Bryan Fischer's revisionist history of Hitler exposed.

On May 25, 2010 (I know, this is actually relatively “old” news in September) – Bryan Fischer went off the deep end on his radio show, equating Hitler with atheism and homosexuality. The video clip was removed from youtube as a “terms of use” violation, without a specification as to the type of “terms of use” violation. I found it on another source. The use here of this video clip is a legitimate “fair use” – neither Fischer nor his organization is entitled to claim a copyright violation for the use of the video clip:



To the extent that the clip might be deemed to be “offensive” – the usage here is to prove just how offensive to reason and sanity Bryan Fischer really is – in his own words.

At least it’s clear that he loses on the basis of Godwin’s Law, alone, for being the first to bring up “Hitler” or “Nazi.”

Serendipitously, my friend Zoe Brain came up with the refutation for Fischer’s wingnuttery in a recent blog post of hers – apparently in response to an entirely different issue (involving the Pope, the Roman Catholic Church pedophilia coveruup, and Joseph Ratzinger’s membership in the Hitler Youth), but the parts that refute Bryan Fischer are reproduced below;
Zoe’s entire post is here.

Below is the results of Zoe’s research that are relevant to Bryan Fischer’s:

But I thought a former member of the Hitler Youth [JP note: i.e., Benedict XVI] would have recalled some of Der Fuehrer's speeches on the subject. Words such as:

"We have put an end to denial of God and abuse of religion."

-- Radio address October 14, 1933

National Socialism neither opposes the Church nor is it anti-religious,
but on the contrary, it stands on the ground of a real Christianity. The
Church's interests cannot fail to coincide with ours alike in our fight against
the symptoms of degeneracy in the world of to-day, in our fight against the
Bolshevist culture, against an atheistic movement, against criminality, and in
our struggle for the consciousness of a community in our national life, for the
conquest of hatred and disunion between the classes, for the conquest of civil
war and unrest, of strife and discord. These are not anti-Christian, these are
Christian principles

-- Koblenz speech, August 26, 1934

Secular schools can never be tolerated because such schools have no
religious instruction, and a general moral instruction without a religious
foundation is built on air; consequently, all character training and religion
must be derived from faith."

That one's in the Vatican Archives. It's part of the Vatican-Nazi
Konkordat of April 26, 1933

As the Nazi State Labour Leader, Reichsarbeitsführer Robert Ley proclaimed:

We believe that there is a Lord - God in heaven, who created us, who leads
us, who directs us and who blesses us visibly. And we believe that this Lord—God
sent Adolf Hitler to us, so that Germany become a fundament for all eternity.

-- NS-Schulungsbriefe, Heft 4/1937.

Thanks for the research, Zoe! I don’t think I know anyone who has her level of positive credibility.

Hitler may or may not have been a “practicing” Catholic as an adult, but he was never officially excommunicated, either. Certainly Pius XII did not do a great deal to oppose Nazi policies. I am not entirely sure whether Bryan Fischer might recognize Roman Catholics as Christians (there are some ignorant Christianists who don’t understand that “Christian” is not limited to the “born again” crowd. It’s hard to tell where Fischer might fall on that issue without a smoking gun).

Is there anything Bryan Fischer is not willing to lie about?

The fact is that there were gay men in Hitler's early retinue of brownshirts. But Fischer's characterization is off the mark. Not all brownshirts were gay. Hitler brutally purged them as he gained in power. The Third Reich made a really big thing about "family values" - and like the Duggars and their "quiver full," to increase the number of Christians, "Aryan" German women were expected to make many babies to strengthen the Reich.

See, for example this site for a summary of Nazi ideology. While there was an "elite" Nazi subculture that encouraged a Greek-style Platonic homosexuality (much as one used to, and still can sometimes find in the Roman Catholic hierarchy, such as with Pius XII and his protege Francis Cardinal Spellman, though the *pedophile* problem is not related to this subculture), the German people were expected to have "Strength, passion, lack of hypocrisy, utilitarianism, traditional family values, and devotion to community," and gays who were not part of the elite were persecuted (much as in Christianist circles - where closeted gay but officiallty "anti-homosexual" preachers, when caught, will seek forgiveness and just get more careful not to get caught).

The biggest problem with Fischer's attempt to make it seem that homosexuality is evil because it was associated with Nazi ideology, and that some of Hitler's gay associates were brutal. Many of his straight associates were just as brutal.

Should we condemn all Christianist Dominionists because some of the more virulent and hate-filled ones turn out to be gay? No - Christianist Dominionism is evil in and of itself, regardless of the sexual orientation of the preachers.

Should we condemn Roman Catholicism because there are gays in the hierarchy? No, the Roman Catholic Church does a fairly good job at claiming that morally evil things are good without having to look at the sexual orientation of the members of the hierarchy.

Should we condemn McCarthyism because J. Edgar Hoover and Roy Cohn were gay?

See this site for some interesting discussion of gay McCarthyites.

McCarthyism was evil regardless of the sexual orientation of the people involved in the witch hunts and purges.

Bryan Fischer is, as usual, lying, and taking things out of context to prove something about gay being evil. All he does is prove, once again, that he has only the most tenuous connection with reality.