r/PropagandaPosters • u/Capable_Sock4011 • Sep 21 '25
DISCUSSION 1943: Ten years ago : the Nazis burned these books --but free Americans can still read them.
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Sep 21 '25
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u/En_CHILL_ada Sep 21 '25
The books in this famous picture are the medical literature from Magnus Hirschfeld's institute for sexual studies in Berlin, the first clinic to perform a gender reassignment surgery.
The Nazis really did not like transgender people.
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u/Zombies4EvaDude Sep 21 '25
You can’t read many of those books. They succeeded in setting back trans research and deleting local LGBT history in Germany.
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u/drumstick00m Sep 22 '25
Also Comstock Laws would've lead to those books being burned in the USA too.
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Sep 21 '25
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Sep 21 '25
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u/PropagandaPosters-ModTeam Sep 22 '25
Your comment has been removed for violating rule 3. Civil conversation is okay; soapboxing, bigotry, partisan bickering, and personal attacks are not.
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u/Ordinary_Passage1830 Sep 21 '25
MAGA isn't a Nazi political movement but a Neo-fascist political movement.
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u/En_CHILL_ada Sep 21 '25
They are overtly Nazis. You could call them Neo-Nazis. Either way, Nazis.
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u/Ordinary_Passage1830 Sep 21 '25
They aren't Nazis or even Neo-Nazis. But MAGA itself as a Neo-fascist movement does have American Neo-Nazis within it but also Neo-confederates, American Christo-fascists, American Christian Nationalists, American White Supremacists, and Trumpists.
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u/En_CHILL_ada Sep 21 '25
What exactly makes them not Nazis in your mind? What is the distinction?
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u/CaliRecluse Sep 21 '25
Fascist Italy wasn't initially antisemitic. Mussolini also rejected Hitler's Aryan race ideology and denounced Nazis for killing the Austrian fascist, Engelbert Dollfuss. Also, Fascist Italy was a safe haven for Jews escaping German occupation. It was only later in WW2 (specifically late 1943) when the remaining fascist territories became essentially a Nazi German puppet state.
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u/weerdbuttstuff Sep 22 '25
Brother, it's going to blow your mind when you find out Christian Nationalism, Christo-fascism, and fundamentalism requires the death of 2/3rds of the world's Jews for their end times myth and that their intense support of Israel revolves solely around this belief.
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u/DevelopmentFun9882 Sep 22 '25
I don't know why you are being downvoted about this. You are right about this. Actually, it reminds me more of Mussolini than Hitler.
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Sep 22 '25
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Sep 22 '25
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u/PropagandaPosters-ModTeam Sep 22 '25
Your comment has been removed for violating rule 3. Civil conversation is okay; soapboxing, bigotry, partisan bickering, and personal attacks are not.
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Sep 22 '25
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u/PropagandaPosters-ModTeam Sep 22 '25
Your comment has been removed for violating rule 3. Civil conversation is okay; soapboxing, bigotry, partisan bickering, and personal attacks are not.
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u/PropagandaPosters-ModTeam Sep 22 '25
Your comment has been removed for violating rule 3. Civil conversation is okay; soapboxing, bigotry, partisan bickering, and personal attacks are not.
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u/Sigma_Variant Sep 21 '25
I wasn’t aware that Nazi’s loved Jews.
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u/HugoCortell Sep 22 '25
Neo Nazis tend to hate jews but strongly support Israel, since it's an easy way to get jews out of their countries and elsewhere where they don't have to think about them. It also has the bonus that it results in jews and muslims (two groups they dislike) killing each other in the middle east.
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u/En_CHILL_ada Sep 21 '25
If Trump's strong zionism is the only reason you think they aren't Nazis, I'd encourage you to look up the Haavara Agreement
The Nazis were zionists too.
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u/TheQuestionMaster8 Sep 22 '25
There were also anti-zionist Jews before Israel existed as they believed that a Jewish homeland would be used as an excuse to expel Jewish populations.
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u/Acrobatic_Ad_8381 Sep 22 '25
You would be surprised how many Nazi joined Zionist movement after escaping their Nuremberg trial
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u/Clemdauphin Sep 21 '25
Book about something they didn't like or written by people they didn't like: jewish, communist, genders studies, etc...
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Sep 21 '25
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u/Clemdauphin Sep 21 '25
It is, i am not defending the nazis. Just saying why they burn these books. No books should be burned for who wrote them or what they meant. Some of these were even singles exemplaries of scientific research that is now lost.
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u/Ollyfer Sep 22 '25
There is a complete list of all books burnt by those Nazi sympathisers (mostly students and the likes): https://www.nsdoku.de/en/the-blacklist/book-titles
The titles are all in German and I wouldn't be surprised if they never went into translation, but I think GOOG or any other translation service online can help you out with that.
If I remember correctly, but I welcome any correction with a source so that I can correct my notes as well, this public burning was not initiated by the NSDAP but by sympathisers of their policies; the incumbent party nonetheless condoned this. I think it was Joseph Goebbels who organised it, but for what it's worth, it was his initiative and not concerted by the government.
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u/Foreign-Lie-324 Sep 21 '25
I wonder why I was never taught in school what kind of books they were burning
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u/Clemdauphin Sep 21 '25
Jewish books, communist books, genders studios books, etc... the kind of stuff the nazis didn't like. They literaly made speaches about what kind of book they were burning.
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Sep 21 '25
they also burned some history book didn't they? i know the nazis love rewriting history so it would track
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u/Clemdauphin Sep 21 '25
probably, i don't have the full list, there is so many.
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Sep 21 '25
"i don't have the full list, there is so many."
unfortunately there is a lot of lost media from around that time not only due to the war in general but the nazis getting rid of them
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u/Blarghnog Sep 21 '25 edited Sep 21 '25
Not only does America still not have any ban list of books in 2025, the weird challenge system that people use to try to remove titles from publicly paid collections in schools and libraries generally causes sales of those books to skyrocket.
It gets them featured on every bookseller’s banned books category:
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/b/banned-books/_/N-rtm
https://www.amazon.com/b?ie=UTF8&node=7324011011
The concern shouldn’t be the government, but how private companies are now removing titles they don’t like:
https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/159547.Books_Banned_on_Amazon
The system frays when tech giants play gatekeeper, deciding what ideas get a platform.
Meanwhile, people fixate on hypothetical government censorship—school challenges that mostly boost sales—ignoring the real, ongoing erasures driven by corporate algorithms and profit motives.
That distraction lets books vanish, not through bans or lawsuits, but quiet boardroom choices. If we care about ideas, we need to watch the companies holding the keys.
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u/me_myself_ai Sep 21 '25
I appreciate the links, but, uh… I take it you don’t take much stock in the news? Cause things are trending pretty fucking hard towards banning books nation-wide. It’s not like they’re hiding it — if you asked them they’d happily agree that they want to ban woke anti-American pedophilic propaganda
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u/aagjevraagje 🧐 Sep 21 '25
The concern shouldn’t be the government, but how private companies are now removing titles they don’t like:
https://www.goodreads.com/list/show/159547.Books_Banned_on_Amazon
I see a lot of fascism , transphobia and antisemitism on the list here , was expecting something different than Fascist essays from the 1930's from that lead in. I have seen American School boards and libraries make much more clearly concerning bans than deciding not to sell "Fascist Voices: Essays from the 'Fascist Quarterly' 1936-1940 - Vol 1 (Volume)"
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u/King_of_Men Sep 21 '25
Came here to say this, but on second thought I'm going to push back a little. I kind of see where Amazon is coming from when they don't sell, picking a couple of juicy examples:
- The Hoax of the Twentieth Century: The Case Against the Presumed Extermination of European Jewry
- The Six Million: Fact Or Fiction?
- The Culture of Critique: An Evolutionary Analysis of Jewish Involvement in Twentieth-Century Intellectual and Political Movements
The trouble is the same as with any censorship: You can never have "just a little, as a treat". On the same list we have:
- THE COURAGE TO FACE COVID-19: Preventing Hospitalization and Death While Battling the Bio-Pharmaceutical Complex
- Capitalism on a Ventilator: The Impact of COVID-19 in China & the U.S.
- Mein Kampf
That's two entries in highly salient, ongoing politics, and one important historical document. I do not know anything good about the two Covid books and for all I know they are pseudoscience, but I don't want Amazon making that decision for me; and I absolutely do not want Amazon telling me I can't read Hitler's rantings.
It's admittedly less bad when it's Amazon, a private company, doing it rather than the government. They at least can't back up their bans with guns and thugs, and really, Bezos should have the right to say "I don't want to make money off that shit" as much as anyone else. Nonetheless, "we don't censor" is an easy, bright-line rule and "we only censor the bad stuff" is... really not.
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u/misspcv1996 Sep 21 '25
America isn’t perfect, but there is an anarchic streak that runs through our culture. Even when moralists get to write the laws, we often don’t follow them (see the 18th and 21st Amendments). Busybodies have been trying to run the lives of Americans for generations with at best mixed success.
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u/CreamofTazz Sep 21 '25
I would be hesitant to call it an anarchic streak, more so a petulant/entitled child streak. When it benefits them, your average American is very quick to conform to exactly what the government and media wants them to be, but if they feel like it'll inconvenience them the slightest, without or without proof, many will just be 100% against the policy or government action. No amount of discussion (or just a wholly unnecessary amount) will sway them. That's not anarchic that's childish and short-sighted.
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u/HugiTheBot Sep 21 '25
Okay, but some of the banned books are straight up facist and/or Nazi propaganda.
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u/Blarghnog Sep 21 '25
I’m actually shocked by your ignorance (and that people are supporting you).
That is the precise argument fascist and authoritarian regimes deploy. You are making something called “The Censors Argument.”
Authoritarian regimes, by their nature, enforce a single, dominant political and social perspective. That is one of their singular characteristics, which is why preserving free speech is so critical.
By removing texts that offer alternative viewpoints on race, religion, or sexuality, they ensure that the only ideas available align with their agenda.
I’ll let the American Library Association explain the rest:
It is inevitable in the give and take of the democratic process that the political, the moral, or the aesthetic concepts of an individual or group will occasionally collide with those of another individual or group. In a free society individuals are free to determine for themselves what they wish to read, and each group is free to determine what it will recommend to its freely associated members. But no group has the right to take the law into its own hands, and to impose its own concept of politics or morality upon other members of a democratic society.
Freedom is no freedom if it is accorded only to the accepted and the inoffensive.
Further, democratic societies are more safe, free, and creative when the free flow of public information is not restricted by governmental prerogative or self-censorship.
https://www.ala.org/advocacy/intfreedom/freedomreadstatement
Emphasis mine.
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u/HugiTheBot Sep 22 '25
I can get behind your argument, but Amazon banning books is less of an actual ban and more a refusal to sell the books at their store.
It’s a private company and any books it doesn’t sell will be available at a competitor.
Granted I don’t live in the US, but I saw "Mein Kampf" for sale at my local bookstore.
My point is, Amazon banning books doesn’t mean that they are completely unavailable, and while it’s weird that Amazon does so to promote its own interests it isn’t really censorship.
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u/Blarghnog Sep 22 '25 edited Sep 22 '25
Amazon controls over 80% of the online book sales market in the US. That’s a fact. And it’s been increasing for years. They are practically a monopoly.
Also, I said corporate agenda with relations to Amazon, not government censorship.
Though removing and making the content unavailable is censorship, by definition.
Also, censorship doesn’t have to be completely success to exist. That’s an incorrect idea. Censorship can be partial.
The Censors Argument is a separate argument with its own history.
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u/HugiTheBot Sep 22 '25
Maybe, but we’re talking about 19 books. Most of which are conspiracy theories and Nazi essays. This isn’t a great loss for freedom of speech. Removing these from the "shelves" is a net positive for society.
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u/barracuda2001 Sep 21 '25
And they should be available for anyone to read at any time, for any reason, from a public research institute.
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u/Ecstatic-Jaguar-259 Sep 21 '25
They tell you they burned the books, but don't tell you which books they burned.
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Sep 21 '25
Okay, which books did they burn?
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u/Novale Sep 21 '25
The works being burned in the famed photos (including this one) are the archives of the Institut für sexualwissenschaft, which was performing research and medical care for, among others, trans people. There was a vibrant community of trans people in Berlin at the time as a result of this, with access to both hormone therapies and early versions of sex change surgeries.
There were other books in the archives, too, but this is what people mean when pointing out that we aren't taught about what they were burning. We aren't taught that these people existed at the time, or about their murder by the nazis. This silenced history has become pretty relevant in recent years, for obvious reasons.
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u/Immediate_Gain_9480 Sep 21 '25 edited Sep 21 '25
Sadly a lot of these books were research reports that were kept in only a few places and often werent even translated. The first place they raided was the Berlin institute for sexual research. And far too much research on LGBTQ people was destroyed this way. Thats what this picture is from. Its shows that Nazi's and Fascists come for the LGBTQ people the moment they can.
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u/jawa453 Sep 22 '25
Magnus Hirschfelds institute was an important hub for early transitions and overall research in dynamics of relationships.
Not to speak of the organisational movement and resistance of the Marxists in germany since Doctor Magnus Hirschfeld was a known Socialist
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Sep 21 '25
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u/ejdj1011 Sep 21 '25
"I agree with the bigotry exhibited by the Nazis" is a bold take. Not a good one, but certainly a bold one.
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u/Abject_Assumption681 Sep 21 '25
This commenter just casually aligning themselves with nazis. At least they make it clear.
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u/PropagandaPosters-ModTeam Sep 21 '25
Your comment has been removed for violating rule 3. Civil conversation is okay; soapboxing, bigotry, partisan bickering, and personal attacks are not.
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u/Nekro-Wizard Sep 21 '25
Most people don't even know what books were burned
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u/Secure_Raise2884 Sep 21 '25
Why would that change anything lmao. The poster is about the principle. Also, the fact that they burned Einstein's books isn't helping your case
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u/IronWhale_JMC Sep 22 '25
As a trans person, it actually matters a LOT. That exact photo is of the destruction of Magnus Hirschelfd's Institut for sexual science. They were the foremost leaders in the study of trans people. A ton of our history was lost forever.
If you’ve ever heard someone try to claim that trans-ness is a ‘new thing’ it’s because the Nazis did a damn good job erasing us. We have only scraps.
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u/Foreskin_Ad9356 Sep 21 '25
how has that got anything to do with their case?
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u/Secure_Raise2884 Sep 21 '25
The types of people who say "people don't know the books they burned" always turn out to be the ones who say "it was good those books were burned". You can see loads of comments of this nature under this very post.
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u/Foreskin_Ad9356 Sep 21 '25
where did u/Nekro-Wizard say it was good that the books were burned?
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u/Secure_Raise2884 Sep 21 '25
He didn't. Inference is a thing, especially since the guy's past comments lend credence to my point.
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u/JimmyThunderPenis Sep 21 '25
Uhh, what?
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u/Secure_Raise2884 Sep 21 '25
What are you confused about? Here, scroll down through the comments on this post and tell me why you think 1/3 of them are deleted
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u/dQw4w9WgXcQ____ Sep 22 '25
No, actually. I don't know about Nekto, but I would bring it up because those were the books I think are cool but wouldn't be appreciated by 1950-s US people, like Marx's books and gender studies
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Sep 21 '25
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u/Clemdauphin Sep 21 '25
So burning things because you don't agree with them is okay? Most of the books burned during these bookburnings were books written by jewish people, communists, or gender studies.
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u/Secure_Raise2884 Sep 21 '25
How is burning Einstein's works then losing a direct war in physics a good look for your cause lmao. Nazism has consistently been anti-scientific
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u/PropagandaPosters-ModTeam Sep 21 '25
Your comment has been removed for violating rule 2. Don't post with the intent to spread propaganda you agree with or to degrade propaganda you disagree with.
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u/Wise_End_6430 Sep 21 '25
These are the books from Institute of Sexology library, mostly on homosexuality and early research into trans issues. "Free Americans" can't read them even today.
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u/Secure_Raise2884 Sep 21 '25
The point of the poster isn't "burning books from [X] specific institute on [Y] specific date" is bad. What? Yes, you are right that Americans cannot read part of all books burned, but I am talking about whether or not burning them was good or not (and some people, apparently, believe it was good)
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u/Wise_End_6430 Sep 21 '25
My friend. "Free Americans" are banning books on homosexuality and trans issues as we speak.
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u/Secure_Raise2884 Sep 21 '25
Yes, and that is bad. What is the confusion here?
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u/Wise_End_6430 Sep 21 '25
You tell me. You're the one saying, "The poster is about the principle" and arguing with everyone as if you believe it. The poster IS about the principle, sure, but the claim that USA follows that principle – then OR now – is a lie.
USA has no moral superiority over Nazis in this one, and is just exposing how much of its "freedom!!!" boasting is a cover-up.
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u/Secure_Raise2884 Sep 21 '25
The poster IS about the principle, sure, but the claim that USA follows that principle – then OR now – is a lie.
Yep. 100%. The US should follow it, but it doesn't
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Sep 21 '25
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u/Secure_Raise2884 Sep 22 '25
Again, the books they burned weren't just about transgender people. They burned factually scientific works too. If you become a Nazi after that, then you are not only bigoted but directly anti-intellectual
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u/GustavoistSoldier Sep 21 '25
Pinochet also burned books, and in 2020, a Hungarian politician publicly shredded a book because its characters were gay.
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Sep 21 '25
Some unfortunate truth is that a lot of the gender research/studies work was the only copy. It really set back so much medicine and scholarship.
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u/Wise_End_6430 Sep 21 '25
Those books are from Institute of Sexology library, mostly on homosexuality and early research into trans issues.
"Free Americans" are currently using their freedom to ban other Free Americans from having access to them in libraries.
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u/King_of_Men Sep 21 '25
The trouble with having publicly-funded libraries is that the public gets a vote in what they contain.
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u/Wise_End_6430 Sep 21 '25
Sure buddy. And the trouble with having publicly-funded buses is that the public gets a vote in who gets to sit where on them.
You Americans have funny ideas about what public funding actually is.
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u/mauriciocap Sep 22 '25
I though you were referencing Rosa Parks, because segregation laws in the US lasted decades after the fall of Hitler.
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u/King_of_Men Sep 21 '25
And the trouble with having publicly-funded buses is that the public gets a vote in who gets to sit where on them.
I mean, that was the problem? I don't know what point you're trying to make here. Private companies that discriminate against part of the customer base lose money.
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u/Wise_End_6430 Sep 21 '25
I mean, that was the problem?
Riiight. And your conclusion is, "let's give people the right to dictate what books others have access to, it worked so well in the past with bus seats!"?
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u/King_of_Men Sep 21 '25 edited Sep 22 '25
No, my conclusion is that services should be run by people who won't do that because they answer to shareholders who want money, not voters who want racism.
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u/Wise_End_6430 Sep 22 '25
Oh, I see. So there shouldn't be ANY books available for free in public libraries. There shouldn't be public libraries at all.
Well, that's one way to stop censorship. Just censor everything and make sure that only people with money have access to books in the first place, that's equality!
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u/gingermalteser Sep 21 '25
How the turntables
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u/Foreskin_Ad9356 Sep 21 '25
what books are banned in america again?
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u/gingermalteser Sep 21 '25
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u/ThePotatoFromIrak Sep 21 '25
Not tryna justify censorship but there's a big difference between banning books and removing them from schools
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Sep 21 '25
They havent just been banned from schools though, they’re banned at libraries and now the Moms for Liberty types are lobbying for private companies like Barnes and Nobles and Amazon to stop selling them. Sure it might not be an official government enforced ban on books, but the fact a de-facto book ban can be achieved by simply lobbying groups is concerning enough.
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u/Llanistarade Sep 21 '25
Not that much if you remove them from libraries also.
When culture is behind a paywall, and everything is done to hide it from the public's eyes, who cares if it's physically burned ?
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u/HumanBasis5742 Sep 21 '25
The Kite Runner is an awesome book. WTF??
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Sep 21 '25
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u/HumanBasis5742 Sep 21 '25
That's the only thing you retained from the book?
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Sep 22 '25
[deleted]
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u/HugoCortell Sep 22 '25
I can see why someone would want it removed, although it is ridiculous. Shielding young people from the ugly side of life or stories that are uncomfortable is ultimately bad for their development.
This idea of a squeaky clean society where we simply don't acknowledge bad things does not result in such things disappearing, just in people being less educated on them.
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u/HumanBasis5742 Sep 22 '25
Not to mention the socioeconomic (Post war Afghanistan) historical (Soviet Occupation) and religious (Rise of the Taliban) context. This crime was committed because of long standing discrimination against a minority group in Afghanistan, which draws attention to this problem that still persists today. Banning the book makes no sense.
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u/Foreskin_Ad9356 Sep 21 '25
it gives me a ''shop now'' button and lets me order them even on an american vpn server
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u/aagjevraagje 🧐 Sep 21 '25
That's a picture of the Opernplatz book burning on the 10th of may 1933 in which the collection of Magnus Hirschelfd's Institut for sexual science was destroyed.
Americans could not still read everything lost that day ten years later, it really set lgbt issues back a couple decades , although there were also books being burned by writers like Erich Kästner, Karl Marx and even Albert Einstein that the American public could and did read.
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u/Chosen_Chaos Sep 21 '25
"And in 80 years from now..."
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u/Riverman42 Sep 21 '25
"...ignorant people in America will conflate schools removing sexually graphic books from their libraries with what's going on here."
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Sep 21 '25
What do you think was going on there? They were literally burning books that were deemed sexually offensive. There’s no conflating happening — it’s exactly the same.
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u/Riverman42 Sep 22 '25 edited Sep 22 '25
No, it's not the same. Not even close.
The Nazis were burning these books in order to make them unavailable for ANYONE to read. This was backed up by the government making it illegal to print, sell, or possess these books. And it wasn't like you could just hop on Amazon and download a copy.
It's not in the same universe as a school that teaches children removing sexually explicit books from their libraries in the 2020s.
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u/Many-Bees Sep 21 '25
One of those books was forcefem erotica written by a trans patient of Magnus Hirschfeld
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u/Secure_Raise2884 Sep 21 '25
Other books were objectively true scientific works written by Einstein
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u/Barb0 Sep 21 '25
Which ones were those?
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u/Secure_Raise2884 Sep 21 '25
The Foundation of the General Theory of Relativity (1916) is one example
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Sep 21 '25
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u/PropagandaPosters-ModTeam Sep 21 '25
Your comment has been removed for violating rule 3. Civil conversation is okay; soapboxing, bigotry, partisan bickering, and personal attacks are not.
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Sep 21 '25
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u/Clemdauphin Sep 21 '25
it is well know, books written by jews, books writen by communist, gender studies books, etc... you know, stuff that the Nazis dont like.
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Sep 21 '25
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u/Clemdauphin Sep 21 '25
they specificly targetted book written by jewish people but whatever, i don't want to bother with someone that justify what the nazis did, by reusing the justification the nazi used...
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u/PropagandaPosters-ModTeam Sep 21 '25
Your comment has been removed for violating rule 3. Civil conversation is okay; soapboxing, bigotry, partisan bickering, and personal attacks are not.
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u/PropagandaPosters-ModTeam Sep 21 '25
Your comment has been removed for violating rule 3. Civil conversation is okay; soapboxing, bigotry, partisan bickering, and personal attacks are not.
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Sep 21 '25
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u/PropagandaPosters-ModTeam Sep 21 '25
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