, composed of small shopkeepers, artisans, and white-collar workers... The Nazi ideology—its spirit of blind obedience to a leader and of hatred against racial and political minorities, its craving for conquest and domination, its exaltation of the German people and the “Nordic Race”—had a tremendous emotional appeal, and it was this appeal which won them over and made them into ardent believers in and fighters for the Nazi cause.
10 ***
An additional incentive for the loyalty of the majority of the population to the Nazi government became effective after Hitler came into power. For millions of people Hitler’s government then became identical with “Germany” Once he held the power of government, fighting him implied shutting oneself out of the community of Germans; when other political parties were abolished and the Nazi party “was” Germany, opposition to it meant opposition to Germany. It seems that nothing is more difficult for the average man to bear than the feeling of not being identified with a larger group. However much a German citizen may be opposed to the principles of Nazism, if he has to choose between being alone and feeling that he belongs to Germany, most persons will choose the latter. It can be observed in many instances that persons who are not Nazis nevertheless defend Nazism against criticism of foreigners because they feel that an attack on Nazis is an attack on Germany. The fear of isolation and the relative weakness of moral principles help any party to win the loyalty of a large sector of the population once that party has captured the power of the state.
11 ***
... An axiom which is important for the problems of political propaganda: any attack on Germany as such, any defamatory propaganda concerning “the Germans” (such as the “Hun” symbol of the last war), only increases the loyalty of those who are not wholly identified with the Nazi system. This problem, however, cannot be solved basically by skillful propaganda but only by the victory in all countries of one fundamental truth: that ethical principles stand above the existence of the nation and that by adhering to these principles an individual belongs to the community of all those who share, who have shared, and who will share this belief.
.png){kind=icon}
Editor's comment
Rationalization is a person's justification of the reasons for his or her immoral behavior.
Lying propaganda is the building material for rationalizing any abomination. From it, man creates his own virtual world in which he places himself, displacing everything human.
Displacement is the elimination of unpleasant facts, thoughts, and experiences from consciousness.
Illustration - "Escape from Reality" by fszalai from Pixabay
.png){kind=small}
Dear reader, We invite you to share your opinion about this article and the Trust but Verify project in general through available communication channels.