By 1900 German Jews were relatively assimilated, and in spite of increasing anti-Semitism remained so until Hitler came to power. Judging from the social climate in the early twentieth century, one might not have expected intense persecution. However, this view does not take account of the deep structure of the culture and the community as described here, which created a persistent potential for scapegoating and persecution.
Increasing mistreatment of Jews
On coming to power in 1933, Hitler immediately moved against the Jews. Jews were dismissed from jobs in government and the military. The first “mild” decrees allowed exceptions, for example, for Jewish war veterans. Why this slow start? The Nazis may have meant to reward the loyalty of German Jews who fought in the war, as Hilberg suggests.6 But we must also consider the psychology of perpetrators and bystanders. The Nazis had to move from words to the psychologically more demanding realm of actions. They also had to consider effects on the German population. A process of habituation was necessary, for the Nazis themselves and for the German people.
Dismissal from jobs in all fields followed; many businesses initiated their own dismissals; and after 1938, government rules led the remaining firms to dismiss their Jewish employees. Aryanization, the takeover of Jewish businesses, also proceeded. Jewish businesses were bought by Germans. Various mechanisms were used to limit competition, so that the amount paid to Jews would not be high. Boycotts and limiting supplies began to ruin Jewish businesses and force their sale. In the late 1930s laws were passed forbidding Jews to own businesses. They were allowed only menial and very low paying jobs and were heavily taxed.
Meanwhile, steps were taken to separate Jews from the rest of the population. An elaborate definition of Jewishness based on the number of Jewish ancestors was created. The Nuremberg laws prohibited marriage and sexual relations with Jews. Breaking these laws could result in persecution and severe public humiliation for Aryan Germans. Germans who did not follow these laws and developing mores were labeled – for example, as friends of the Jews (Judenfreunde) or as desecrators of the race (Rassenschänder), the name for people who had sexual relations with Jews. Jews were forced to wear a yellow Star of David in public and eventually were collected into restricted living areas.
Large numbers of people participated in this process, taking Jewish jobs, boycotting or taking over Jewish businesses, breaking off family contacts and love relations, designing and executing anti-Jewish laws, and disseminating anti-Jewish propaganda. Why did they participate? Fear of Nazis had to be a reason, but the attitude of the population makes this an insufficient explanation. Besides, there was opposition to the Nazi euthanasia program, but not to the persecution of the Jews.a7 An important reason must have been a cultural tilt, an inclination that perpetrators and the ordinary members of society shared as a result of shared culture, and a societal tilt as this joined with life conditions and resulted in shared needs and a shared openness or inclination for responding to them in certain potentially destructive ways. Self-interest must also have influenced some: profiting from jobs, from business takeovers. Christians to whom Jews had given their property in an attempt to protect it from the Nazi state would have a stake in actions that made it unnecessary to return the property.
Another source of support for persecution was the desire to be part of the group. Interviews with rescuers of Jews in Nazi Europe show that many were “marginal,” separated from the mainstream by religion, background, or experience; this enabled them to reject the system’s views about Jews.b8 For people tied to the group, the cultural devaluation and the climate of hostility generated by the Nazis made passivity or limited participation in action against Jews relatively easy.
Even passivity changes bystanders. But Germans had a semiactive role as they participated in societal actions against Jews. Devaluating Jews even more, regarding them as blameworthy, would make it easier to watch and passively accept their persecution and suffering and one’s own involvement. This, together with a changing self-concept, a view of themselves as capable and willing to harm others for “justified” reasons, prepared some people for increasingly active roles as perpetrators. As people participate in harming others, it becomes increasingly difficult to stop and break the continuity. The personal changes make a new vantage point, a new decision, even less likely.
For example, some members of the Berlin Psychoanalytic Institute remained in Berlin after the Nazis assumed power. Self-selection and acceptance of the Nazis probably played a role in who stayed. They passively accepted Nazi influence at the institute and the dismissal of Jewish colleagues. Some of them began to adapt psychoanalytic theory to fit Nazi ideology.10 Some later participated in the euthanasia killings and even in the extermination of Jews.11
Empathy can be affected by simply telling people to take different perspectives when observing what happens to someone else. Observers feel empathy and concern when told to imagine what it is like for someone to experience distress or pain – intense heat or an unpleasant personal interaction – or to imagine what it would be like to be in that person’s place. When observers are told to take a more detached, impersonal view, to simply observe what is happening, they feel less empathy and concern.12
Differences in perspective can result from external influence or from the enduring characteristics of individuals or whole groups. The greater the differentiation between “us” and “them,” the less likely it is that others’ fate is observed empathically and that observers will imagine what it is like for “them” to experience distress and suffering. The German people were exposed to extensive propaganda – “evidence” of the
