Karl Hodge
Sep 8, 2018 · 1 min read

National socialism was not socialism at all. Even to describe it as a “type of socialism” is to give it a credibility it does not have.

Hitler adopted the term “socialism” as a brand, to appeal to working Germans at a time when socialism was an emerging, vogueish idea — but there was no intention to enact socialist policy and certainly no love for it.

Hitler put actual socialists in concentration camps. He disbanded trade unions and replaced them with his own German Labor Front. He took manufacturing into state ownership to control the means of production for the government, not the people. The aim was not to redistribute wealth within the master race but to create a militarised hierarchy, perpetually at war, in which its leaders enjoyed the spoils. It was a closed class system, totally at odds with the tenets of socialism.

Please stop perpetuating this myth.

    Karl Hodge

    Written by

    Writer and University Lecturer. Doing research into games, VR and journalism, all at the same time.