Who's to Blame??

This week I have found the topic of the Hitler Myth to be of most interest to me. In the reading the author states that Hitler's inner circle perhaps perpetuated the myth so much then Adolf Hitler himself began to believe he was invincible. This made me think that in society we do this a lot... letting the little kid who can't sing believe they have a voice like an angel or letting people who aren't very attractive think their God's gift to Earth. We do things like this by human nature to not hurt those around us but then this perpetuation of an untruth leads the person to believe it to be the truth and they do something like embarrass themselves on American Idol or in Hitler's case, attempt world domination. Now while these two instances are not comparable in any form, they both lead to emanate failure. So the question is who is to blame?? Do we blame the loving parent for encouraging their obviously talentless child or do we blame the kid who grows up believing their parents encouragement rather than seeking the truth? I thought about this in my analysis of Hitler. I like most, are quick to blame Adolf Hitler for all of the atrocities of World War II and the Holocaust. But many of us know from first hand experience they humans tend to start believing what they are told continually and of course one wants to fulfill and live up to the praise and hype surrounding their name, whether it's false in actuality or not. I started to think maybe it wasn't Hitler's fault he basically went on a power rampage. He had to know his pitfalls from the beginning, so in order to conceal them he had to find and execute the quickest solution to fulfill all of the hype surrounding him. His successes would lead to more praise by not only his inner circle but the world also(don't forget he was Time's Man of the Year). I don't think in hindsight we will ever know anything about the real Adolf Hitler, because he was transformed into Hitler by those around him. So do we blame the man who tried to live up to the name or do we blame those who indirectly created the entity we know as Hitler??

Prostitution

I found the issue of Prostitution in Imperial Germany to be interesting. We did not discuss it, but I'm sure everyone knows that legal prostitution still exists, Amersterdam and the US even (Bunny Ranch in Nevada). We discussed many of the pitfalls of state sponsered prostitution but present advocates of state sponsered (4 lack of a better term) prostitution argue that state mandates and police protection rather than arrest, benifits all involved in the industry (prostitute, customer, and pimp). They have the same argument that their predeseccors in Imperial Germany had, that legal prostitution protects the prostitute and prevents the spread of disease.

I do agree with this argument in an ideal situation when a prostitute, male or female, decides to sell his or body because they feel this is the most benificial job for them. However, it appears that prostitution almost never occurs because of an ideal situation. Today we see many stories of women being kidnapped and forced into prostitution internationally and within the US, also we hear horror stories of victims of rape or other types of abuse choosing prostitution as a form of love and gratification not found anywhere else. This aspect of the reasons one may choose to be a prostitute was also true in Imperial Germany. Women at that time needed easy money. There were also even less job oppurtinities for women at that time. So prostitution does not ever appear to be beneficial in the long run, but the easiest and quickest solution.

When we discussed the role of the police in respect to prostitution in Imperial Germay, the first thing that came to my mind was that they actually were just glorified pimps. They made sure the women were in the right district to gain customers, they made sure the women were up to date in their medical examinations, and they reprimanded the women when they did not follow the rules. These job duties just spelled out pimp to me when thinking of them in the prostitution world. Thinking of the police as pimps made me think of other questions. Did the ptostitutes pay off the police? Did the police get free services? And if the police were doing the actual pimpming, what was the role of the brothel owner?? Just some questions to leave you guys to ponder on...