Women in Nazi Germany

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Women in Nazi Germany became the subject of Nazism by the Nazi Party (NSDAP), promoting the exclusion of women from German political life along with its executive and executive committees. While the Nazi party decided that "women should not be accepted by either Party executives or to the Administrative Committee", this does not prevent many women from becoming party members. The Nazi doctrine elevates the role of German men, emphasizing their combat skills and fraternity among male counterparts.

Women living in a regime characterized by policies restrict them to the role of mothers and spouses and exclude them from all positions of responsibility, especially in politics and academia. The policy of Nazism contrasts with the evolution of emancipation under the Weimar Republic, and is equally distinguishable from the patriarchal and conservative attitudes under the German Empire. The female regiment at the heart of the Nazi Party's satellite organization, as the German Bund Deutscher MÃÆ'¤del or NS-Frauenschaft , has the ultimate goal of encouraging the cohesion of the" community community " Volksgemeinschaft .

First and foremost in the Nazi doctrine that is implied about women is the idea of ​​motherhood and procreation for those who bear children. The Nazi woman model has no career, but is responsible for the education of her children and for the household. Women have only limited rights to training that revolves around domestic tasks, and, over time, are limited from teaching at universities, from the medical profession and from serving in political positions within the NSDAP. Many of the restrictions that were lifted after the war dictated later policy changes in the regime's existence. With the exception of Gertrud Scholtz-Klink, no women are allowed to perform official functions, but some exceptions stand out in the regime, either through its proximity to Adolf Hitler, like Magda Goebbels, or by excelling in certain fields, such as filmmaker Leni Riefenstahl or aviator Hanna Reitsch.

While many women played influential roles in the heart of the Nazi system or filled official posts at the heart of Nazi concentration camps, some engaged in German resistance and paid with their lives, such as Libertas Schulze-Boysen or Sophie Scholl.

Video Women in Nazi Germany

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Under the Weimar Republic, the status of women is one of the most progressive in Europe. The Weimar Constitution of 19 January 1919 proclaims their right to vote (chapters 17 and 22), gender equality in civil affairs (art 109), non-discrimination against female bureaucrats (art 128), maternity rights (art 19) and equality of husbands - the wife in marriage (chapter 119). Clara Zetkin, the leading leader of the German feminist movement, was a Member of Parliament in the Reichstag from 1920 to 1933 and even presided over the session in the role of Dean. But Weimar does not represent a big leap forward for women's liberation. Women remain under-represented in parliament; motherhood continues to be promoted as the most important social function of women; abortion can still be prosecuted (Ã,§ 218 of the Criminal Code); and women workers do not achieve substantial economic progress like the same salary. With the advent of consumerism, business and government have an increasing need for labor; although the work becomes a route of emancipation for women, they are often restricted to administrative work as secretaries or sales staff, where they are generally paid 10 to 20% less than male employees, under various pretexts, such as claims that their understanding of domestic duties frees they are from certain household expenditures.

While most other parties under the Weimar Republic run women candidates during elections (and some elected), the Nazi party does not. In 1933, Joseph Goebbels justified this position by explaining that "it should be left to men who belong to men". Germany went from having 37 women MPs from 577, none, after the November 1933 election.

The beginning of the Nazi regime

Adolf Hitler's power as Chancellor marks the end of many women's rights, although Hitler has succeeded in his social upgrading in part thanks to the protection of influential women. But in terms of voting patterns, the proportion of higher male voters supports the Nazi party compared to female voters. Hitler socialized in a prosperous circle, and with socialites such as Princess Elsa Bruckmann, wife of editor Hugo Bruckmann, and Helene Bechstein, wife of industrialist Edwin Bechstein, at the beginning brought the Nazi party into a significant new source of financing. For example, Gertrud von Seidlitz, a widow of a noble family, contributed 30,000 marks to the party in 1923; and Helene Bechstein, who owns the land in Obersalzberg, facilitated Hitler's acquisition of the Wachenfeld property.

In 1935, in a speech to the National-Socialist Women Congress, Hitler stated, in relation to women's rights:

in fact, giving equal rights to women, as demanded by Marxism, gives no rights at all, but is a deprivation of rights, because they attract women into zones where they can only be inferior. This places women in situations where they can not strengthen their position with regard to men and with society - but that only weakens them.

The fact that Hitler was not married and that he represented the masculine ideals for many Germans led to his ingenuity in the public imagination. In April 1923 an article appeared in the Post MÃÆ'¼nchener stating "women worshiped Hitler"; he is portrayed adapting his speech to "the taste of women who, from the beginning, counted among his most passionate admirers". Women also sometimes play a role in bringing their husbands into the folds of Nazi politics, thus contributing to the recruitment of new NSDAP members.

In a society that began to regard women as equal men, Nazi policy was a setback, which forced women from political life. Nazi policies relating to women are one aspect of their efforts to stem what they perceive as the decadence of the Weimar Republic. In their eyes, the Weimar regime, which they consider to have a Jewish character, basically appears to be feminine, and tolerant of homosexuality - the true antithesis of German virility.

Heinrich Himmler states as much as possible to SS-GruppenfÃÆ'¼hrer, on February 18, 1937:

Overall, in my view, we have wounded too much our lives, to the point that we are militarizing things that are impossible [...] To me, it is disastrous that women's organizations, women's communities and women's communities intervene in a domain that destroys all the feminine charms, all the grandeur and feminine elegance. For me it is a disaster that we are poor poor men - I speak publicly, because this does not mean you directly, we want to make women a logical tool of thought, to educate them in all possibilities, which we want to maskulinkan with time difference between the sexes, the polarity will be lost. The road to homosexuality is not far away. [...] We must be very clear. The movement, ideology can not be maintained if used by women, because humans understand everything through the mind, while women understand everything through sentiment. [...] The priests burned 5,000 to 6,000 women [for magic], because they preserved emotionally ancient wisdom and ancient teachings, and because, emotionally, they did not let go, while men, they were logically and rationally discarded.

Officially, the status of women changed from "equal rights" ( Gleichberechtigung ) to "equality" between men and women (< i> Gleichstellung ). Historian Pierre Ayç§oberry points out that "these attacks offer the double advantage of pleasing their male counterparts who are concerned about this competition, and returning to personal lives of over 100,000 people proud of their success, the majority of whom are voters who support leftist politics". This policy creates concerns among militants in the NSDAP, who fear that it will endanger the number of female graduates, a reservoir needed for future party positions.

Withdrawal from higher education

In 1933, school programs for girls changed, especially with the aim of minimizing them from pursuing university studies. Five years of Latin classes and three years of science were replaced by courses in German and domestic skills training. It produces no productive results; on the one hand, a large number of girls are enrolled in boys' schools, while on the other hand, 10% enrollment restrictions at the university level are generally ignored. Thus, the steps only lowered enrollment in medical school from 20% to 17%.

Some women's associations, especially communist and socialist groups are prohibited, and in some rare cases, members are arrested or killed. All associations were requested to surrender Jewish members, such as Protestant Women's Union, Household and Rural Association, German Women's Colonial Society and Queen's Unity Union. But quickly, the majority of associations were dissolved or elected among themselves to disappear, such as BDF (Bund Deutscher Frauenverein), founded in 1894 and dissolved in 1933 to avoid being controlled. Only one female association survived under the regime (Gertrud BÃÆ'¤umer, Die Frau, or Female) association, until 1944, but placed under the guardianship of Reich Education and Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels. Rudolf Hess founded Deutsches Frauenwerk who, with the Nazi women's branch of the NS-Frauenschaft, had the goal of becoming a mass organization for the regime.

In 1936, a law was passed to prohibit certain high-level positions within the judicial system for women (especially judges and prosecutors, through Hitler's personal intervention) and the medical field. Female doctors are no longer allowed to practice, until their loss has a harmful effect on health needs and some are recalled for work; also dissolved is the Association of Medical Women, which is absorbed into his male partner.) Under the Weimar Republic, only 1% of university posts are filled by women. On June 8, 1937, a decree stipulated that only men could be named at these posts, if not in the social field. Nevertheless, on February 21, 1938 "in an individual and extraordinary capacity" after being lobbied by Gertrud Scholtz-Klink, a female scientist Margarete Gussow earned a post in astronomy. Mathematician Ruth Moufang can receive her doctorate, but can not get the right to teach and be forced to work for the national industry. Emmy Noether, another mathematician, was dismissed from his post under the "German Law for Recovery of Public Services" on April 7, 1933, having been active in the 1920s in the USPD and SPD. The Physics researcher, Lise Meitner, who directed the Department of Physics at the Kaiser Wilhelm Society, remained at his post until 1938, but this was only because of his Austrian citizenship, ending with Anschluss); he then went to Holland, and then Sweden. In the scientific field, there is almost no nomination of women; in 1942, a woman was not allowed to direct a scientific institution, despite the fact that no male candidate had proposed. Women's exile from political life is total: they can not sit in the Reichstag, the regional parliament or the municipal council.

There is no substantial resistance to this control. The bourgeois women's association argues, as do many others, that the Nazi government is a vulgar phenomenon that will soon fade away, and that through their participation they can still use some influence. Thus they deceive themselves into believing that they are getting "acceptable arrangements", as they usually do under the patriarchal system. Due to the widespread tendency to belittle the threat presented by the regime, historian Claudia Koonz highlights the popular saying of the time: "The soup has never been eaten as hot as cooked." The most determined women in their opposition also direct their views on emigration, or, if they take an active stance, risk being arrested and detained, and possibly executed, the same as the men's opponents of the regime.

Partial recovery 1937

Recognizing the needs of women in certain professions and their usefulness in the country's economy, anti-emancipation policies in labor are quickly blunted. Women were instead invited to obey Nazism and were convinced by the idea that they could become mothers and be employed, Joseph Goebbels even attacked the anti-lipstick propaganda campaign at VÃÆ'¶lkischer Beobachter and attacked the most excited ideologues.

Maps Women in Nazi Germany

Nazi feminine idea

New Woman

The Nazi woman must adapt to the German society desired by Adolf Hitler (Volksgemeinschaft), a pure and physically powerful race. He does not work, lives in a motherly naturalization and follows the slogan of former emperor William II of Germany: Kinder, KÃÆ'¼che, Kirche, meaning "Children, kitchen, church". In a document published in 1934, the Nine Commandments of the Workers Struggle, Hermann Goering bluntly summarized the future role of the German woman: "Take the pot, dust and broom and marry a man." It is anti-feminism in the sense that the Nazis perceive the political rights afforded to women (access to high-level positions for example) are incompatible with the nature of reproduction, the only role in which they can develop and serve the interests of the nation. Thus, Magda Goebbels stated in 1933: "German women are excluded from three professions: soldiers, as elsewhere in the world, government and judiciary.If a German girl has to choose between marriage or career, she will always be encouraged to marry, because that's what's best for a woman ". It is impossible to make a mental leap to the winning conservative and patriarchal society for example during the Second Empire; in effect, the totalitarian character of the regime shifts away from the concept that women have made on shelves by society. Instead, they are expected to participate in the basic level in the role of mother and spouse. The fact that the female regiment (Bund Deutscher MÃÆ'¤del then Frauenschaft) is so organized, does not allow women to be degraded into what they could do in the 19th century. Without a doubt, conservative voters and the fringes of a population so critical of the image of women freed from the 1920s found particular satisfaction in the new regime. But the goal is different, asking every woman to take part in the development of the "1000 year Reich". The liberation of women by itself is limited, and Heide Schlaerpmann declares convincingly in Frauen und Film that the films of Leni Riefenstahl (the official film director of the regime) "are quite negated values ​​of female sexuality and offer only autonomous woman who cheats ".

Don'ts and obligations

The use of makeup is generally prohibited, and certain politeness is required of women, in contrast to the period of the Weimar Republic, which experienced more freedom at the moral level. In 1933, the NSBO ​​meeting (National Sozialistischer Betriebs Obman, female section of the German Workers Front) stated that women "painted and powder were banned at all NSBO ​​meetings." Women who smoked in public - in hotels, cafÃÆ'Â © s, on the road and beyond - will be excluded from NSBO ​​â € <â € <". Activities considered more or less traditional are limited to recommended places: music, manual work, gymnastics. Sexuality is prohibited, except for reproductive purposes; liberated young women are considered "depraved" and "antisocial". Mothers are encouraged to have children: thus created "Ehrenkreuz der Deutschen Mutter" (in English: Cross of Honor of the German Mother) for mothers who have brought to the world more than four children. A "German Mother's Day" was also created; During 1939, three million mothers were decorated. With regard to abortion, access to services was quickly prohibited, until in 1935, the medical profession became obliged to report the stillbirth to the Regional Office for State Health, which would further investigate the child's natural loss; in 1943 Interior and Justice ministers enacted the law "Protection of Marriage, Family and Motherhood", which makes provision for the death penalty for mothers convicted of infanticide.

Physical standards

In line with Nazi racial theory, the Nazi government promoted the Arya (Nordic) archetypes as the ideal physical appearance: women should be blond, beautiful, tall, thin and strong at the same time. This image is spread through advertising through official art, then through ancient art, and more specifically through Greco-Roman sculptures. Academician Monique Moser-Verrey noted: "a revival, for thirty years, from mythological themes such as the Paris Judgment." Moser-Verrey notes:

It is surprising, however, that the image of women projected by women's literature in the 1930s clearly contradicted the traditional view of the sweet housewife propagated by Rosenberg and Goebbels. The female characters of the women's novels during this period are often strong and tenacious women, while sons and husbands are quickly killed to death. Everything happens as if one sees through these fictions a true antagonism between the sexes produced by the constant mobilization of these two groups that are separate from one another.

Mode

Fashion for women in Nazi Germany is problematic for Nazi officials. The Nazi government wants to propagate "Arya" women. In various posters and other forms of media, this ideal Nazi woman is strong, fertile, and dressed in historic traditional German dress. However, Nazi officials also did not want to block the German clothing or fashion industry from creating profits, as the government also sought to create a consumerist society largely based on German domestic products. Differences in purpose often cause differences in what is considered to be fashionable, nationalistic, and politically correct for women in Nazi Germany.

However, despite disagreements about how ideally women's fashion "Aryan" German, anti-Semitic, anti-American, and anti-French, Nazi rhetoric played a key role in printing German women's fashion ideology. The Nazis strongly criticized Western fashion in the 1920s, claiming the Jazz Flapper mode as "Dominated French" and "very Jewish." In addition, the Nazi Party strongly opposed the Flapper style because they perceived it as a masculine woman and created unscrupulous ideals. Because Nazi propaganda depended on the isolation of women into the private realm of being housewives and mother figures, the desire to abolish the 1920 mode in Nazi Germany was logical.

However, while the Nazi government is trying to create the motherhood ideals for Aryan women, they also seek financial benefits from the textile industry. While Hitler urged women to consume, he concluded that women should only consume German products. The creation of the German Fashion Institute that seeks to create a Western high fashion niche market creates a variety of opinions about how Nazi fashion and politics should interact.

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Women's regiment

Compulsory education for girls is not ignored and boys and girls are placed on the same footing at school. Girls are encouraged to continue their secondary education but university courses are closed for them. Beginning in 1935 they were required to fulfill a six-month working period for the benefit of women's employment services, which are Reichsarbeitsdienst Deutscher Frauenarbeitsdienst . Adolf Hitler stated, on April 12, 1942, that Reich's schools had to collect "boys and girls of all classes" to meet "all youths of the Reich". Education manual Das kommende Deutschland notes that:

JungmÃÆ'¤del (young girl) must know a) the date and place of birth FÃÆ'¼hrer, and be able to tell her life. b) He is able to tell the history of the movement and struggle of SA and the Youth of Hitler. c) He knows the life collaborators of the FÃÆ'¼hrer. "

It is also necessary that they know the German geography, its hymns and the clauses of the Versailles Covenant.

BDM is specifically regarded as instructing women to avoid Rassenschande (racial dirtiness), which is treated very important for young women to defend the Aryan race. During the war, repeated attempts were made to disseminate Volkstum ("racial awareness"), to prevent sexual intercourse between Germany and foreign workers. Nazi propaganda published a pamphlet ordering all German women to avoid sexual intercourse with all foreign workers brought to Germany as a danger to their blood. German women accused of racial pollution were paraded in the streets with heads and shaved plaques around his neck detailing his crime. Those sentenced were sent to the concentration camp. When Himmler reportedly asked Hitler what punishment should be imposed on German girls and German women who were found guilty of committing disarmament with prisoners of war (POW), he ordered "any POW with a German girl or a German would be shot" and German women should be publicly humiliated with "her hair shaved and sent to concentration camps".

Robert Gellately in the Gestapo and the German Society. Upholding the Race Policy 1933-1945 writes about cases such as German women found guilty of sexual relations with prisoners of war and foreign workers. One case in March 1941 was a married woman who had an affair with a French prisoner of war whose head was shaved and herded to the town of Bramberg in Lower Franconia carrying a sign that said, "I have tarnished the honor of a German woman." Case another is Dora von Calbitz who in September 1940 was found guilty of sexual intercourse with the Pole. He had shaved his head and was placed in the center of the city of Oschatz near Leipzig, with a sign that said, "I have become an undeserved German woman where I seek and have contact with Poles, by which I exclude myself from the community of people. "

Girls education also means political education; there was already an elite school of political studies, Napola (Nationalpolitische Anstalten), one for women opened in 1939 in Vienna and another in 1942 in Luxembourg. These institutions have no purpose to enable women to reenter political life but provide the best with the cultural baggage necessary to occupy posts related to managing women's affairs. This concerns a very small minority. However, on June 5, 1942, Finance Minister Lutz Schwerin von Krosigk, a conservative politician, threatened to cut grants to a second school, if not a simple apprentice for teenagers, reject all political education for girls. Adolf Hitler decided otherwise on 24 June 1943, promising the construction of three new Napola.

When Hitler's Youth is devoted to regulating the extra-curricular life of male teenagers, Bund Deutscher MÃÆ'ddel (BDM), inhabits girls from 14 to 18 years of age. Founded in 1934, the movement was required after the law of 1 December 1936. It was led 1934-1937 by Trude Mohr, then 1937-1945 by psychologist Jutta RÃÆ'¼diger. Young girls trained for specific jobs (social work, cleaning) or farming (Ernteeinsatz, helping with the harvest) and practicing sports; but surprisingly, as the educational guidebook of Das kommende Deutschland suggests, the requested physical performance is sometimes the same as that of boys (for example, running 60 meters in less than 12 seconds). Every Wednesday night, for girls aged 15 to 20, "house parties" take place, to discuss art and culture. Holiday camps, held for a week during the Summer, in Germany or abroad, are held. There was also a required six-month work service, Reichsarbeitsdienst der weiblichen Jugend (National Women's Service Service), completed in 1941 with an additional six months in Kriegshilfsdienst (for war effort). For young women aged 18 to 25 looking to work, in 1938 Pflichtjahr was institutionalized, a mandatory year of agricultural service or domestic work.

National Socialist Women League

Women can become members of the Nazi Party, but newcomers to the party are only accepted if they are "useful" (nurse or cook for example). They numbered 5% of women in 1933 and 17% in 1937. But since October 1931 the NS-Frauenschaft (NSF) existed, a political organization for Nazi women, who tried above all to promote the ideals of the German Nazi woman model; in his foundation, he is responsible for training in the household. Young women join when they are 15 years old. On December 31, 1932, the NSF accounted for 109,320 members. In 1938, he had 2 million, equivalent to 40% of the total number of party members. The NSF is directed by Gertrud Scholtz-Klink, who has the title of ReichsfÃÆ'¼hrerin; he called his members "my daughters" and gained strong influence over them and certain credibility. Her view of women is clearly in line with Adolf Hitler's view, but she still defends access to several positions of responsibility. He did not participate in large party meetings but was invited to the party congress.

School textbooks were edited starting in 1934, often under the supervision of physician Johanna Haarer, a writer especially for Her First Lady and His Baby, widely publicized, and promoting the driving role of the German mother in building the regime, or Mother, tell me about Adolf Hitler ( Mutter, erzÃÆ'¤hl von Adolf Hitler ), to lead women to indoctrinate their children in Nazi values:

Household training is promoted through Frauenwerk (German Women's Work), which opens a thematic course for "pure ethnic" women. However, it should be noted that although there are many courses for domestic training, gymnastics and music, they leave those who are oriented to anti-religious teaching.

The NS-Frauenschaft "does not play a political role and does not oppose the loss of women's hard-earned rights, defends the role of family mothers at home, aware of their duties at the heart of society, provided that women in the private sphere do not hide their responsibilities at under the Third Reich, we know today that Frauenbewegung (the women's movement) considers the place of women in society to be the heart of a community that excludes Jews and performs civilization missions in the Eastern-occupied Europe to preserve race ".

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Second World War

During the Second World War, while contrary to their past claims, the National Socialists changed the policy and allowed women to join the German army. Adolf Hitler had asserted in a speech to activists of the National Socialist Women's League on 13 September 1936: "We have generations of healthy men - and we, the National Socialists, will watch - Germany will not form part of the women's grenade throwers or the elite female sniper corps. "Therefore, women were not assigned to combat units during the war, but were considered as additional military personnel, responsible for logistical and administrative duties in areas lacking due to the number of people sent to battle. Other women also work in factories or in military education. Military members from the Reichsbahn (National Railway Company) or Feuerwehr (firefighters) wear uniforms that fit the times, especially with skirts. Gertrud Scholtz-Klink, a member of the NSDAP and leader of the National Socialist Women's League stated:

We often hear, even from women, the most diverse objections to work in weapons factories. The question of knowing whether we can ask for a job like this or that woman is now passing well.

Beginning in 1943, the Minister of Economy Reich introduced a job training program called Berufsausbildungsprogramm Ost for agricultural duties in the East (not to be confused with ethnic cleansing General Ost Ost). He extended the existing laws of the Reich, on the protection of minors and employment standards for the German Girl League ( Bund Deutscher MÃÆ'¤del ) Osteinsatz , for whom such work is mandatory. Teenage girls are hired at Brandebourg Market for agricultural work programs. They are active in the occupied Polish residential areas as their assignment. However, referring to the January 1943 decision, calling for the mobilization of German women aged 17 to 45, Gertrud Scholtz-Klink of the NSDAP said in September of that year at a conference at Bad Schlachen:

The educated women in the women's league and available to Wehrmacht not only have to type and work, but also become warriors from FÃÆ'¼hrer.

Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels in his speech Sportspalast delivered on 18 February 1943 at the Berlin Sports Hall, asked German women to work, and to be aware of their commitments:

1. "What is the use of beauty salons that encourage the cult of beauty and who spends much of our time and energy? They are extraordinary during peacetime, but wasted time in wartime Our wives and daughters will be able to welcome our warriors win without a beautiful peaceful jewelry. "
2. "That's why we hire people who do not work in the war economy and women do not work at all, they can not and will not ignore our requests.The job of women is very big.This is not to say that only they belong to the law can work. Everything is welcomed, the more that join the war effort, the more we liberate the army to the front. "
3. "For years, millions of German women have worked with brios in war production and they patiently wait to join and be helped by other women."
4. "Especially for you women, do you want the government to do everything in its power to encourage German women to mobilize all their strength to support the war effort, and to let me go ahead if possible, help the men ahead?"
5. "The great upheaval and crisis of national life shows us who men and women really are.We no longer have the right to speak of weaker sex, because both sexes show the same determination and the same spiritual power."/li>

The mobilization of women in the war economy has always remained limited: the number of women who undertook professional activity in 1944 almost unchanged from 1939, to about 15 million women, in contrast to the British, so the use of women did not develop and only 1,200,000 of them worked in the industry weapons in 1943, in difficult working conditions and often badly treated by their superiors, who deplore their lack of qualifications. In the army (Wehrmacht)

In 1945, there were about 500,000 female servants in the Wehrmacht (Wehrmachtshelferinnen), who were in the heart of Heer, Luftwaffe and Kriegsmarine. About half of them are volunteers, others perform mandatory services related to the war effort (Kriegshilfsdienst). They took part, under the same authority as prisoners of war (Hiwis), as additional personnel of the army (Behelfspersonal) and they were assigned to duties not only in the heart of the Reich, but to a lesser extent, to occupied territories, for example in the Polish general government which was occupied, in France, and later in Yugoslavia, in Greece and in Romania.

They basically participate:

• as a telephone, telegraph and transmission operator,
• as the administrative and messenger scribe,
• in anti-aircraft defense, as a listening equipment operator, operates projectors for anti-aircraft defense, employees in meteorological services and additional civil defense personnel
• in military health services, as volunteer nurses with the German Red Cross or other voluntary organizations

In SS

SS-Gefolge is a female SS male wing, but otherwise it is limited to volunteer work in Emergency Services (Notdienstverpflichtung). SS Female is one of SS-Helferinnen (de) or SS-Kriegshelferinnen . They are responsible for additional transmissions (telephones, radio operators, stenographers) in the SS and sometimes at the camp (this is Aufseherin, see the next section). There is an internal hierarchy in the female wings of the SS, which has no influence on male troops, although titles addressed to women sometimes have an influence on the owners.

SS-Helferinnen was trained at the Reichsschule-SS in Oberehnheim in Elsass. The Reichsschule-SS (in full, Reichsschule fÃÆ'¼r SS Helferinnen Oberenheim) is a training center for SS, reserved for women, and opened in Obernai in May 1942 on the orders of Heinrich Himmler. The training was more difficult than that for women registered in the German Army. They must meet certain physical criteria determined by the regime: they must be 17 to 30 years old and measure more than 1.65 m (5 ft 5 inches), while in the long run, relaxation registration criteria (age limit) are raised to 40 years and the minimum height decreases to 1.58 meters); they even received 15 Muslim students. After being in a privileged status, war widows are favored before the reception is opened for other social classes. Women enrolled in the Reichsschule-SS come from various economic, class and educational backgrounds and include members of the ranks of the aristocracy, Princess Ingeborg Alix. Reichsshule-SS appealed to the female Nazi ideologues who foresee the possibility of social climbing by becoming SS-Helferin, and candidates often come from families with SS and other NSDAP members. In his review of Jutta Muhlenberg's book, Das SS-Helferinnenkorps: Ausbildung, Einsatz und Entnazifizierung der weiblichen AngehÃÆ'¶rigen der Waffen-SS 1942-1949 , Rachel Century writes:

MÃÆ'¼hlenberg is very careful not to generalize and tackle all SS-Helferinnen with the same brush. Although all these women are part of the bureaucratic staff, and are 'Mittenseninen, Zuschauerinnen and zum Teil - auch Zeuginnen von GewalttÃÆ'¤tigkeiten' [accomplice, spectator and sometimes even violent witness] (p 416), he notes that each women still have personal responsibility for what they do, see and know, and it will be very difficult to identify the individual responsibilities of each SS-Helferin. MÃÆ'¼hlenberg focuses on de-Nazification in the American sector, although the British zone is also discussed. A detailed report was made by Americans about the school, showing how women at school should be tackled; they will be automatically detained... MÃÆ'¼hlenberg concludes that the errors of the former SS-Helferinnen lie in their voluntary participation in the SS bureaucratic apparatus.

The school closed in 1944 due to Allied progress.

In camps

Women are in the Nazi ranks of Nazi concentration camps: this is Aufseherin and is commonly belonging to the SS. They are guards, secretaries or nurses. They arrived before the start of the war, some of them trained starting in 1938 in Lichtenburg. This was due to the need for personnel following the increasing number of political prisoners after Kristallnacht on 8 and 9 November 1938. After 1939, they were trained at Camp RavensbrÃÆ'¼ck near Berlin. Mostly from lower or middle class social societies, they previously worked in traditional professions (hairdressers, teachers, for example) but, unlike men who were required to fulfill military service, women were driven by a sincere desire to achieve the female wing of SS , SS-Gefolge. Of the 55,000 number of guards in all Nazi camps, there are 3,600 women (about 10% of the workforce); however, no woman is allowed to give orders to a man.

They worked in the Auschwitz and Majdanek camps beginning in 1942. The following year, the Nazis began the women's draft due to lack of guards. Later, during the war, women were also assigned on a smaller scale in the Auschwitz Neuengamme camps (I, II and III), Plaszow FlossenbÃÆ'¼rg, Gross-Rosen Vught and Stutthof, but never served in the death camp of Be? ec, SobibÃÆ'³r Treblinka or Che? Mno. Seven Aufseherinnen serve at Vught, 24 are in Buchenwald, 34 in Bergen-Belsen, 19 in Dachau, 20 in Mauthausen, three in Mittelbau-Dora, seven in Natzweiler-Struthof, twenty in Majdanek, 200 in Auschwitz and its sub-camps, 140 in Sachsenhausen, 158 in Neuengamme, 47 in Stutthof, compared with 958 serving at RavensbrÃÆ'¼¼ck, 561 at FlossenbÃÆ'¼rg and 541 in Gross-Rosen. Many supervisors work in sub-camps in Germany, some of which are in France, Austria, Czechoslovakia and Poland.

There is a hierarchy in the position of Aufseherin , including the following higher ranking: Rapportaufseherin (head of Aufseherin), Erstaufseherin (first guard), The < LagerfÃÆ'¼hrerin (head of the camp), and finally, (senior inspector), the post is only occupied by Anna Klein and Luise Brunner.

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Women members of a discriminated minority

Under the same threat as men who are Jews or Romani, women belonging to this community are equally discriminated against, then deported and partially annihilated. In many concentration camps there were several sections for female detainees (mainly in Auschwitz and Bergen-Belsen) but the camp at RavensbrÃÆ'¼ck, opened in May 1939, distinguished itself as a special camp for women, in 1945 totaling about 100,000 prisoners. The first concentration camp of women was opened in 1933 in Moringen, before being transferred to Lichtenburg in 1938.

In concentration camps, women are considered weaker than men, and they are generally sent to gas chambers faster, while male power is used to work men for fatigue. Some women are subjected to medical experiments.

Some take the path of resistance, such as Polish member Haika Grossman, who participates in the organization for help for the Bia ghetto? Ystok, on the night of 15-16 August 1943. On October 7, 1944, members of Sonderkommando, 250 prisoners were responsible for the bodies of people after gassing, rising; they had purchased an explosive stolen by a Kommando from a young Jewish woman (Ala Gertner, Regina Safir, Estera Wajsblum and Roza Robota) working in the armory of Union Werke. They succeeded in destroying the fourth Crematorium IV.

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Women's resistance to Nazism

In addition to the resistors being forced into their commitments because of their risk of being deported and destroyed because of their race, some were also made against the Nazi regime of Germany. Women represent about 15% of the Resistance. Monique Moser-Verrey notes:

If we can say that, among the persecuted minorities, women are more often spared than men, it is their low status in a male-dominated society that does not make them a sizable enemy of the regime, but it is they who understand those needs. to hide or flee before a misled partner, whose social inclusion is more complete.

Communist Student Liselotte Herrmann protested in 1933 against the appointment of Adolf Hitler as chancellor and managed to get information to foreign governments about German weaponry. In 1935 he was arrested, sentenced to death two years later and executed in 1938. He was the first German mother to suffer from the death penalty since the beginning of the regime. Twenty women from DÃÆ'¼sseldorf, who saw their father, brother and son deported to the BÃÆ'¶rgermoor camp, managed to smuggle the famous The Song of the Deportees and make it known. Freya von Moltke, Mildred Harnack-Fish and Libertas Schulze-Boysen participated in the Kreisau Circle Rescue and Red Orchestra groups; the last two were arrested and executed. The 20-year-old student, Sophie Scholl, a member of The White Rose, was executed on February 22, 1943 with his siblings Hans Scholl and Christoph Probst, for posting a flyer. The inhibitor Maria Terwiel helped spread the knowledge of famous sermons condemning the Nazi movement given by Clemens von Galen, Bishop of Munster, as well as helping the Jews to flee abroad. He was executed on 5 August 1943. Successful female protests can also be recorded, called RosenstraÃÆ'Ÿe, a racial "Aryan" woman married to Jews who, in February 1943, gained their husband's release.

Women also fought for Resistance from abroad, such as Dora Schaul, a Communist who had left Germany in 1934 and was involved from July 1942 with clandestine networks, Deutsch Arbeit (German Labor) and Deutsche-Feldpost (My German countryside), from the School Military health in Lyon. Hilde Meisel attempted in 1933 to galvanize British public opinion against the Nazi regime. He returned to Germany during the war but was executed at the corner of the road.

A little over half of the Righteous People Among the Nations recognized by Yad Vashem are women. While many of them cooperate with other family members, some of these brave women are initiators of salvation and act independently to save the Jews.

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High-level society and power circle

Although women do not have political power in Nazi Germany, a circle of influence does exist around Adolf Hitler. In this circle, Hitler became acquainted with British Unity Mitford and Magda Goebbels, wife of Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels. Magda Goebbels is known by the nickname "First Lady of the Third Reich": she represents the regime during state visits and official events. His marriage to Goebbels on 19 December 1931 was considered a community event, in which Leni Riefenstahl was an important guest. She acts as a model for the mother of Germany for Mother's Day. Eleonore Baur, a friend of Hitler since 1920 (he participated in the Beer Hall show) was the only woman who received the Order of Blood; he also participated in official receptions and was close to Heinrich Himmler, who even named him an SS colonel and allowed him free access to the concentration camp, which he attended on a regular basis, notably Dachau. Hitler did not forget that he owed some of his political rise to women who were integrated in the world of society (aristocrats or industrialists), such as Elsa Bruckmann.

Women are also able to distinguish themselves in certain domains, but they are exceptions that prove the rules. So Leni Riefenstahl is the official film director of the regime and is given huge funds for her cinematic production ( Triumph of the Will , and Olympia ). Winifred Wagner directed the published Bayreuth Festival, and soprano Elisabeth Schwarzkopf was promoted as a "Nazi Diva", as noted by the American newspaper. Hanna Reitsch, an aviator, distinguishes himself with the handling of test aircraft and military projects of the regime, especially the V1 flying bomb.

Prominent lady from Nazi Germany

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Female during the fall of Nazi Germany

After the fall of Nazi Germany, many German women dubbed "TrÃÆ'¼mmerfrauen" ("Rubble Women") participated in the rebuilding of Germany by cleaning up the debris caused by the war. In the Soviet occupation zone, more than two million women were victims of rape. One of them will publish a memoir to remember this experience: Eine Frau in Berlin (A Woman In Berlin). When the Soviets entered German territory, German women usually had no choice, except suicide, to obey. Age does not matter with victimization across the entire generation strata. The famous Russian writer Alexander Solzhenitsyn, angry with finding the body of a little girl who was killed after a gang rape, wrote a spicy poem to mark the moment for posterity (i) (right) .

What Solzhenitsyn's poetry also reveals the penchant for revenge of the Red Army demands in Germany, a retaliation announced by Soviet leaders. Soviet troops were given a certain degree of license in early victory in dismissing the Germans, as even Josef Stalin expressed his indifference to rape. The example can be seen in what Stalin once asked the Yugoslav communist leader Milovan Djilas, "Can not he understand it if a soldier has crossed thousands of kilometers through blood and fire and death having fun with a woman or taking some trouble?" Many German women die in the midst of such trivial things, their husbands and families suffer unparalleled sadness with them, and some of them choose to take his own life in exchange for rape. Even when not raped, women hide in apartments, warehouses, and cupboards for fear of being violated, starving, fearful, and lonely leaving psychological scars for years to come. For more background see: Rape during the German occupation.

Accountability for war crimes committed

The question of the fault of the German people in their support of Nazism has long overshadowed the women, who have little political power under the regime. Thus, as explained by the German historian Gisela Bock, who was involved with the first historian to highlight this issue, by asking women during the Nazi era. In 1984, in "When Biology Becomes Destiny, Women in Weimar and Nazi Germany", he writes that women who are enslaved economically and morally, can not exercise their freedom by being confined at home and placed under the rule of their husbands. Thus, we attribute the study of the subject during the 1980s primarily to the perception that women are victims of "machismo" and "misogynistic" fascism. In terms of the voting pattern, the proportion of higher male voters supports the Nazi party compared to female voters.

However, the simplicity of this analysis tends to disappear with recent research. In 1987, historian Claudia Koonz, in "Mothers in the Homeland, Women, Family and Political Nazis" questioned this statement and admitted some mistakes. He states the following: "Far from impabel or innocent, women allow the killing of the State on behalf of the interests they define as motherhood." For him, the housewives only allowed them to assert themselves and understand their identity, especially through the Nazi-led women's association Gertrud Scholtz-Klink. Therefore they help stabilize the system. Women enjoy the politics and state of eugenics, which promise financial assistance if birth rates are high, so they will help stabilize the system "by maintaining the illusion of love in a hateful environment." In addition, if Gisela Bock denounced his associates' work as "anti-feminist", others as Adelheid von Saldern refused to stop at the tight choice between engagement and oppression and more interested in how Nazism included women in their project for Germany. The recent work of the historian Wendy Lower (consultant to the Holocaust Memorial Museum of the United States), suggests that a large number of women were accomplices for Nazi atrocities, and sometimes direct participants. Such a reality made it very clear that at the end of the war German women had crossed the full circle of incubators that had once been closed to Arya's future to influential contributors in the Nazi concentration camp system.

Neo-Nazism

There are many neo-Nazi militants or former Nazi defenders, such as German Helene Elisabeth von Isenburg or Gudrun Himmler (daughter of Heinrich Himmler), who is active through the organization of Stille Hilfe, and French citizens Françoise Dior and Savitri Devi.

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See also

• Fascism
• Gender studies
• The history of German women
• Nazi Germany
• Women's history

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References

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Further reading

• Century, Rachel. dictate the Holocaust: Female Administrator from the Third Reich (PhD Dissertation, University of London, 2012) online. References pp 277-310
• Heineman, Elizabeth. What's the Difference a husband does? Women and Marital Status in Nazi and Postwar Germany (1999).
• Hitten, David B. Film Leni Riefenstahl . Metuchen, N.J. & amp; London: The Scarecrow Press, 1978.
• Koontz, Claudia, et al. When Biology Becomes Destiny: Women in Weimar and Nazi Germany (1984).
• Lower, Wendy. Furies Hitler: German Women in Nazi Killing Fields . Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2013.
• MacDonogh, Giles. After Reich: Brutal History of Allied Occupation . (2007).
• Morton, Alison. Military or Civil? Anies Curious of German Women's Aid Service during the Second World War. 2012. ASIN B007JUR408
• Moser-Verrey, Monique (1991). "Les femmes du troisiÃÆ'¨me Reich". Recherches fÃÆ' Â © ministes . 4 (2): 25-44. doi: 10.7202/057649ar. Ã, PDF via ÃÆ' â € Å"world web portal (www. erudit.org).
• Owings, Alison. Frauen. German Women Calling the Third Reich (1994).
• Pine, Lisa. Nazi Family Policy, 1933-1945 (1997).
• Reese, Dagmar. Growing Women in Nazi Germany (2006).
• Sigmund, Anna Maria. Women from the Third Reich . (2000).
• Stephenson, Jill. The Nazi Women's Organization (1981).
• Stephenson, Jill. Women in Nazi Germany (2001).
• Competition for Women Lebensraum, 1928-1932 , in Renate Bridenthal, Anita Grossmann and Marion Kaplan, When Biology Becomes Destiny. Women in Weimar and Nazi Germany . New York: Monthly Review Press, 1984.
• Tscharntke, Denise. Re-educating German Women: Women's Sexy Affairs Section from the British Military Government, 1946-1951 (P. Lang, 2003).
• Williamson, Gordon. German WFP Service of World War II (Osprey, 2012).

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External links

• United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
• WWII: Women from Reich - Photo Gallery - LIFE Magazine

Source of the article : Wikipedia