Nazism

The Nazi View of Disability

Social Darwinism—the application of Herbert Spencer's idea of “the survival of the fittest” (it was English philosopher Spencer who first used the phrase)—was widely accepted and promoted in the Germany of the 1920s. Adolf Hitler's political manifesto, Mein Kampf, adopted a strongly social Darwinist approach: “The strongest asserts its will; it is the law of nature” (quoted in Gallagher 1995, p. 21). One of his perennial concerns was with the biological basis of the German race. This took the form of perorations against Slavic or Jewish intermarriage with Germans, and the threat of “mongrelization.” It also led Hitler to express prejudice against the weak, sick, and disabled. Thus, he expressed admiration for the Spartan city-state of classical times: “The exposure of the sick, weak, deformed children, in short their destruction, was more decent and in truth a thousand times more humane than the wretched insanity of our day which seeks to preserve the most pathological subjects” (quoted in Gallagher 1995, p. 21).

In his speeches and policies, Adolf Hitler negated both the Christian and humanist traditions, by explicitly promoting militarism and putting the good of the nation above the rights of individuals. For example, he claimed: “Nature is cruel; therefore we are also entitled to be cruel. When I send the flower of German youth into the steel hail of the next war without feeling the slightest regret over the precious German blood that is being spilled, should I not also have the right to eliminate millions of an inferior race that multiplies like vermin?” (quoted in Fest 1974, pp. 679–680).

Mein Kampf is full of prejudice against disabled people and expresses the view that disabled people should be prevented from reproducing. However, these views were not unique to Nazi ideologues: Beliefs about race and fitness had been popular since the late nineteenth century in German science and medicine. Old ideas were reinforced and emboldened by the development of the Nazi movement. During the 1930s, and especially after the takeover of power in 1933, propaganda against disabled people became more common. For example, the film I Accuse featured a husband who killed his wife, who was suffering from multiple sclerosis. This idea of mercy killing was to become a major element in the Nazi approach to disability. Other terms used in propaganda posters and films to describe disabled people included “useless eaters,” “ballast existence,” and “life unworthy of life.”

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