Hans And Sophie Scholl: The White Rose Movement

The book “Sophie Scholl and the White Rose” by Annette Dumbach is a book about resistance, Nazism and the path to freedom under Hitler’s rein. In this story the main characters Sophie and Hans Scholl play a part in the path towards resistance during Hitler’s power.

The lack of resistance and ignorance of the ordinary German population cost many million Jewish lives. The Nazi party’s desire for popularity and support meant that if there was a protest, actions would be taken to keep the public happy, or quiet, with minimal loss of reputation and status. In other words, it meant that the people could win. One successful attempt of protest proved that this theory would have worked. The Rosenstrasse Protest that occurred on the 27th of February 1943 led to the release of several hundred Jewish men from a Gestapo headquarters. This symbolic protest highlighted the fact that if the public were to protest, the execution of Jews could have been slowed or even halted. Despite this, the Rosenstrasse Protest remained the only large protest against the Holocaust throughout its entire duration. This means that the German population continued to ignore and become passive bystanders of the genocide happening around

Although the Jews tried to resist, many factors were against them, such as lack of weapons and resources, trickery, fear, and the crushing power of the Germans. Many people refused to participate in these uprisings, but for those who chose to rebel, they served as an example for all of camp residents. In Night this happened also when the three inhabitants were hung and shown to the entire camp. Those who conformed to justice paid the ultimate price, but with that other learned what not to do. They sacrificed themselves unknowingly for their

The courage in the people of Germany during WWII caused them to take chances in order to stay alive, do the right thing despite the sacrifices and resist Nazi propaganda. In Germany during WWII anyone who resisted the Nazis would receive punishment. “ Hans blew it online verge of joining the party. Everyone knew you weren’t supposed to paint over the slurs written on a Jewish shop front” (Zusak 104). Hans was a very skilled painter and one day decided to go and paint over the slurs the Nazis had written on Jewish shops. Hans did this on purpose because everyone knew you would be punished for erasing Nazi propaganda. This reveals that Hans and also other Germans resisted the Nazis despite the consequences. They chose to resist their propaganda because they did not agree with it. In the novel there was various incidents were courage

Walking to your death is a hard thing to do especially in the conditions that they had to go through. They walked through snow, burning heat and were tortured by the SS guards. People need to know about this so that nothing like this ever happens again. Hitler killed off people that witnessed their crimes. They did not want them to survive so they sent them onto the marches so they would not get in trouble. Most had to walk on these marches but others had to ride on

Within Germany, a country torn between the rise of a totalitarian party that determined a superior race, Nazism, and the survival of the oppressed, young Germans face a test between a sense of self and society. Individuality would be suppressed within this new type of society, and being different would be the deadliest obstruction to life. The violations of the rights to life, religion, and speech are relived through the stories of the German youth that lived through this haunting time, whose name would be tarnished in their struggle to survive. In their fight, their morals would be challenged and influenced until the Nazi regime ended, and the violation of human dignity would leave them wondering if life was worth living after all. The Nazi Party grew under its leader, Adolf Hitler, which struggled not to use violence against those that disagreed with their views, starting with armed groups known as the Strum Abteilung, who pledged to be ready to sacrifice their life in the aims of the Nazi Party and absolute loyalty to their leader. Their cruel intolerance began by their strong nationalism and their hatred of democracy and communism, and they gained power through the economic depressions around the world, controlling the media by instilling fear and propaganda that influenced a strong belief in their leaders. This belief in the leaders would soon seem to override Church influence when the official body of the Church failed to do anything significant

In the book Frauen: German Women Recall the Third Reich by Alison Owings, we are provided with plenty of women who describe their lives before, during and after Hitler received power. This book provides us with different views of the time era and as well as how the impact of Hitler affected every woman differently through social class, age, marital status and etc. This paper will explore the lives of three German women who seem to be in the Grey area during the over control of Hitler but mostly with the killings of the Jews. This paper will further explore the complicity and the different levels of resistance that these three women had during this time era which is 1933-1945. The three women that will be discussed in this paper are Margarete (Margrit) Fischer, Ellen Frey, and Christine (Tini) Weihs. When looking into the lives of all three women these women it seems as though women didn’t have much of a responsibility for the events that were happening around them. Although these women seemed to be complaint to a certain degree with the events there were going on around them. These women would have been complaint due to the fear of what happened to Germans when they stood against the events that took part.

At first, the book did not become very popular because it brought forward the darkest zone of humanity; it broached a topic that the world wanted to leave untouched, forgotten. But that is exactly what Wiesel did not want to let happen. One of the great successes of this hugely appreciated and critically appraised book was that it managed to bring out the stark reality of the concentration camps, the Nazis, the Polish and all the people in the world who kept silent on the face of such atrocities meted out to their fellow citizens. Wiesel once remarked that the opposite of good was not evil, but indifference. The horror of the Holocaust was not only the acts committed by a section of people but the fact that a

Wiesel presents the demoralization of Jews through the physical changes in the appearance of the Jews. The Nazis came out with “...a new decree [that] every Jew had to wear the yellow star” and that made them stand out in society because they were branded like cattle (Wiesel 11). The yellow star became a label that dehumanized the Jews by making them stand out from everyone else because it was one way of making sure people judged them based on their race. Another way the Nazi soldiers took away the identity of Wiesel was when “...their clippers tore out

During the time of the Nazis coming to power, some of German citizen soon questioned the Nazi empires authority. Then soon after the German citizens at the time question if they went against the Nazi Empire what would happen. “Most Germans worried primarily about their own survival and thus, as information began to leak out about the deportation of Jews and the other Nazi abuses, they kept any concerns they might had to themselves” (Hoffmann 1). Showing the oppression of the Nazi empire affecting their citizens and not only the Jews. This however started to oppress the people that did not agree with the Nazi ideology at the time. Than citizens were questioning why no one would go against the Nazi rule and try to rebel against their ideas and the

People are motivated to make a difference when they believe a change must be made and each person has their own motivation to make a change. They realize that they no longer like what is happening in the world, or even in their life, and they decide it must be changed. In A Noble Treason by Richard Hanser, Hans Scholl wants to make a difference and go up against Hitler by writing leaflets under the alias White Rose. Hans Scholl grew up in a family where his parents let him make his own choices and let him believe in whatever he wanted. They never pressured him into their choices and own beliefs. His father did not support Hitler and his beliefs, even though at the time, in Hans Scholl’s life Hitler was an incredibly prominent hero. Hans Scholl joined the Hitler Youth and fought for everything he believed was right. Hans soon realized he and Hitler did not see eye to eye on many things. Hans valued his individuality and Hitler took it from him. Hitler took away all creativity he personally found ugly and forced upon everyone what he thought was beauty. The leaflets Hans Scholl had written was his way of making a difference by bringing forward what the people of Germany may not have noticed was the reality of Hitler's actions. Hans Scholl’s motivation to make a difference was the fact that Hitler put limitations on everything, the more Hans Scholl wanted to learn, the more he was unable to do so, and this caused him to feel that he no longer had his freedom to be an individual.

Ben Ross teaches his students a remarkable lesson about the Nazi by creating The Wave. The purpose of his experiment is to teach his students how the Nazi was able to manipulate the German people. In this process, propaganda is pivotal; this was used by the Nazi to gather support from German. Nazi propaganda relied heavily on slogans and symbol; for instance, the Swastika was used to symbolize “good fortune” and “well-being”. Likewise, Mr. Ross draws, “a circle with the outline of a wave inside it” (43; ch. 6), as a symbol for The Wave because, “it has movement, direction and impact” (43; ch. 6); or, he uses a simple slogan, “Strength Through Discipline, Strength Through Community, Strength Through Action!” (62; ch. 8), to demonstrate the importance of discipline in reality. Next is the illusion. The Nazi Germany gives people faith in a superior

He urged the people, “go into your churches, kneel before God, and implore his help for our brave army.”(25) This moment hinted at a more independent minded approach to traditional authority. When coupled together, the emotions of the crowds and the ability of groups like the Fatherland Party to find a footing in the political arena, gives reason to believe that the German people were ready to make a change that served their newfound interests. Fritzche explicitly makes this point, “the patriotism that Germans displayed was of their own making and suited to new conceptions of nation and citizenship which invited rather than discouraged public participation.” (66) At the conclusion of the war, millions of people were at a loss, and the Nazis stepped in to fill a void left by their opposition who had stoked the flames of nationalism but failed to capitalize on its apparent momentum. This included a strong message that laid blame for the German surrender at the feet of those in charge. Also, previous notions of class were turned upside down or, for the Nazis, right side up, making it possible for an illiberal, fascist community to become the norm. Simply put, “Basic elements of the Nazi message spoke to the political aspirations that burghers had held for more than ten years.” (192) Germans became Nazis by their own choosing, they were not forced to

The white rose society were some of the first ones to start this revolt against hitler. Alexander Schmorell and Hans Scholl , both of whom were studying medicine, were the first LMU students to consider mounting an active campaign of resistance against the Nazi regime. Within two weeks, between the 27 June and 12 July 1942, they wrote, printed and distributed the first four “White Rose” protest

After years of mandatory national service, both Hans and Sophie found themselves attending the University of Munich. Because Hans had started going to the school a few years before Sophie joined him, he already had a group of friends that shared the same beliefs as him and his sister, so Sophie easily befriended them as well. Together they discussed the ugliness of war and Hitler’s actions. In time they came to believe that they should do more than just talk about their ideas and actually start acting upon them. The group decided to print and hand out leaflets calling resistance to Hitler, and began calling themselves the White Rose. Some of the members were Christoph Probst, Alexander Schmorell, Willi Graf, and even a philosophy professor at the university named Kurt Huber (“Hans Scholl”).