How did the Nazis persuade the Germans

that the Jews were “undesirable”?

To identify Jewish stereotypes from Nazi propaganda

To analyse why propaganda was so effective

How propaganda encouraged people to accept murder:

4 steps:–Make real people into stereotype– Separate the stereotype from any

positive ideas– Associate the stereotype with negative

ideas– Increase the seriousness of the negative

ideas

1

Identify your enemy and create a stereotype

The Jew’s Nose is bent at the

tip, it looks like the figure 6”

Illustration from children’s book ‘The Poisonous

Toadstool’

Why is a stereotype important?

1. Because stereotypes don’t have feelings that you have to worry about

2. Because stereotypes are different from the real Jew that runs your local tailors, or lives down the road from you, so it’s easier to imagine they’ve done something wrong

3. Because stereotypes can be everywhere (even where real Jews were not), which makes the threat seem like it is everywhere

A beer mat with the slogan:

“Whoever buys from a Jew is a traitor to his people”

Martin Gilbert

The Holocaust, 1987

2

Separate the stereotype from everything good (i.e everything German!)

3

Now associate the stereotype with bad things, for example….

“The Jewish Octopus”

Taking over German businesses; a very bad idea for Germans suffering from a recession as they were when Hitler came to power!

4

Now make the negative ideas worse and worse

…The Jews are a threat to children

Inge's Visit to a Jewish Doctor : "Two criminal eyes flashed behind the glasses and the fat lips grinned."

…The Jews are a threat to young women

How Jews Torment Animals :

"The animal fell once more to the ground. Slowly it died. The Jews stood around and laughed."*

…. The Jews practise ritual slaughterNot for religious reasons but for fun!

Its not much of leap of imagination from the idea of Jews as capable of these

terrible crimes, to the idea of that the Jew is really so bad it should be destroyed for

the good of German society…

Jews as rats

“When the vermin are dead, the German oak will flourish again”