THE MEANING MAZE

THE MUTILATION OF MEANING

 

VOICES

Dohnányi told Tietze that he had realized from the very beginning that the regime was moving toward war and disaster and that only a revolution could stop it, but “the obtuseness and cowardice of people of property and influence, and the stupidity of most officers, frustrated all efforts.” Only intrepid workers and disciplined Socialists of the sort Dohnányi met in Sachsenhausen had it in them to be effective resisters, he thought. He told Tietze over and over again about the men he had found in prison whose value he had recognized at once. Did it have to be that it was only in a concentration camp, when it was too late, that he encountered these “unblemished idealists, hardened by suffering,” who would have given the resistance its ultimate promise for the future?

Elizabeth Sifton and Fritz Stern (2013). No Ordinary Men: Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Hans von Dohnányi, Resisters Against Hitler in Church and State. New York: New York Review Books, pp. 124 – 125

Hans von Dohnányi was a lawyer who embarked on the beginning of a very successful career during the Weimar years in Germany. After holding a position in the Foreign ministry he was appointed as an assistant in the Institute of Foreign Affairs in Hamburg; he simultaneously continued his legal studies, culminating in his doctoral degree. In his various positions he was known for his devotion to his country and his democratic convictions. In 1929 he took a position in the Ministry of Justice, and in 1933 became the chief assistant to the Reich minister of justice appointed one year before. After Hitler gained the reins of government and moved in a totalitarian direction, he eventually met Hitler and later commented to his wife “The man is mad.” He joined others at high levels of the government and the military in a disparate group that constituted the German resistance and was involved in active plans to assassinate Hitler. The Gestapo later viewed him as “the spiritual head of the conspiracy” to eliminate Hitler. He was eventually subjected to an SS court-martial, which reached a verdict of “high treason”, and he was hanged in April, 1945.

(Adapted from: Elizabeth Sifton and Fritz Stern (2013). No Ordinary Men: Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Hans von Dohnányi, Resisters Against Hitler in Church and State. New York: New York Review Books, pp. 44-45 and 126.)

His relative immunity to the effects of the obtuseness and cowardice of most of his peers prompts our curiosity. Why was Dohnányi able and willing to conceive and take the actions that so many in later decades recognize should have been the common core of the response to the growing Nazi threat?

His words can evoke intense, varied emotions among readers. In retrospect, with a full view of evolving events — the political and practical program building of the Nazi authorities, and the slaughtering behemoth unleashed upon other nations and the German nation itself — makes the words of a far-sighted martyr sacred, as it should. His mind and his actions encapsulated moral imagination and moral courage, a life of honor forged through integrity, compassion, and suffering. His early and accurate predictions of the menace to German culture, his brave actions in support of his comments, his capacity to link fundamental family and cultural values to daily behavior that promulgated these same values while putting him at extraordinary risk, lead many observers to respond that “he should know” about emerging autocracies. This encourages adopting openness to his advice when contemplating how to avoid unleashing the potential destructive forces of dangerous demagogues when they appear and are unopposed in their early actions.

It is also true that a reader might have the impression that this major world catastrophe was readily avoidable. Is this true? What was Donyányi saying? What is the meaning of “obtuseness”? Similarly, was “obtuseness” the major element releasing the destructive forces of the Nazis, or is a simpler explanation more accurate: that for 90% of the assenting population it was fear, the regrettably ordinary “cowardice” that we all are vulnerable to and too often participate in, that enabled the rise and persistence of evil and immoral political programs.

Such questions hover over a landscape that is much more complex than the straightforward choices implied, even if this simplicity captures some root causes. Among other elements commonly invoked is the phenomenon of the “demagogue”. Isolating this concept of “demagogue”, however, carries the risk of diverting attention from other contributing elements, a misstep that we must be alert to. A focus on demagogues is advantageous, however, in that study of the phenomenon eventually captures many of the other causal elements in its investigative net, while illuminating identifiable and consistent elements of a demagogue’s behavior that might have predictive and preventive value.

A first consideration, therefore, will be whether we can “see” a demagogue, particularly a newly emerging demagogue. This will precede a later, more general consideration of what we “see” and what we do not “see” in our worlds.

But we shall briefly look at this idea of “obtuseness” that Dohnányi mentions, because his remark reflects how so many respond when looking at the radical changes in Germany in retrospect – that his contemporaries ought to have recognized the destructive intentions of this demagogue. Is this a reasonable judgment? Or was the demagogue’s behavior too complex and indecipherable?

Whatever the answer, an observation forces itself upon us. When confronted by a complex challenge requiring significant intellectual effort, especially when the situation causes it to be tainted by concurrent fear, a simple and comprehensive answer is a sweet alternative.  Supporters of a demagogue are slow to understand, but quick to comply. 

This is a specific instance of a more common phenomenon — the experience of giving in to impulses leading to self-indulgent, desired actions. These are actions known to bring a vulnerability to criticism, but a common response is a later attempt to avoid criticism by characterizing the behavior as acceptable and insignificant and refusing to apologize:

VOICES

 

As to going home, shame opposed the best motions that offered to my thoughts; and it immediately occurred to me how I should be laughed at among the neighbours, and should be ashamed to see, not my father and mother only, but even every body else; from whence I have since often observed, how incongruous and irrational the common temper of mankind is, especially of youth, to that reason which ought to guide them in such cases, viz. that they are not ashamed to sin, and yet are ashamed to repent; not ashamed of the action for which they ought justly to be esteemed fools, but are ashamed of the returning, which only can make them be esteemed wise men.

Daniel Defoe (1719/1972). The Life and Strange Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe of York, Mariner. London: The Folio Society, p.24.

 

In order to clarify the difficulty of such judgments, in later posts we shall recall that a demagogue turned dictator is not the only instance of human behavior that is difficult to “read” and understand, with the potential to cause observers to seem “obtuse” in their lack of understanding.

Accompanying music:

Ludwig van Beethoven, Symphony No. 9,   3. Adagio molto e cantabile

Christoph von Dohnányi, The Cleveland Orchestra & Chorus, Telarc Digital