Wednesday, June 17, 2020

Radio Story

I'm in the midst of a great book on German history....entitled: 'Hitler's First Hundred Days', by Peter Fritzche).  It's a great piece of research and I'd highly recommend it.

One aspect gets brought up by Fritzche, which is never openly discussed by Germans or historians.

Radio was in this 1932 period, in Germany, had rules. 

It's a curious thing that the Weimar Republic put into place.  They saw radio approaching and made up a law that said public political chatter was forbidden, and you could NOT buy advertising for any political party.  So from the mid-1920s when radio took off.....all the way through to the end of 1932....the law stood there and protected the public.

So this odd thing happens....the law said that the government officials (which at this point included Hitler and the significant Nazi figures of the government)....had the right to speak as the national authority.  They didn't have to open any special doors, or even pay for their time on radio.

They spoke....often, and laid down the case that the KPD Party members (the Marxist and Communists)....were a 'threat' to Germany. 

That's all it really took....to really scare people....chatter upon the radio.  Fritzche even says that radio became a 'trusted' source...even more so than paper-print. 

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