School Debate - Was Hitler Insane?

Maybe you should go for the "If it's a crime" defence.

"If it's a crime to love your country, then my client is guilty. If it's a crime to want what's best for the citizens of your country, then my client is guilty. If it's a crime to violate the sovereignt- wait, forget I said that bit."

"And if its a crime to bribe a jury, I'll soon be guilty of that too!"
 
No, he was not insane (though his mental state did break down during his final year), in fact, he knew exactly what he was doing.

Well, according to the LEGAL definition of insanity, he might very well HAVE been insane. He seems to have been convinced that murdering every Jew in the world was the right thing to do, and apparently had no moral qualms about doing that. That could be argued to demonstrate an incapacity to know right from wrong.

On the other hand, there is some evidence that he may have tried to maintain some "plausible deniabilty" with regard to the Holocaust (although it is unclear whether that came from Hitler himself or from his underlings who were fearful of being caught holding the bag if the war didn't turn out so well). So that could be evidence that he DID know it was wrong, and chose to do it anyway.
 
"Pet the Dog" is a TVTrope for a villain doing nice things. I was mostly thinking about his relationship with his secretary--apparently he was a surrogate father to her--than anything involving a real dog.
Oh I thought you were referring at least partially to his dog Blondi to which he was supposedly rather fond of.

I'm also not convinced Tony Soprano and his ilk are -paths either, although I'm not familiar enough with the show and the characters to make any kind of substantive judgement. IMO violating social standards aren't enough, since in the antebellum South, one could claim abolitionists were psychopaths based on that alone.
Part of the problem with Psychology is there are so many gray areas that are very much open to interpretation and personal opinion. Which is why you'll often have expert witnesses on opposing sides who testify to completely different conclusions.

About the "third option," by that standard ANYONE could be a psychopath who's gotten good at "pretending." The only one who could objectively say someone is a psychopath or not is a telepath (who can see into their mind) or God Himself (who knows all things).
Actually there has been some success in monitoring brain activity to emotional stimuli to tell if someone is "faking" emotions. There even was a court case several years back where a mother accused the father during a custody battle of being a pedophile. In order to prove his innocent he allowed a university to conduct a test of his neural responses to to sexual stimuli which did end up showing he wasn't aroused by children. IIRC he won his court case largely because of it. But as you say anyone can try to get off an insanity defense which is exactly the case that prosecutors sell the jury and far more often than not juries agree.
 

Bearcat

Banned
On the other hand, there is some evidence that he may have tried to maintain some "plausible deniabilty" with regard to the Holocaust (although it is unclear whether that came from Hitler himself or from his underlings who were fearful of being caught holding the bag if the war didn't turn out so well). So that could be evidence that he DID know it was wrong, and chose to do it anyway.

By American justice standards, that's probably enough evidence of legally being able to understand the illegality of his acts to earn Adolph a needle.

Evil, yes. Irrational, yes. Obsessive, yes. Criminally insane, no.
 
Well, according to the LEGAL definition of insanity, he might very well HAVE been insane. He seems to have been convinced that murdering every Jew in the world was the right thing to do, and apparently had no moral qualms about doing that. That could be argued to demonstrate an incapacity to know right from wrong.

On the other hand, there is some evidence that he may have tried to maintain some "plausible deniabilty" with regard to the Holocaust (although it is unclear whether that came from Hitler himself or from his underlings who were fearful of being caught holding the bag if the war didn't turn out so well). So that could be evidence that he DID know it was wrong, and chose to do it anyway.
Even if he personally did not see it as being wrong it wouldn't have been enough save him. If I were trying to counter his insanity defense I'd present the fact that he clearly demonstrated an awarness of the social contract when he backed down from his early efforts to "cleanse" the mentally handicapped resulted in a public outcry which shows he had an awareness of the opinions of others and the ability to moderate his behavior and decisions in response to them. And as you say a cover up is also pretty damning because you don't try to cover up something unless you feel someone will see it as being wrong.
 
I think it depends on WHEN you evaluate his mental state... in the 1920's and 30's he may have had some low level paranoia, inferiority complex, and a really weird relationship with his neice... that said, he spoke cohearantly, was a gifted public speaker and highly adept politician and political operator. Even into the early stages of the war, many generals (including those who disagreed with him bitterly in the later years, notably Manstein and Guderian but many others as well) commented that he had an astonishing memory for detail, and was able to recite impressive and complex economic figures just as easily as he could find the best place to site an 88mm gun or learn how a new aircraft engine would perform

From the winter of '41 on he steadily deteriorated into massive paranoia, sczitzophrenia, increased delusions, hearing voices, irrational fear etc... now this wasn't a constant inverted V decent into madness... he was still quite cogent even into late '43 and could make reasoned arguements with people and at least listen to counter arguements... but from then on, especially after july '44 he went off the deep end, suffering from his allready existing symptoms plus new ones that debilitated him mentally and physically

so the question becomes what went wrong with him after 1941... there are a lot of conjectures that have been put out there by historians and theorists:

1. His personal doctors, Morell and Stumpfegger injected him with all kinds of stimulants, sleeping agents, and mercury based quack recipes that altered his chemical balance... this was undoubtedly true, and has been coroberated by numerous witenesses...IMO it explains partially why he got so much worse towards the end, but I don't think it adequately explains his orginal problems
2. PTSD... this has been offered based on his impressive WW1 service, the death of his neice, and the WW2 war effort falling apart... its possible this had some effect, but then again he seems to have been damn paranoid his whole life
3. A physical illness either a brain tumor, or advanced syphillis...again its possible but was never conclusively proven... although after '44 he had all the well known symptoms of Parkinson's disease
 
Thank you for all those replies! I know that this topic is kinda sensitive so to me, placing it in either PolChat or keeping it here doesn't matter.

As well, I believe that most people here agree that my group should focus on defending on the basis that he is Medically Unfit for Trial, which is what we are going to do alongside our arguments that his behaviors which were akin to a mixture of Schizophrenia, Asperger, Bipolar-disorder etc. affected his judgment.

Also, I stumbled upon two psychological analysis of Hitler which would become invaluable in the trial.

Lastly, yes, its a Highschool debate. :)
 

DAMIENEVIL

Banned
If this trial had taken place with Hitler able to stand trial there would be alot of historical ramifications.

How many people in The World at the time thought the jews should be wiped out. He might be able to successfully argue he was doing the world a favour. You never do ever see his major reason for wanting the jews and all the others gone. He also could argue against the fact that if he was guilty of these so called crimes how come the the US government or the British were not guilty of the same crimes ie the (Natives and the Boers) Or the Soviets for that matter for their labour camps. He was not Insane he knew exactly what he was doing. Also Since none of Hitlers ideas were original to him but others ideas incorporated into his belief structure.
 
Top