We Reserve The Right To Forget (2)

Alcoholics Assemble
“Hi, my name is… and I am an alcoholic.”

Though a non-drinking adult human being, I must say that I have always admired this about the AA. “Hello, my name is… and I am an alcoholic.” This is how members of the US-founded recovery fellowship, the Alcoholics Anonymous (AA), by custom, introduce themselves during their meetings. There, of course, is no compulsion on members to do so—to state in such blatant terms, the fact that one is addicted to booze. But this simple sentence has proven itself a very crucial step to true recovery for alcoholics worldwide. Because it is only by admitting that there is a problem that one goes out in search of a solution—and consequently, attain for themselves, true liberation from that problem. ‘Admitting’, it is a very important step. Because problems do not dissipate—they do not vanish into thin air because one deigned to close their eyes to them. Problems persist till they are uncovered, and solutions proffered for them. Indeed, there are important lessons to be learnt from these recovering alcoholics all over the world.

So, is this an article about alcoholics? I know you know this not to be the case. Because as we are all fully aware, there are no alcoholics in Ghana…

CHAPTER ONE: THE NAZIFICATION

Hitler, he knew that for one to successfully make something of a nation, one had to capture, first, the collective consciousness. And there is no better way of capturing the public consciousness than by playing to the demands of the stomach, heart, and mind. The German people, like all people worldwide, yearned to fulfil their basic human need of putting food in their stomachs and that of their families. They yearned for decent employment, good living, and all such basic necessities. They yearned also for the fulfilment of higher human needs—needs such as the attainment of a sense of self-worth, self-importance.... You know, those demands of the heart and mind.

And to reach this state of importance, one may employ either of these two approaches:

The first approach guarantees for one, true self-actualisation—in potential perpetuity. The latter only simulates the state. It goes about lying to itself that it is in that coveted state of self-actualisation when, in fact, it is the state of mere self-importance, self-aggrandisation that it has managed to pull. Mere self-aggrandisation—grand in its over-representation of oneself in their own mind’s eye. An over-representation of self which makes such persons only laughable in the public’s eye... Laughable because these people have committed the fatal mistake of thinking that in bringing others low, they automatically go high. Such persons become nothing but mere wannabes. And as we know, wannabes, they never ‘be’—they never ‘are’. For their efforts are always misplaced. The results they attain are nothing but fleeting. Because such people, they waste time investing efforts, resources, and ingenuity not into truth, but into pretence.

In his vision of building a self-actualised Germany, Hitler, he chose this second approach—the fleeting, self-aggrandising approach.

Thus began this whole comedic parade of the Aryan race. The so-called superior race, being, according to the afore-under-achiever, Hitler, the German people. The prosperous Jewish population of Germany were, according to Adolf, an infiltration, a disease, ‘rats’, ‘tuberculosis’, hurdles to the German people’s potential of attaining this state of ‘purity’—the ‘pure’, unblemished state of superiority. Hence the mass ethnic cleansing—one resulting in the extermination of about 6 million Jews and the death of over 16 million people in total.

But before he could get to this point in his agenda, Hitler, he knew that for one to successfully cause destruction upon a people, one had to capture, first, the collective consciousness. And there is no better way of capturing the consciousness of fellow humankind than doing so at their formative years—at those very early stages of their lives when their brains are but a clean slate, mere clay, game for the moulding. The educational system as a whole became a breeding ground for the indoctrination of the young generation in the Nazi ideologies of militarism, superiority, racialism, antisemitism.

The führer was idolised, and his ideologies idealised in the minds of these children right from the very early stages of their schooling. The games these children played, the media, art, literature, etc., they were made to consume were all used as indoctrination tools. German teachers of the era were strategically largely Nazis—lending ease to this Nazification agenda.

Groups such as Jungvolk were instituted to serve as after-school indoctrination grounds for boys 10 years and above, boys who were to earn a place in the Hitlerjugend (Hitler Youth) when they attained the age of 14, and ultimately a place in Nazi military upon reaching 18 years.

But is indoctrination ever complete if done to one gender, leaving behind the other? Never. And Hitler knew this. These very boys whom he had spent time and resources brainwashing would grow up, meet a girl, fall in love, and with one pass of these girls’ hands through their hair, they would forget everything the Führer had laboured to teach them. Like Delilah did to the locks of Samson, these un-indoctrinated girls would ‘shave’ years of this brainwashing right off the heads (minds) of these boys—unlock the screws Hitler had worked so hard fastening in their brains.

Indeed, collective indoctrination is never complete when it is done to one sex, leaving behind the other. So, the Führer, he formed the League of German Girls (Bund Deutscher Mädel (BDM)) purposely for young German females… A camp which had three sections—one for girls aged 10 to 14; the second for young ladies aged 14 to 18, and a third for young women aged 17 to 21.

As former children ourselves, we can all attest to the fact that the ultimate dream of every child is to be an adult. Hence the elaborate world of play pretend employed by kids worldwide—since time immemorial. And these Hitler children and youth organisations, they gave these kids the opportunity to escape the world of nkuro—the world of play pretend. They made these children feel like they are actually playing a part in the real world. In these Nazi youth organisations, the German child and young adult was made to feel like a stakeholder, partaking in real-time, in orchestrating the Germany envisaged by Hitler. The Hitler regime managed to separate the child from the guidance and authority of their parents, society, church. The German child’s only real allegiance was directly to the state—to the Führer. The German child’s guardian and god was Hitler himself.

So, there you had it, a bunch of new generation girls and boys, armed with Nazi ideologies of superiority, racialism, radicalised militarism, waiting to take on the world… A generation inculcated with the spirit of the Nazi Party, with ties to family and church broken, waiting to take over from the older generation... A generation waiting to lend perpetuity to these deadly Nazi ideologies through procreation and subsequent socialisation... Their children, their children’s children, all to be steeped in this exaggerated sense of self-importance… A generation equipped with an unmatched capacity of causing harm and deaths upon fellow human beings just so they can reach and maintain this state of self-importance—this sense of superiority. Imagine such a world. A world of numerous Hitlers. Oh, the massacre…

CHAPTER TWO: DENAZIFICATION
Sorry for this abrupt ending, but this article risks being a very long one. We are going to have to continue this next week. Because when you start an article with the sentence ‘I am an alcoholic’ and go on to make the mistake of making that article a long one, this is what happens: a large number of people will read just that first line, take a quick glance through the long pages of texts before them, give up, and go about their lives with a conclusion formed in their minds—a conclusion informed by just that first line alone. I am sorry, but ‘I am an alcoholic’ isn’t a cross I’m willing to die on today. So yes, we will have to continue this next week.

It’s a date. I promise. Happy Easter by the way! Erh… a bit too late, no?

[Published in the Business & Financial Times (B&FT) - 13th April, 2023]