[/caption]I'm currently reading They Thought They Were Free: the Germans, 1933-45. The below paragraph shows the effects of a dictatorship and Nazism on the people. It sheds light on what the people were thinking and how they were feeling in their daily lives. They weren't given a list of do's and don'ts or a handbook of rules and regulations. Instead, they were intimidated into being overly cautious. Imagine feeling as if you're walking on eggshells 24/7.
The remarks below are from a German high school teacher who was asked if Julius Caesar's works were banned in the schools.
Not that I remember. But that is not the way it was. Everything was not regulated specifically, ever. It was not like that at all. Choices were left to the teacher's discretion, within the 'German spirit.' That was all that was necessary; the teacher had only to be discreet. It he himself wondered at all whether anyone would object to a given book, he would be wise not to use it. This was a much more powerful form of intimidation, you see, than any fixed list of acceptable or unacceptable writings. The way it was done was, from the point of view of the regime, remarkably clever and effective. The teacher had to make the choices and risk the consequences; this made him all the more cautious.
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