Nazi Propaganda and the 1936 Olympics

the time, and the Nazis were in power. Before the Olympics, German Jews had been segregated and

After Germany lost World War I, it was in a national state of humiliation. Their economy was in the drain, and they had their hands full paying for the reparations from the war. Then a man named Adolf Hitler rose to the position of Chancellor and realized his potential to inspire people to follow. Hitler promised the people of Germany a new age; an age of prosperity with the country back as a superpower in Europe. Hitler had a vision, and this vision was that not only the country be dominant in a political sense, but that his ‘perfect race’, the ‘Aryans,’ would be dominant in a cultural sense. His steps to achieving his goal came in the form of the Holocaust. The most well known victims of the Holocaust were of course, the Jews.

The 1972 Olympics were supposed to show that Germany had changed as a country. They were supposed to be “The Happy Games” but instead are remembered for the massacre of the Israeli athletes. The Munich Massacre has changed how terrorism is dealt with in different countries and in the Olympics as a whole.

Starting with Document 3, we are shown how the Nazi’s took the Olympic Games during the period of World War 2. Document 3 shows that the Nazi’s interpreted the Olympic games as a competition showing what countries have the most power in the world. Since during World War 2, The Nazi’s were trying to spread their ideas and beliefs to the world and they thought a good way to do this was the Olympic Games since their interpretation of the Olympic Games was a way to show a country's supremacy. In the end, The Nazi’s were provoked to cheat as they were caught practicing a course before the course was to be presented. In the end, the world was shown what would happen when national conflicts are brought into the Olympic games.

To begin, the 1936 Olympics were important and unique in several ways. One reason is Anti-Semitism actually slowed down during the games. Another point is they were the first Olympics to have a torch relay, a tradition which is still in practice today. Next, it was the first Olympics to be televised, but only to special viewing booths around Berlin. Finally, after his display at the Olympics, people thought Hitler may have been almost

Most people would classify the Berlin Olympic Games of 1936 as just another Olympics, and they would be right because the Games did have the classic triumphs and upsets that occur at all Olympic Games. What most people did not see, behind the spectacle of the proceedings, was the effect the Nazi party had on every aspect of the Games including the results. Despite Nazi Germany’s determination to come off as the superior nation in the 1936 Olympics, their efforts were almost crushed by the very people they were trying to exclude.

So Hitler took on the task of building new stadiums and rest houses for the athletes. They were big, lavish, and of course had giant swastikas down the sides. They were also in the perfect location, a small recluse area so they didn’t have contact with the outside. Hitler did all this in an effort to show that he cared for them. Around this time the Holocaust also started, and all of the Jews were publicly persecuted and killed. But Hitler was smarter than that, so he told everyone to take down Anti-Jew signs and stop persecuting the Jews, so that when the foreign athletes would be in Germany, they wouldn't see the massacres or the hatred. Therefore the foreigners would bring back good comments about Germany to their

It was 1936 and Hitler was the ruler of Germany, his beliefs were very opinionated. He thought Arians were the born rulers and leaders of the world and everyone else was 2nd. Jesse Owens a black man was going to the Olympics in Berlin, Germany. In the 1936 Olympics Jesse Owens took a stand against

What happened in the background of this wondrous occasion is deceptive and can't be depicted without actually being there. Hitler and the Nazi party utilized the Olympics as a way to guarantee the world that there was no reason for genuine worry about what was happening in Germany. Their accomplishment in reducing developing concerns enabled them to proceed in their abuse of Jews and others. Hitler has had a long arrangement for the eventual fate of Germany. All that he had attempted to do truly began June 30, 1934.

“No kind of demonstration or political, religious or racial propaganda is permitted in any Olympic sites, venues or other areas” (Advertising, Demonstrations, Propaganda* 98). This rule shows just what the Germans were hoping for, a peaceful, passive, war-free environment in which countries can get together and compete. Although we all know that quite the antithesis was upon the 1972 Olympics in Munich between September the fifth and September the sixth. The Munich Massacre, one of the worst massacres of all time, was driven by the vengefulness of the Palestinian group known as Black September, towards the people of Israel, or more relevantly, towards their Olympic team (Rosenberg). Since this confrontation between Palestine and

"...Sport is prostituted when sport loses its independent and democratic character and becomes a political institution...Nazi Germany is endeavoring to use the Eleventh Olympiad to serve the necessities and interests of the Nazi regime rather than the Olympic ideals."

Aldous Huxley, author of the famous dystopian works 'Brave New World’, commented that “Propaganda gives force and direction to the successive movements of popular feeling and desire; but it does not do much to create these movements”. The decree instating the new Ministry defined its task as the spreading of “enlightenment and propaganda within the population concerning…the national reconstruction of the German Fatherland”. It sought to Nazify German culture, wiping away the Weimar decadence of the 1920s with traditional values, societal sense of racial worth, ‘Führerprincip’ and concentration of German culture, purging it of degeneracy and Üntermenschen. Joseph Goebbels had two primary objectives: To ensure nobody in Germany could see or hear anything hostile or damaging to the Party and ensure that Nazi ideology was encouraged in the most persuasive possible manner. Nazi propaganda promoted ideology by demonising the enemies of the Nazi Party, especially Jews and communists, but also capitalists and intellectuals, it maintained the personality cult around Adolf Hitler, and promoted campaigns for eugenics and Pan-Germanism.

Soon after Hitler took power in 1933, questions began to arise from the United States and other Western democracies of whether or not they should support the idea of the Olympic Games hosted by the Nazi Regime. America was particularly concerned about the persecution of Jewish athletes that lived in Germany in 1933. In the United States, debate over participation in the 1936 Olympics was a hot topic. The U.S. always sent one of the largest teams to the Olympics. Groups on either side of the debate stated strong views of whether the United States should participate in the Olympics in Hitler’s Nazi Germany.

Most Germans hoped that the 1972 Olympics would help to heal the racial damage caused by the 1936 Olympics. It was the first time the games had returned to the state since Nazism

The Olympics, an event where the most physically fit push themselves to the extreme to win against other nations. In 1936, Adolph Hitler and the Nazis held the Olympics in Berlin, Germany. American athletes had a hard time deciding if they should travel to Berlin and take part in the Nazi Olympics. The Berlin Olympics was a personal issue for the American team, which included Jesse Owens. He wasn't sure that he should join the team because of the views that were expressed by the Nazis. Despite this, he had a lot to show the world.