
Germany sees 'overwhelming' sales of Hitler's Mein Kampf - rgbrgb
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-38495456
======
tyingq
The article covers the why...it's not terribly surprising.

 _" While the Bavarian regional government held the copyright, reprinting of
the book was banned. But the copyright expired a year ago."_

So, a book that was banned, is no longer banned, and...

 _" Mein Kampf (My Struggle) is an expensive academic text, and is being
bought by libraries, schools and history academics."_

Basically, not much to see here. Libraries and schools are buying a book they
should probably have, for historical purposes. The swell in sales is because
they couldn't buy it before now.

~~~
ycmbntrthrwaway
Guess almost anyone who wants to actually read it just downloads the text.

~~~
bhaak
You can also easily buy it in second hand bookstores.

Even in Germany. The book itself wasn't banned, only the reprinting was
suppressed by copyright.

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JDDunn9
I just finished reading "Mein Kampf" last month. It's not very good. It's
about 20% racist rants. He talks about some legitimate grievances German had
at the time and from their history, and military strategy. I didn't walk away
feeling like Hitler was brilliant or anything like I did with Trotsky after
reading "Terrorism and Communism".

~~~
Koshkin
Yeah, there are better books to spend your time on than those two...

~~~
unmole
I have a similar reaction when someone suggests Ayn Rand.

~~~
Grue3
Except, you know, Ayn Rand's writings haven't resulted in genocides and mass
human rights violations.

~~~
soneil
You could make the same argument that this is why it should be read.
Especially with the right being on the rise across the west, there's still
much to be gained in understanding how the "average man" was led down this
path "last time". "doomed to repeat it", etc.

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hackuser
> 'Not a runaway hit' ...

That quote is followed by explanations why being #1 on the non-fiction best
seller list isn't meaningful. Maybe not.

But sane, non-extremist humans seem to have an unending desire for normalcy so
strong that they delude themselves every time. They will grasp at it no matter
how clear the signs. When Adolf Hitler himself ran Germany, he was supported
by organized violent gangs, brutally suppressed the opposition, promoted and
executed a program of vicious hatred and religious discrimination, built up an
army, conquered multiple neighbors, and was an obvious psychopath ... could he
make the signs more clear for everyone? ... yet UK Prime Minister Neville
Chamberlain was widely supported when he said could negotiate with this
monster and obtain "peace in our time" \- he really said that. Churchill, who
called for opposing Hitler and preparing for war, was a political outcast.
Leading Americans supported and did business with Hitler; the U.S. Congress
blocked the President from supporting Hitler's victims and foes; boatloads of
refugees from Hitler's terror were sent away from U.S. shores, many to their
deaths.

So I'm not comforted at all by these claims that it's not a big deal. Either
people will confront the fearful reality and stand up and fight the reborn
monstrosities of racism, nationalism, and other prejudice, or those
monstrosities will continue to advance unhindered.

If you wait to act until the evil people to announce they are evil and tell
you their secret plan, like in the movies, you'll find yourself passively,
quietly herded to whatever end they have in mind for you.

~~~
mordant
Hitler _told the world_ his 'secret plan', _in advance_ , with _Mein Kampf_.

And, unlike most politicians, he did his level best to fulfill the promises he
made before coming to power.

So, it's hard to escape the conclusion that a substantial proportion of the
German people understood and supported his program, no matter how evil he was
and it was.

~~~
hackuser
This isn't really true, unless that book from the 1920s spoke of some things
generally. When the events were actually happening the late 1930s, multiple
times Hitler said he was not interested in further conquests, promising
normalcy and peace. Remember he signed a treaty with Chamberlain saying so,
and also another with Molotov (which Hitler also violated). The Holocaust was
hidden so effectively from the world that the Allied powers plausibly denied
knowledge of it. Germans living in nearby towns denied knowledge of it.

EDIT: Some edits to qualify statements that were too absolute

~~~
LyndsySimon
> The Holocaust was hidden so effectively from the world that the Allied
> powers plausibly denied knowledge of it.

I don't believe this assertion. The Holocaust was reported in great detail by
those fleeing Nazi rule, and the Allied powers absolutely knew what was
happening. The general population knew as well, if they were paying attention:

[http://www.telegraph.co.uk/history/world-war-
two/11370972/Ho...](http://www.telegraph.co.uk/history/world-war-
two/11370972/Holocaust-Memorial-Day-Telegraph-revealed-Nazi-gas-chambers-
three-years-before-liberation-of-Auschwitz.html)

> Germans living in nearby towns denied knowledge of it.

While it's true that they denied knowing of the existence of extermination
camps, it's an idea that has been widely rejected.

See for yourself - here's a video of German residents of Weimar being forced
to tour Buchenwald after liberation. Do these people looked surprised and
mortified to you?

[https://www.ushmm.org/online/film/display/detail.php?file_nu...](https://www.ushmm.org/online/film/display/detail.php?file_num=1923)

~~~
lispm
The large extermination camps were not in Germany, they were outside of
Germany, built by Germans:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extermination_camp](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extermination_camp)

There were no nearby German towns.

Knowledge about them was not that widespread, many jews were brought there not
knowing what to expect.

Buchenwald was not an 'extermination camp' like Auschwitz-Birkenau.

There were many concentration camps in Germany with many people being killed
there. Many people knew about the Holocaust and what happened. But the biggest
industrialised killing happened outside Germany in these extermination camps
(over 3 million victims), and that knowledge was much less widespread. Some of
those extermination camps were closed and deconstructed before the end of the
war, for example Treblinka and Belzec.

~~~
hackuser
From what I recall, U.S./UK/French/etc. forces liberated at least several
camps, so those would have been in Germany (not France or Benelux, and not on
the Eastern Front). Also, they compelled local Germans to tour the camps, so
there would have been German towns nearby.

On such an important topic, it would be great if you could provide citations
beyond Wikipedia (arguably the godfather of 'post-truth' information ...).

~~~
lispm
Again, extermination camps were not in Germany. Not one. US/french/forces
can't have liberated anyone from those extermination camps, since their troops
were not there. Only the soviet army reached the extermination camps - those
camps who were still there and not closed earlier.

Concentration camps were also in Germany. Many. Sure the US/UK/French army
liberated people from there.

The Wikipedia articles on these topics are actually quite good. Don't spread
FUD.

[https://www.britannica.com/topic/extermination-
camp](https://www.britannica.com/topic/extermination-camp)

~~~
hackuser
It's sad that our discussion turned ugly; it's usually a good time to move on.

EDIT: Edited it.

------
gumby
85K sales in a country of 85M is not very interesting. I bought a copy in the
US, basically because I could, and what a snoozer. I certainly didn't bother
to finish it. Ditto The Communist Manifesto. 85K can easily constitute some
institutional purchases (as others have commented in this thread) plus just
some curious book readers ("What was all the fuss about anyway?"). I'm sure
most libraries with a significant history collection had a copy already.

