What lessons should have been learned and implemented from the rise of Hitler and the Nazis in their ascension to power to prevent a recurrence of similar actors and ideological campaigns in future?
One important lesson of the Nazi rise to power and the Holocaust is that Nazis characterized their enemies as disgusting rather than scary.
Disgust is a different feeling than fear, and it leads to different responses. Hitler used imagery of infection and disease to describe not only problems in society but eventually groups as well. This talk of filth and infestation laid the emotional groundwork for the “purge” solution.
If we want to avoid another Holocaust, we need to be wary of analogies like rot, cancer, infection for describing people and points of view.
And then conservatives embraced the term and now proudly use it to describe themselves. They know they are toxic, oppressive and cruel and they celebrate it.