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#1 - Compare and contrast Triumph des Willens and Why We Fight #1: Prelude to War (1943). Both are linked to the WWII page on my website. You can address cinematic style, messages, psychological appeals or other elements employed by 2 of the most influential producers of the period, Leni Riefenstahl and Frank Capra.
#2 - Watch Inside the Mind of Hitler. What did you find most interesting or disturbing about Dr. Langer's psycho-analysis of Hitler? Be sure to support your views with specific references to the video. What about Langer's conclusions?
Due Friday 5/25 by NOON.
63 comments:
When Dr. Walter Langer was first commissioned by the Secret Serivce of the United States to examine the psychological midst of Adolf Hitler, even he doubted the possibilities of this seemingly insurmountable task. Shockingly, after a mere five months of research and observation, Langer was able to make predictions that rang true in the last two years of the war, including Hitler's suicide. Hitler's near text book fit with many complexes and psychological conditions was what I found most intriguing about the investigation. Despite never meeting Hitler and having to rely heavily on accounts and documents that may have contained bias, Langer was able to create a psychological profile to encompass nearly all facets of his personality. Hitler was a man of many contradictions, but Langer was able to riddle out Hitler's sexual perversions as well as his incomprehensible confidence. The Messiah complex was one part of Hitler's persona that I never considered. Hitler's poor health as a child and the deaths of his three brothers before his birth had a profound impact on him, an impact profound enough to lead him to believe that he was under divine protection and that he had been selected to live in order to fulfill a special purpose. The Christ that Hitler compared himself too however was not the caring and generous God of popular Christianity today; Hitler pictured himself as Christ the fighter, who had to save himself and defend himself from the Jews. I never knew Hitler to be a man of religious convictions, and furthermore I never knew that Hitler paralleled himself with Christ. That no one questioned these startling assumptions and beliefs is even more surprising to me. The idea that Hitler's crusade was based in the belief that God had bestowed a mission upon him adds a completely new aspect to his political ideologies. Langer's psycho-analysis was deeply personal considering Hitler himself was never examine, and the idea that Hitler's adult actions all stem from the misgivings of his childhood, especially a possible mishap in the toilet-training phase, had me in disbelief, but Langer's ultimate predictions showed me that his science was a valid one.
As mentioned before, Langer was able to predict that Hitler would withdraw from the public spotlight when criticism increased at the end of the war. Langer made his predictions when Germany was still doing fairly well in the war, and he had no real indications of Hitler's behavior in the event of German failure. Logical conclusions pointed to Hitler spending more time in the public spotlight to keep up his "cult of personality", but Hitler followed Langer's predictions and became more and more reclusive as Germany began to fall. Historians, who believe that military, political, and other factors must be considered when making predictions call Langer's guesses a simple matter of luck, and they may be right, but Langer was able to provide justification for his assumptions and explain a greta deal about Hitler's mental state. Luck probably was a factor in Langer's successful conclusions, and the text book nature of Hitler's psychological conditions also helped Langer's case, but the fact that he was able to make multiple predictions that proved true remains impressive.
The question I did was number two. I found it very interesting that by psychoanalyzing Hitler they were able to predict many of his actions such as his suicide. Also I found that some of the reasons for them wanting to psychoanalyze Hitler to be interesting, one of the main reasons being that the germens were developing missiles that could launch nuclear and biological attacks. I also found Dr. Langer’s initial lack of confidence that they could get a good psychological analysis of Hitler. I also found it interesting that the video said that Hitler’s ideas represented a good number of the people which lead to his rise to power. I also found it interesting that the team that analyzed Hitler in the Freudian approach despite the lack of information but they were still able to create a good profile of Hitler using this approach. Hitler seemed extremely crazy especially in regards to his mother. But what the team that this team did is extremely impressive given their limited information. This was a very amazing case and probably made many leaps forward for his field.
Hitler’s many complexes and psychological issues were definitely the most fascinating find from Dr. Walter Langer’s investigation. His psychological profile so accurate and was able to predict his death, even though Langer never had the ability to meet Hitler but had to rely on accounts and documents about him. For instance, his messiah complex was formed due to his life history. He had poor health as a child, but managed to survive when his older brothers died preceding his birth. He had a “divine protection” because God had given him a mission. This concept of Hitler being a religious man was startling, but Langer made it clear that he did not associate himself with the generous aspect of Christ but rather a defender: a defender of good blood and protecting his kin from Jews. Furthermore Langer predicted Hitler’s actions at the end of the war, at a point where there was no reason to think Germany would lose the war. As criticism increased from Germany Hitler would withdraw from public view, this proved to be true as Hitler gradually spent less time in public in consequence with Germany’s decline. Langer’s predictions have proven themselves accurate which is notable, however they have been considered guesses by historians.
Inside the Mind of Hitler presents an important history of WWII as well as the psycho-analysis of Adolf Hitler by Dr. Langer. Dr. Langer was commissioned to psycho-analyze Hitler so that the Allied Powers could predict was his next moves would be in the upcoming events in the war. In only 5 months he was able to accurately predict Hitler’s actions that lead to his demise. There were many intriguing parts of Langer’s psycho-analysis of Hitler, including his love for his mother after being brutally beaten by his father, his apparent asexual nature with his mistress Eva Braun, as well as the disturbing accounts of his love for his niece. This information is essential to knowing who Hitler really was, because Langer believed that the essence of his character was created in his childhood. Since he was torn with the fear of his abusive father and an untimely death like his weak brothers before him, he was often overly loving of his mother and idolized her. When she died from breast cancer he was said to be in extreme grief, and later during his reign he placed Nazi propaganda on her grave and made it like a shrine. According to this information, Langer was able to make many important conclusions. He said that Hitler would have more temper flares as he began to lose the war, one in his own command would try and kill him, he would speak less to the public when they began to turn on him, and he would eventually commit suicide. It is amazing that all of these predictions came true, and luckily for the allies they did. This film was a great way to really see inside the mind of Hitler and it's good to know all major public figures are psycho-analyzed like Hitler was so nothing like the Holocaust could ever happen again.
What I found most disturbing on Dr. Langer’s psychoanalysis of Hitler is Hitler’s sexual fantasies and actions. One part of the video was devoted to analyzing Hitler’s sexual acts with his niece, whom he requested to urinate on his face for sexual pleasure. The conclusion of this is that Hitler’s desire to be sexually humiliated by a woman reveals his true inner weak being. That the strong leader and speaker of Nazism was only a mask and this sexual act revealed that internally Hitler is really a weak and abused person, whom he secretly was. And as a defense mechanism against his own flaws, which he hated, he used projection, the rejection of his own flaws and attributing them in others, and persecuting them, and denying to face his own problems. What later intrigued me was how Dr. Langer eventually came to be able to make predictions of Hitler’s future actions before they happened only by looking at the patterns and the consequences of the psychological damage done to Hitler when he was younger and what was gradually crippling him. Langer was able to predict that Hitler will reduce the amount of public appearances due to a growing critical crowd, that Hitler will become reclusive and not make any peace negotiations, leading to the total destruction of Germany, and that Hitler will commit suicide. All of which came true.
I watched Inside the Mind of Hitler. This documentary was very interesting in the methods it presented info about the psycho-analysis studies done on Hitler 3 years before the end of the war. I found much of the physiological methods of analyzing a person to be particularly interesting. The specific example used in this documentary was the Freudian method. Their analysis of Hitler proved to be surprisingly accurate. So an example I was surprised about was the prediction that he would seclude himself towards a more critical society. I personally thought, based on sound logic that he would start rallying the people as he did during his meteoric rise. Hitler seemed to fit awkwardly yet perfectly into many of the predefined complexes and his actions seemed to me easy to predict with that information. Plots against Hitler and his suicide were both also predicted. The action by the US CIA seemed to have been worthwhile.
However I was disgusted by Hitler’s sexual action. Langer made an analysis with the relationship between Ava and Hitler, and proved that Hitler was not the same as a normal person sexually which was shown through the actions between Hitler and his nephew. I was disgusted when I found out Hitler forced his nephew to urinate on him. I believe too that this does shows that Hitler is weak and desires to be sexually humiliated.
To say Adolf Hitler was a very disturbed person would be an understatement. He was the extreme. Almost to the point where the word human couldn't be used to describe him, rather satan would be more adequate.So, a typical question is "how can a person become like this?" or "how did a person become like this?". Dr. Walter Langer provides the answer in his psycho-analysis of Hitler as seen in Inside the Mind of Hitler. What I found most interesting was the fact that Hitler's childhood doctor was Jewish. In the show, Langer interviews Dr. Boch on his caretaking of Hitler in his youth. One thing Langer pointed out was the fact that he was Jewish. What I don't understand is how could he have turned against the Jews when the man who took care of him as a child was in fact Jewish. It also brings up the question of whether him having to tell Hitler of his mother's timely death has any correlation to his hatred of Jews. Since he had such a close relationship to his mother, to the point that being with her was "like paradise" to him, it seems as if his hatred towards the world was focused on the people associated to the man that brought the horrible news of her death upon him. It's an interesting thought. What came as the most perturbing to me in Langer's analysis was Hitler's sexual life and how he got his sexual pleasures. The fact that he had a "very close" relationship with his niece was in itself beyond creepy, but what he made her do to please him was revolting on all levels. How can someone get satisfaction with urine all over them? This just proving that he is one messed up character, to say the least.
I am very impressed with how spot on Langer's conclusions were. Merely 2 years after he predicted that Hitler would commit suicide, it became truth. He clearly mastered the art of psycho-analysis. Also, I think he is right about his statement that if he had completed the profile earlier earlier there wouldn't have been a Munich Conference. Chamberlain had no clue how messed up Hitler really was and if he had known that he was that power hungry and disturbed, they probably wouldn't have wasted any time with trying to appease him.
Overall, Langer's analysis of Hitler was very interesting and gave me a deeper understanding of the infamous Hitler. He was the embodyment of evil, not to mention the fact that he had one of the most obnoxious mustache's in history! Either grow it all out or shave it off bud!
Response #2
The part of the documentary that I found most disturbing about the documentary was the extent of the mental repercussions that Hitler received from missing the toilet training period of his childhood. When the psychologists mentioned that Hitler had missed his toilet training period, my brother and I, who were both watching the documentary, burst out laughing. At first it sounded ridiculous that something so silly could have such mental repercussions, but as the video went on, the claims started to make some sense. They were able to make this conclusion from very few details in the first place, which was originally surprising. The psychologists concluded that, because of Hitler’s mother’s obsessive cleanliness, there must have been exceptional pressure on Hitler as a small child when being toilet trained. Through this they were able to conclude that young Hitler was faced with feelings of frustration. These later could lead to feelings of humiliation and destruction that “form the basis for a sadistic character.” The toilet training stage is one of the five Freudian Stages of Childhood, and in the video they explained that missing one of these stages could cause serious repercussions on through adulthood. It made me realize that I should probably read up of Freudian psychology before having children of my own, just to make sure I don’t mess them up somehow. Langer’s conclusions were extremely surprising and accurate. He predicted that, as Germany’s situation in the war worsened, Hitler would appear in public less and less because of the shame he felt for letting down his people. Langer also predicted that Hitler would commit suicide due to the same sense of shame and failure when he felt that he failed Germany. I think that the contributions on Langer’s team are extremely important, especially because they were the beginnings of the political profile branch of the CIA.
I think what Dr. Langer was able to deduce from only five months of work was truly amazing. Langer was able to determine Hitler’s psychiatric make up with out ever having first person contact with the man. Most mental health professionals struggle to understand a person after several day worth of direct contact but Langer was able to create an accurate representation of Hitler’s social make up with questionable secondary information.
This project was mostly a research project and I think it shows the ability and dedication of Langer and his team to be able to find the Hitler family doctor. Then, they were able to use the man to gain useful information about Hitler. This is amazing considering how Hitler used his public image as a shield to hid his true personality. I also think it is interesting how they were able to take events from the past and use those as guides to shape some one's personality. This reminds me of the song “You Have to be Taught to Hate” from South Pacific. Hitler proves the validity of this statement because he was raised by a mother who was fairly normal but his father was aggressive and indirectly taught Hitler to show wrath on those he did not approve of. I found Hitlers sexual fantasies and actions with his niece most disturbing because these are some of his only actions where he is clearly outside of excepted norms along with the murder of the jews.
I think it is amazing as well the clarity of the predictions which Langer and his team made in their conclusions. They predicted that Hitler would die by suicide and would go into recluse as the end approached. I think the ability for the OSS to call on a professional is a representation of why the U.S. won WWII. They were able to get the best from their very diverse country to come together and fight for a common cause.
I think, aside from Hitler's twisted fantasies, the most disturbing thing about Hitler's psyche was that this sadistic man was created as a child. I think that when Langer explained that the reason Hitler turned to using the Jews as a scapegoat to unify the German people as Hitler projecting what he didn't like about himself on others answered an essential question for me. I kept asking myself why the Nazi Regime specifically targeted Jews and with this psychiatric profile it answered so many questions about each of his actions from his targeting of Jews to his aspirations to be simultaneously strong and weak as a man as a result of his childhood, especially his interactions with his parents. Most interesting about this film, to me, is that at the dawn of psychiatric profiling and in five months of difficult research Langer was able to predict Hitler's suicide and reaction the decline of WWII. Hitler, being riddled with complexes, is interesting because of his fears of sexual expression as a result of his castration anxiety, his immense possibly sexual love of his mother as a result of his Oedipus complex, but mostly and most historically relevant his Messiah Complex. It is amazing to me that he derived his confidence and purpose from the fact that he was the one Hitler boy to have not died in childhood. I am in total shock that his fear of embarrassment was derived from his toilet training phase and from this Langer predicted that he would kill himself than find himself in the situation of a failure.
These traits that Langer found in Hitler were essential in the rise of the Nazi party and the creation of a Cult of Personality (Yeah Living Colour!) but were also essential in its ultimate demise and the end of its Führer.
The psychological analysis of Adolf Hitler: Dr. Langer was first presented with a tough job. One sought out to be almost impossible. Putting together a psychological analysis of one of the most insane men at the time period, Adolf Hitler. From the beginning, he expressed his concern of not having enough information and sources. Yet within 5 months of well focused research, he and his team were able to put together a full report. The little amount of time spent on such a mind was astonishing in itself. Especially for the fact that Dr. Langer made several predictions that proved to be true. (for the most part). From its beginnings, the research team made it clear that there are 5 stages of growing up. They were determined to find the one stage that went wrong within Hitlers life. It is said how he had a drunk and abusive father. This abuse is basically what drove young Hitler into the arms of his mother. It was interesting to see a man, who we perceive as all powerful and heartless, put in such a vulnerable position. This was a great stage where Hitler was weak. Dr. Eduard Bloch, spoken with directly, said that Hitler was a weak child. He defined him and his mothers on terms of a "relationship where the reciprocal admiration was unusual". At his mothers death, he grieved greatly, and cried. I again found it interesting to see a completely different side of this all powerful man. Here they found one of Hitlers faults. As they progress, they begin to describe Hitlers interest sexually. I would have to say this was the most disturbing part. They noted how him and his mother lived in a small, extremely clean apartment. Dr. Langer said that an anally personality creates no interest in anything sexual. This would explain Hitler's little sexual activity. It is said that he was asexual, which was supported at the time. He did however pursue some sexual relations with his niece, Ava. This type of incest practice was quite disturbing as well. Especially the extent in which they described it. On another note, it was also interesting to see that his defense mechanism was projection. Where he deemed it necessary to protect his ego and always establish himself as superior. This is where his "messiah" personality came about. Now toward the end of the picture came the predictions. After the close psycho-analysis, Dr. Langer came to the conclusion that Hitler was indeed a psycho-path. With such a personality, he was firm in believe that when the war went against him he would become frequently neurotic. Secondly, an assassination attempt would occur, which proved to be true but failed to kill Hitler. Left him with nothing but injuries and anger. Also, that he will follow a road to immortality and seek vengeance. And lastly that theres a likely possibility that he will commit suicide. The scariest and most disturbing prediction that came true. 2 years later, Hitler sat with Ava, who he previously married the day before, and ingested a pill following up with a bullet to the head. Its scary to think how this analysis paralled to real life. This was disturbing and filled with interesting (surprising) information i never knew before. In the end, Dr. Gerald Post made his claim that a personality profile should be established for any world leader and/or potential threat. Since then, the CIA has profiled every world leader. Technology has improved as well as accumulated knowledge. I cant imagine how exact these profiles are and i see how beneficial they can be.
Dr. Langer discovered many strange facts and behaviors of Hitler in his examinations of various sources. What I found most disturbing was his obsession with his mother. Hitler went a bit too far with his fondness because he ended up seeing his father as a rival for his mother. Even though he definitely had grounds for being afraid of his father because of his countless abuses as a child, it was just odd to see his father as someone interfering with his mother because Hitler was not the one married to his mother. I also found that what he did with his niece, most specifically his sexual fantasies, were extremely weird. He also became jealous when someone went out with one of his relatives. It was interesting to hear that because he was possibly asexual, he had something to hide (based on Langer's hypothesis). Langer's conclusions were nothing I had ever heard before. He told that because of a terrible childhood, Hitler was affected throughout his whole life. In addition, Langer thought that Hitler would become more deranged as the war went on, and he was correct looking back. Finally, Langer guessed that there would be an assassination attempt on Hitler later on because of opposition to his rule. Langer was right about this because it happened a few years after the report. In conclusion, Langer had many correct assumptions about Hitler and his life and behaviors, however crazy they were.
After watching Inside the Mind of Hitler, I have concluded from Doctor Langer’s psycho-analysis, that Hitler’s hateful personality and ruthless actions all stemmed from one simple fact; Hitler was a bully. Although this may seem ridiculous, the foundation of Hitler’s insanity takes root in the simplest aspects of psychology. As a child, Hitler was neglected and abused by his father. The more he was abused, the more he became insecure, and the weaker he became. The death of his brothers caused his weakness to turn into anger as he succumbed to the despair that penetrated his mind. Hitler needed a way out; he wanted to escape his weakness and become stronger. The only way he felt he could do so was to bring down others, which is exactly what had happened to him. If only he could be the superior one and bring down those around, then he could be strong. Through this process he became power-hungry and driven by his own weaknesses and insecurities; he sought to punish others; just as a typical bully would put down others in attempt to accommodate their own insecurities. One of the most appalling and disturbing examples of Hitler’s weakness I came across in Langer’s investigation was that he demanded his niece, Gielley, pee on his face. Apparently this gave Hitler sexual pleasure which I found both shocking and interesting. Because Hitler got pleasure from an act that was completely degrading, it shows how weak his state of mind actually was and just how twisted his thought processes were. It’s almost as if Hitler’s set of morals was completely reversed. Also, one of the most interesting aspects I found from Langer’s psycho-analysis was that Hitler believed he was comparable with the Messiah. Although he was utterly insecure, he had convinced himself that by degrading, humiliating, and ultimately killing others, he would be superior. Because of this warped mind set, Hitler maintained a total complex that he used to justify his actions. Because he was “superior” to the Jews, he believed that they deserved what he was doing to them and could in no way challenge his superiority. Overall, Langer’s investigation incorporates Hitler’s childhood, sexual habits, personalities, and other aspects of Hitler’s life to develop disturbing psychological conclusions and interesting explanations behind his reign of terror.
Almost everything found in the psycho-analysis of Adolf Hitler was pretty disturbing. He was aggressive, disturbed, and insane in many ways, and viewed himself as a savior, in an almost religious sense. But by far the most disturbing, in my opinion, was the sort of sexual behavior Hitler exhibited. According to Sigmund Freud, all behavior exhibited later in life is a product of one’s sexuality. In the study, Hitler was found to have possessed the Oedipus Complex, asexual behavior, and was inconclusively found to have strange sexual pleasures and partake in little sexual activity. According to the family doctor, Adolf had a strangely close and affectionate relationship with his mother. He also had an abusive father. The combination of these led him to exhibit behavior tied to the Oedipus Complex, where he wanted a relationship with his mother, and had aggressive feelings towards his father, and consequently the world around him. Later in life, many of the people around him described him to be asexual, and the overseer of the home Hitler stayed at said that he had never seen any evidence of Hitler and his lover engaging in any sexual behavior. The description about activity he took part in with his niece was particularly disturbing, however unreliable it might have been. He required his niece to expose herself to him and then urinate on him, causing him pleasure, but her disgust. Even if that was an exaggeration from an unreliable source, Hitler was found have a strange relationship with her, and some of the facts are probably true. The culmination of all of these strange behaviors obviously points to an unsteady mind. Langer states that the fear of women was a product of his child, and mother and father, and Hitler’s strange desires showed a weak personality by being humiliated by a woman. All of the failings of Hitler’s youth (no pun intended) led him to have weird sexual obsessions and behaviors, and points to much of the most disturbing and aggressive behavior he showed during his reign.
I personally am extremely interested in the process of profiling human psychology and the entire documentary was extremely interesting. The most interesting part of the psycho-analysis of Hitler was the relationship between Hitler and his mother. The dynamic between them initially is quite understandable, for Hitler was physically abused by his father throughout his childhood. But, into his early years even Hitler’s doctor noticed the strange bond between the two. Hitler felt as though his mother was his protector and savior, whereas Hitler’s mother held him very close for she had lost 3 children prior. The doctor referred to Hitler as a “weak small boy” which gives him all the more reason to confide in and allow his mother to guard him from his father. When Hitler’s mother passes, he proceeded to transform her grave into a Nazi shrine, covering her dead body with memorabilia from his reign. To me, I found this to be very odd because he was showing his mother his success even after she was long gone. This shows how Hitler compensated his psychological weakness with outwardly power and control. The part I found most disturbing about Dr. Langer’s psycho-analysis of Hitler was his perverse tendencies. The description of Hitler’s interactions with his niece was extremely difficult to listen to, and made me feel immensely uncomfortable. According to the description, Hitler made his niece strip, stand on top of him, and then urinate on him. This form of sexual release is absolutely vulgar, but very unique. This made me think back to the conclusion that Langer posed which was Hitler’s “toilet training” part of his life was disturbed, so it would make sense for the act of urination to effect him differently than others. I believe the most surprising of Langer’s conclusions was that he predicted Hitler was going to kill himself 2 years before he committed the act. He predicted an act that which no one at the time would ever have considered; Hitler was at the top of his regime and showed no weakness. It truly shows the credibility to the science of psycho-analyzing and how credible Langer is himself.
Dr. Langer’s psycho-analysis of Hitler was astonishingly accurate, even correctly predicting how he would die years before it happened. To me, the most disturbing aspect of the investigation was Hitler’s relationship with both his mother and his niece. It is both disturbing and fascinating to learn that Hitler’s sadistic personality was created when he was a young child. The violent actions of his father pushed Hitler closer to a mother who adored the only one of her sons who had lived. Hitler is a clear example of Oedipus complex, as he began to see his father as a rival for his mother. Her death greatly affected him. I found Hitler’s relationship with his niece to be absolutely disgusting. He forced her into performances that included her urinating on him. Hitler's sexual perversion was the most disturbing part of the video. Hitler’s twisted psyche aside, I found Dr. Langer’s predictions about his future behavior to be quite interesting. He claimed that Hitler would become more reclusive as Germany began to fall and that eventually he would kill himself. These predictions proved to be correct. Hitler's psycho-analysis proved to be disturbing, and yet I am impressed by Dr. Langer and his ability to create such an accurate profile of such a disturbed man in only five months.
Option #2:
The most interesting thing I found about Dr. Langer’s psycho-analysis of Hitler was how accurate his predictions were of Hitler’s future. The two most surprising predictions were Langer’s find that Hitler was most likely homosexual, and the he would commit suicide. Obviously, the latter came true. Langer backed up his claim that Hitler was homosexual using the fact that he had many feminine characteristics, likely from his childhood, and the abnormal number of homosexual leaders Hitler place in high ranking positions. Another one of Langer’s predictions foretold the demise of Germany, when Germany was still very strong, and the “crumbling” of Germany around Hitler. As the war turned, Hitler retreated from his troops, the opposite of Churchill, who roused his troops when they needed it. He commissioned a “scorched earth” policy, literally burning the German country side, crumbling many buildings and cities. Langer also impacted the far future, by proving that psycho-analysis was a real and effective in determining what foreign leaders will do. Although many historians don’t believe that Langer really predicted all of this, I believe that psycho-analysis is an effective tool in envisaging what others will do.
Response #2:
I watched "Inside the Mind of Hitler", and to be honest, it held my attention the entire time. I have always had a morbid curiosity and fascination with the Holocaust, because I could never figure out what could drive a human to be so inhumane. I completely agree that a person's personality is crucially shaped and effected in their childhood, which is evident through Hitler, as his dad beat him when he was younger.
Something I found weird was when the doctor mentioned Hitler's relationship with his mother- he called it "reciprocal adoration" that was "unusual". That within itself made me wonder. Then it went on to describe how boys who wanted their mother's affection began to see their fathers as rivals for that same attention. That disturbed me. Add to that the speculation that "Hitler was more than an uncle" to his niece, and I was even more grossed out and at the same time, completely interested because it's really unlike anything else I've ever heard.
Langer's conclusions make sense to me; I think he hit the nail on the head every time he deduced something having to do with Hitler's psychiatric state. All of his research in Freudianism gave way to clear answers that fit the description of Hitler's personality to a T. But what really got to me was his prediction of Hitler's suicide, and that led me to believe his conclusions were valid and legitimate.
#2)
For me, the most shocking part of Hitler’s psychoanalysis was the investigation of his relationship with his niece. His sexual drive was really strange, and I’ve never heard of anything like it. Equally odd was his willingness to become sexually active with younger relatives. I’ve heard a lot of people say that Hitler behave asexually, but based on this video it seems like his sexual drives were really misplaced, almost like an extreme case of a fetish. Perhaps more than anything else, this proves how different Hitler’s mind was from something we might call normal. The analysis of Hitler’s childhood was interesting, but I am only convinced of parts of it. His attachment to his mother was definitely more defined than normal, but I don’t think it had quite the effect that the psychiatrists predicted. Likewise, I don’t see how his development in his “potty-training” stage could have led to live long sadism. Obviously, I am not a psychologist and they probably understand these things better than I do. Some of the childhood effects that they discussed I agreed with completely. I think an abusive father would play a huge role in the future of a child. The most interesting thing about his childhood was how he was the only one of three sons to survive. Given Hitler’s mentality, I can see how this would have a major effect on him. He would seem invincible, able to overcome death, and almost like a superhuman. It would give the incredible confidence that he had, and make him believe that he could succeed even if everyone else failed. The predictions, I felt, were somewhat lacking. The prediction that his rages would become more frequent and violent as the war turned against him almost goes without saying. Hitler was a man prone to these rages, even at a time when he held a majority of Germany’s admiration and support. Given his success, people rarely questioned him. So, as the war turned against him, it would kill the illusion of his invincibility. As people began to question him, and the pressure to succeed mounted, I would imagine that his rages would increase. The prediction that people would try to assassinate him is basic as well. Hitler himself had to plan the assassination of many people to reach his position. It is not inconceivable that a high ranking military or political figure underneath him would visualize themselves in his position, and try to steal his power. The most impressive prediction, I feel, is the prediction of Hitler’s suicide. At the time when the analysis was done, Hitler was just past the peak of his power (Stalingrad was over, I believe, and this was Hitler’s first major military defeat). At this time, he was still powerful and inspirational to the German people. He still had his supreme confidence, and described the major defeat in Stalingrad as just a “minor setback”. Given the situation, it is difficult to believe that he would deteriorate into suicidal tendencies.
It was amazing that Dr. Langer could accurately predict Adolf Hitler’s actions after just five months of researching. The idea to investigate and psycho-analysis Hitler’s mind was an incredible feat considering the false information that was available during that time. As mentioned in the movie, Hitler had made an effort to erase his childhood history from the public. His childhood was one of immense interest; the family structure was typical of what one would expect from a man like Hitler. His father had an abusive personality that caused the young Hitler to cling and depend on his mother. The strong connection between mother and son was described by Dr. Eduard Bloch, the Hitler family doctor, as an abnormal relationship. The bond between the two expressed a connection that was unlike any that Dr. Bloch had ever seen. When Hitler learned of his mother’s death, the anguish and pain that showed on his face left an unforgettable impression on Dr. Bloch. The information that Dr. Langer was collecting from interviews and research allowed him to make predictions on what Hitler would do. He guessed that Hitler would become reclusive when the war turned against Germany. Hitler began to attend less mass rallies and retreated to his mansion with his girlfriend Ava Braun. Dr. Langer was also able to predict Hitler’s method of death; Adolf Hitler committed suicide in his Berlin bunker in 1945. I found Hitler’s sexual behaviors most disturbing. The fact that he made his niece urinate on top of him demonstrated his abnormal behavior and personality. Another interesting aspect of the movie is that the field of psycho-analysis in the Central Intelligence Agency began with the study of Adolf Hitler. I agree with Dr. Langer’s view that if the analysis was done before the start of the war, then the course of history would have been different. I believe that if Neville Chamberlain had read Dr. Langer’s profile of Hitler, then he would have been more cautious when negotiating with Germany. Altogether, the movie gave me new knowledge in the psyche of the infamous Adolf Hitler.
I watched inside the mind of Adolf Hitler. I personally found Langer's conclusions fascinating, as I could never have imagined that Hitler's psyche could have been so deeply influenced by events in his childhood. I was also impressed by the fact that Langer was able to create an accurate psycological profile of Hitler without ever coming in contact with him face to face, and using only questionable, often biased, secondary sources.
One thing that interested me was the fact that Hitler would project his flaws onto the general populus, more specifically, the Jews, in order to relieve his self humiliation. His insecurity caused by his traumatic childhood and abusive father translated directly to his adult life. I was also fascinated by how Langer was able to correctly predict that Hitler would seclude himself as the war began to turn against him and that he would eventually commit suicide. Both of these predictions were made 2 years before the conclusion of the war, and they were made assuming all of the prior assumptions made by Langer were correct.
I was deeply disturbed by the nature of Hitler's perversions. The behaviors that Hitler exhibited were very atypical of the normal human being, and when factoring this into his calculations, Langer was able to make more deductions about Hitler's metal state.
The psychy of Adolf Hitler is explored in Inside the Mind of Adolf Hitler. Dr. Walter Langer was given 5 months to examine Hitler's psychology in 1943, and at the time, even Langer doubted the possibilities of the task presented to him. Through watching this clip, I have gained much insight on the character of Adolf Hitler, his disturbing past, and what motivated him to become one of the world's most dangerous politicians. Perhaps the most fascinating part of this clip was how accurately Dr. Langer predicted the future of Adolf Hitler. Langer predicted, through his meticulous work and research, that Hitler would become more reclusive when the tides turned against him in Germany, and that the fate of Hitler would ultimately end in his own hands. Both predictions proved to be true after two years. It is fascinating to me that based on Hitler's childhood, his perversions, his complexes, that such accurate predictions could be deducted. Langer, through his interviews with individuals close to Hitler, determined that Hitler had a Messiah complex; because Hitler was the only surviving son in his family, he believed that he was put on this earth for a purpose, which later initiated him to seek power to change Germany. Therefore, when the German people began to feel distraught due to the long-winded war and the seemingly hopeless results, Hitler, unlike Churchill, felt it was a direct hit to himself, and thus began to isolate himself from the public. What also fascinated me was that Hitler's sexual perversions were his way of seeking weakness; Hitler, though he was the most powerful man in Germany at the time, was a frail person on the inside, and thus sought to be almost subjugated in a way by his niece to satisfy his wish to be weak. According to Langer, this frail facade also led Hitler to commit suicide. Instead of confronting his troubles when it was apparent that Germany was losing the war, Hitler found it overwhelmingly difficult, and thus was willing to take his life before confronting his problems, which he thought was a sign of defeat. Thus was the end of Adolf Hitler. Langer hence proved that studying the psychy of political leaders is a valuable tool and strategy.
In viewing Dr. Langer's psychological profiling of Adolf Hitler, I am immediately reminded of the very similar process of getting “inside the mind” of a serial killer; in fact, Hitler seems to share qualities with many of these seriously depraved individuals. An early turning point in the lives of both seems to be the misshapen childhood: death of siblings coupled with their own survival, abusive fathers, and a mother who was their hero, guiding light, and even true love are all noted features in the background of many serial killers (such as Ed Gein's fanatical devotion to his mother) that invariably seem to lead them to a failure to fit in with normal adult society. Linked to this inadequacy and alienation is also a sexual depravity seen in his perverted interest in urination and possible homosexuality. In many ways, Hitler was the perfect image of a serial killer, who just happened to wield incredible political power, which he used to further his murderous campaigns and desires. Hitler's skewed interpretation of religion was perhaps the most central point in the argument, as it exposed the Messianic state of mind that he perceived himself in. To Hitler, he could do no wrong; he was the savior of the German people, divinely sent to reclaim the glory of the German people. In his mind, Christ was not a saintly, forgiving child of the Lord. Rather, Hitler embraced the view of “Christ the Fighter” and pledged to wage a holy war against the Jews, as well as make his people the undisputed chosen people of God. With the belief that he was doing the right thing in the eyes of heaven, Hitler would be nearly impossible to dissuade. From these postulates, Langer is able to draw a logical conclusion; as the German chances for victory grew slimmer and slimmer, there was no way that Jesus Christ incarnate could allow himself to be captured by the metaphorical Romans. Perhaps to avoid being “crucified” for his cause (as Mussolini would gruesomely encounter), Dr. Langer correctly predicted that Hitler's most probable response to German defeat drawing near would be to take his own life. The viewer must be reminded that Dr. Langer and his team could not postulate this from the comfort of Allied victory clearly in their horizons. Despite setbacks after a disastrous Russian campaign, Hitler's army was far from crippled, and the war would drag on in fiercely locked battle for a few more years. To have made these predictions at a time when neither the Axis nor the Allies had made any definite headway over the other, and to have patched together an accurate psychological report of a man who was for all intents and purposes a mere image, a veritable but distant demon, to the average American, Dr. Langer's aptitude in his field is unbounded. In essence, his ability to locate and sift through numerous documents and informants to identify the trends in Hitler's actions, as well as his state of mind, is nothing short of amazing.
Walter Langer, in a remarkably short period of time, was able to conduct an incredibly thorough and chillingly accurate psychoanalysis of Adolf Hitler. The one thing I found most interesting, and disturbing, were the issues of his sexual perversion. His perversion, which extended to the point of forcing his neice to undress, squat while he examined her privates, and then force him to urinate on her, demonstrated a rather extreme desire to be demasculated and humiliated. This seemed to ultimately relate back to his Oedipus Complex, and the desire he had for his mother. I found that the extent to which his complex meddled with his mind and caused him to act in such an asexual and perverted way was astounding. I would never have imagined that his conditions of growing up drove him to desire to be possesed by his mother to the extent that he did. As for Langer's conclusions, they all proved to be unnervingly accurate, in that he was able to predict Hitler's recluse from the German public when the war was going bad, and his eventual suicide. The accuracy of his predictions certainly provides strong evidence that psychoanalysis can be incredibly accurate and useful.
Inside The Mind of Hitler was quite an informative and interesting documentary. It allowed a closer look into the face Hitler hid from the public eye which was examined and analyzed by Dr. Langer from a psychological standpoint. He had only five months to compile and predict the actions of this brutally tyrannical leader with the help of secondary sources. Perhaps the most disturbing psycho-analysis found by Dr. Langer was Hitler’s asexual nature in regards to the accounts of his niece. It was intriguing to see that Hitler’s childhood included an overly abusive father whom he feared and yet was devoted to loving his mother whose gravesite he visited like a holy shrine when she died due to breast cancer. He was her only surviving son, and consequently, led Dr. Langer to believe he had a messiah complex. All of these strange aspects from his childhood onwards were major factors in contributing to why Hitler was the way he was. They were also the basis for the startlingly accurate conclusions that Dr. Langer made such as the fact that he would draw further away from the public as the war moved on, someone would attempt to assassinate him, and he would end his life by committing suicide. These predictions were not far off the mark in any way, and were indeed simply a reflection of what his inner life was like. This documentary was very fascinating and it highlighted the significance of the science of political profiling.
Hitler was a man who, given the correct conditions, would be a field day for any self-respecting psychologist. His cornucopia of issues ranging from the Oedipus complex to his failure to develop through of one Freud's critical five stages in childhood development were perfect case studies. However, in 1943, when Dr. Walter Langer, commissioned by the Secret Service to profile Hitler psychologically, set down to get into the mind of Hitler, his resources were considerably limited. He had absolutely no primary source to work with. He could not conduct a typical Freudian "Talking Therapy" where the psychologist sits down and simply talks with the patient. All he had to go on were second-hand accounts of Hitler and the literature written about him, all extremely inaccurate. What I found most interesting about Langer's analyzation of Hitler is the startling degree of accuracy that Langer had in predicting the future actions of Hitler considering the eclectic but unreliable sources he drew from. His predictions, even the ones that went against common sense, were all correct. For example, the prediction that as the war turned against him, Hitler would become increasingly reclusive was entirely accurate, even while logic would predict the exact opposite. The ability of Langer to see through Hitler's façade of superhuman invincibility and confidance and reveal his sexual perversion as well as need to be dominating was also startling. How could someone possibly draw so much information from such unreliable sources? Most amazing was Langer's prediction of Hitler's suicide. The year he made these predictions, 1943, the war was in no war won by the Allies. The Nazis were still going strong, led by their seemingly indomitable leader Adolf Hitler. Yet, Langer successfully predicted his suicide. The accuracy of the predictions was seems occult, even in hindsight.
This whole video and psycho analysis of the infamous Adolf Hitler is disturbing and shocking. I was truly amazed when Dr. Langer made so of the predictions of the war after he had finished his analysis. He predicted that Hitler would commit suicide, and in fact Hitler swallowed some cyanide and shot himself in the head. He also predicted that as the war went on that Hitler would slowly make less and less public appearances, and he exactly was proved right when later in the war he kept to himself and stayed in his vacation home. There were many shocking reports and interviews throughout this video. One of the most disturbing things that was reported was Hitler’s sexual, or asexual fetishes. An original Nazi party member gave an account of Hitler’s late niece’s experience with this secret fetish. Hitler had a fascination with young women urinating on him, just one more disturbing fact about one of the most infamous men in all of human history. I found this documentary very interesting and intriguing, but disturbing at the same time.
After viewing the video about Dr. Langer's psycho-analysis on Adolf Hitler I can honestly say that I was shocked by the analysis and by Langer's amazingly accurate conclusions. I think that one of the most surprising elements of Hitler's life was that he was actually an extremely weak human being. Langer concluded this through careful analysis on Hitler's relationship with his mother and his teenage niece. Hitler grew extremely close to his mother due to the harsh abuse from his father. However, the Hitler family doctor described the relationship between mother sand son as unusual, one he had never seen before. Also, Hitler was in a questionable relationship with his young teenage niece. Dr. Langer described both of these examples as strong evidence of Hitler's lack of strength as a human being. It is interesting because this man had a huge amount of influence over the German people and he did horrible things someone who appeared to be a strong leader was actually terrified and weak. I also found it interesting that Dr. Langer was able to accurately predict what Hitler would do in the future. Through careful analysis of Hitler's childhood Dr. Langer was able to predict that Hitler's terrible actions would become more intense and more frequent. He went on to also say that there would be an assassination attempt on Hitler and one year later, there was. Dr. Langer was also able to expect that Hitler would make less public appearances, further reinforcing his weak personality. As more people began to resent Hitler he retreated from making public appearances. Hitler was afraid of his collapse and when his hopes of being a world leader shattered Hitler committed suicide. Dr. Langer also predicted this, stating that Hitler would not and could not surrender or negotiate.
Inside the Mind of Hitler was an interesting video about the psycho-analysis of Hitler WWII. At first, I was most interested in how they would find personal information about Hitler. I found it surprising how people like Hitler’s doctor were so ready to talk to the American psychologists. From the testimonies, I’ve actually learned quite a bit about Hitler, like his childhood and family, which isn’t discussed too much in the history books. I felt some sympathy for him about his early life because he was tortured by his father and then later the death of his mother. I could also understand why he wanted to take high positions in his older age (and maybe have the German people view him as a messiah) because he was the only surviving son. Dr. Langer’s connections between Hitler’s early life and his later actions made lots of sense, which I enjoyed, because I would’ve never found some of the connections he made. Hitler’s older life was also very strange, especially his sex life, which was awkward, to say the least. Dr. Langer’s conclusions, however, made it make more sense.
What I found extremely interesting was Langer’s accuracy of the predictions. His initial statement about how Hitler’s attachment to his mother would cause him to be strange around women was completely confirmed. His later prediction on how Hitler’s high ranking officers were going to attempt to assassinate Hitler also came true when a few generals plotted to bomb Hitler (I found the recent movie interesting too). The psychologists even expected Hitler to go into the public less often when the tide of the war was starting to turn, which occurred. They even calculated that he would commit suicide in a few years, and sure enough, Hitler took some cyanide and shot himself. Finally, I thought it was nice that all leaders today are secretly psycho-analyzed.
I chose to watch Inside the Mind of Hitler. What I found most interesting was Dr. Langer’s ability to accurately predict Hitler’s actions and responses. Perhaps waffles. After researching Hitler’s formative years (including the influential toilet training phase), Langer was able to categorize Hitler and predict several important events in the future. A year before Colonel von Staufen attempted to assassinate Hitler, Langer had guessed that Hitler’s staff would become disillusioned and make an attempt on his life. When Hitler began to lose the war, Langer incredibly discerned that Hitler would become angry; an extreme testimony to Langer’s almost prophetic ability that would go on to define an era. Lastly, Langer predicted that Hitler would kill himself, willing to abandon his German people to avoid the shame of losing. This is both interesting and disturbing; the fact that Hitler could be classified so accurately indicates that his character is perhaps not unique. Although the circumstances around him gave him the ability to rise to his position, the idea of others who fit into Hitler’s archetype is unsettling.
In 1943 the Americans put together a team of Harvard psychologists to try and work out what Hitler would try and do next. The theories and conclusions are especially interesting to me because of my personal love of psychology and profiling. The interpretation of his past was one thing I found interesting. The proof that his dad was a drunk and abusive as well as the fact that some his brothers and sisters died creating a distorted picture of the world around him was one fact that seemed to explain his violent and distorted view of the Jews and other around him. Another proof of the abusive father and relation ship with his mother was seen when the doctor announced his mother had died. Hitler’s love for his mom and the want to do something to make her proud may have actually led to his involvement in the Nazi party and the vigor with which he fought for German superiority. One theory was he suffered from an oedipus complex. This is the theory of an individual who depends mostly on his mother and loathes and fears his father. Another theory I found interesting was that of the failure of his toilet training stage which lead to latter sadistic qualities, the proof of this was the neat freak attitude of the mother. These two led to a anal retentive personality and an a sexual personality. The evidence was awkwardness around women. This weakness led to overcompensation and to overcome this he developed a surface picture on top of his weak empty personality. He believed Hitler would express his weakness sexually. Like that of Hitler and his niece. The evidence was the jealously of Hitler when she reacted with other men. This relationship with his niece shows his sexual perversion. This comes from his want to be humiliated showing his desperately weak and afraid side. Used projection or the denying of characteristics in himself and put them on others. Hitler’s weakness would then was projected on the Jewish people. The death of all Hitler’s brothers would lead to a belief he was chosen or special or better then them. This lead to the thought he was under divine protection or the messiah complex the belief you have Christ like qualities. This is proved by his identification with Christ, the warrior Christ who fought against the Jews. Langer then came to the conclusion was the war progressed Hitler would become more narcotic and further enraged. He also predicted the officer core would attempt to assassinate Hitler as he progressed. Langer also proposed his public appearances will slowly halt due to an inability to face objection. Langer also predicted Hitler will commit suicide if cornered believing it to be the surest route to immortality that’s if he had a messiah complex. His hate for the world showed to be correct because he would not surrender no matter what happened. The most fascinating prediction to me was that of Hitler’s suicide. The accumulation of all his qualities resulting in this ultimate prediction that if Hitler’s dream of total power was to fail the empty self would emerge and Hitler will have to kill himself rather then let that side emerge.
What I found most disturbing in the film clip on Hitler’s psychology is that the United States put such faith into such an inept psychologist. Langer does not look for corroborating evidence for some facts, he just accepts one man’s story as fact instead of looking into further options. For example Langer accepts the story about a sexual perversion that Hitler supposedly had. However this man had every reason to hate Hitler; he was kicked out of the party he helped find, he was forced to flee to Canada, and his brother was killed. This makes his story shaky evidence; the only thing coming even close to backing up his rumor was that Hitler’s cousin had killed herself. However because he gave the interview on May 13th 1943 he already knew that Hitler’s cousin had killed herself and he could have worked that into his story. In addition Hitler was obsessed with purity (not only in race, Hitler was a strict vegetarian and never drank alcohol) so this rumor seems to clash drastically with one of the most fundamental principles of Hitler’s life. In addition Langer uses only Freud’s psychoanalytical approach and no others. I am surprised that Langer made such a big deal over Hitler loving his mother. Is anyone in the John, Milton? This is not the worst of the film however. The most shocking, horrifying, and uncouth element of this film is the fact that they mispronounced at least six different words. That is just sloppy.
#2. Dr. Walter Langer's psycho-analysis of Adolf Hitler would seem to the ordinary person to be another study on one of the most studied dictators of all time. However, some of the points that Langer bring up are quite shocking, and it is the most definitive case study of Hitler. Commissioned by the United States Secret Service to examine the mind of Hitler, Langer was at first doubtful. Hitler seemed reclusive and confusing to Dr. Langer at first. After a couple of months, Langer already had some concrete ideas due to his research he conducted. He predicted the suicide of Hitler, which occurred after the war. He predicted that Hitler's messiah complex existed due to Hitler's past. He foretold that Hitler would withdraw more from the public eye as the German's started to retreat and lose the war more, and he soon made no speeches or announcements to the German public. These startlingly accurate predictions were all due to the genius of Langer. In the video, the idea that I found to be most disturbing was how close to the psychological conditions that Hitler turned out to be. It was almost as if Hitler was the perfect example of a psychological case study.
Even though he had no interviews or contact with Hitler himself, Langer was able to create these observations that were extremely accurate, which I think is amazing. One of the key ideas that Langer examined in Hitler's past was the death of his three brothers and Hitler's poor health. Since Hitler did not die after these events, he believed that he was protected by divine intervention, and this belief that he could not die led to many of his later life decisions. He believed that he was put on this Earth in order to fulfill a special purpose, and he compared himself to Jesus Christ of the Christian religion. However, the Christ that he compared himself to was one that was not afraid to fight, and so Hitler assumed that he should fight the Jews. These crazy notions may seem absurd at first, but Langer proved to be an accurate foreseer. Near the end of the war, Hitler began to withdraw from the public, and Langer foresaw this even when Germany was winning in WWII. Even when other people believed that Hitler would keep up his cult of personality and remain in the public eye, Langer would not change his opinion. However, all of these predictions were what they were, guesses. Many historians believed that Langer guessed all of these ideas, since he had no access to Hitler himself and he did not include some military and political factors in his predictions. Even if they might be simple guesses, Langer's powers of deduction and accurate predictions show his skills as a psychoanalytical expert.
Question #2
Through watching Inside the Mind of Hitler, I believe that the work that Dr. Langer was able to do on his psycho-analysis of Hitler for the OSS, through only the use of second and third party sources as well as biased literature, was extremely remarkable, and important for the allied commanders and leaders. Of his conclusions, I find that the most remarkable seems to be the ability in which Langer was able to identify the messianic complex that Hitler undoubtedly had and to use it to predict his eventual suicide. Langer had very little confidence at the beginning of his evaluation, yet through research and the use of accepted Freudian principles he was able to complete his assignment. Langer was able to determine that the way his mother treated him after the death of his three eldest brothers in a house with an abusive father, led to Hitler’s belief that he was the most important person in the world, as he was to his own mother. Hitler viewed himself as a messiah coming to not save his people, but create a world where he was worshipped. Langer predicted that in Hitler’s fragile mental state, once his dreams were shown to crumble, he would go insane, and take his own life. Two years before the event, allied commanders had an opportunity to know the future through Langer’s work. I find that the most disturbing aspect of Langer’s psycho-analysis was the section that dealt with Hitler and his interactions with women. Hitler had a very prominent Oedipus complex which caused him to sexually desire his own mother, and preventing him from having real relations with other women. Also, Langer revealed how Hitler enjoyed being sexually humiliated, through his interactions with his own niece. Overall, Langer was able to create a supremely detailed and effective analysis of Hitler, leading to the creation of a new field.
Question Number 2: Inside the Mind of Hitler
Watching Inside the Mind of Hitler was less scary and more eye opening than I expected it to be. I found Dr. Langer’s psycho-analysis of Hitler to be successful in creating a human being behind the infamous name of Adolph Hitler, and his prediction about Hitler’s suicide was uncanny.
Typically, the first thing that comes to mind when I hear the name Hitler is the Holocaust. I immediately think of the over 6 million people who died and their torturous last days. However, Dr. Langer’s research and psycho-analysis revealed the person that welded the notorious name. I was surprised to learn of Hitler’s Oedipus complex, but, as Dr. Langer explained, it made sense for Hitler because his father beat him, and his mother cherished him for surviving despite his fragility. I found it interesting that Hitler responded to his father’s abuse by going to his mother, because that is such a normal reaction that I did not expect such from Hitler. Even so, Hitler’s Oedipus complex disturbed me because he seemed so eager to show off his Nazi Party to his mother: he covered her gravestone with Nazi memorabilia. As the family doctor mourned in his interview, wouldn’t a mother “turn over in her grave” if she learned that her beloved son was carrying out such crimes? Why would Hitler be proud to show his mother the political party that encouraged genocide? Out of all the discoveries Dr. Langer made through his thorough research, including Hitler’s asexuality (he never had a physical relationship with his eventual wife) and his messiah complex from outliving his three brothers, his Oedipus complex both interested and disturbed me the most.
Moreover, Dr. Langer’s prediction of Hitler’s suicide shocked me. He made it two years before the war ended, in 1943, when Germany was weakening but still not losing. I doubt anyone else, who had never actually met Hitler in person, would have expected Hitler to have suicidal tendencies. It shows that Dr. Langer was a dedicated psycho-analyst who produced accurate work through extensive research.
The question I decided to do was the psycho-analysis of Adolf Hitler by Dr. Langer. The information given in this documentary is very disturbing. Dr. Langer only had five months to come up with this profile and what he did in five months was truly amazing. It was a daunting task but he did it. This documentary is very unique because Dr. Langer had to do a psycho-analysis of a person who he has never met. He had to rely on different accounts and documents. No doubt that some of these documents and accounts must have been biased. I found several things that were disturbing. First of all, Adolf Hitler viewed himself as Christ, not as a saint but as a defender. He pictured himself as “Christ the Fighter.” He believed that he had “divine protection” from God. Three of his brothers had already died while he had survived. He believed he had survived for a reason and he had a mission to fulfill. He embraced the view that it was his mission to protect himself and his people from the Jews. I did not know that he had these religious views which adds an interesting aspect to his political views. Furthermore, Dr. Langer’s predictions proved to be accurate. He predicted that as criticism increased against Hitler, he would withdraw himself from the public. He would make fewer speeches and would just stay away from the public spotlight. One would think that he would increase his public appearances in order to bring the people together. As Dr. Langer predicted, Hitler became reclusive and did not make any peace negotiations either. He also predicted that Hitler would commit suicide. It is shocking to see that all the predictions Dr. Lange made were accurate. Some historians say that Dr. Langer got lucky but he also provided justification for his reasons. Luck might have been involved but I don’t blame the guy. He had to make these predictions based on documents and accounts of Hitler. Nothing else. This work of Dr. Langer is important, as it laid the foundation for CIA to psycho-analyze future world leaders.
To me, the most interesting part of Dr. Langer’s psychoanalysis was the accuracy of his predictions; especially when he estimated that the war would end with Germany’s total destruction and Hitler committing suicide. When this is put into perspective with the fact that Langer was never able to have a traditional psychoanalytical session with Hitler and had to rely on documents, this accomplishment is astounding, shows the validity of psychoanalysis. On a more disturbing scale, Langer brings up the idea that Hitler saw himself as a god sent crusader on a mission; while it is often said to be true that the path the hell is paved with good intentions, but this brings that statement to a new level. Even more disturbing is the sexual fantasies of Hitler that Langer mentions, which truly shows the degree to which Hitler had lost any claim of normality and the degree to which he built up his public facade.
After watching “Inside the Mind of Hitler, “ I was intrigued and fascinated by the conclusions drawn by Dr. Langer and his staff in the psycho-analysis of Adolf Hitler. The entire video revealed how his childhood greatly affected him as a person, who he became. This to me was the most interesting. The holocaust, the genocide of millions, stemmed from the death of his mother, and failing one of the crucial phases of childhood. This is extremely shocking and somewhat disturbing. Hitler exploited the flaws of others, to mask his own. Basically, because of his childhood, this became possible to Hitler, and his life became that of crazy. Dr. Langer described his sexual life, and the disturbing images told from Hitler’s niece. The images included urination for pleasure, humiliation, and what many believe to be homosexual tendencies. The analysis Langer was able to create, which at one time seemed so impossible, was able to puzzle together the mind of Hitler, and solve why he acted in the way he did. Dr. Langer got to know Hitler so closely, through literature and the family doctor, that he was able to make precise conclusions on the mind and nature of this man. He predicted that at some point, he would drive himself to suicide. Indeed he did. This entire clip was so interesting, and the information and profile that was created to identify Hitler is so crucial to understanding the decisions he was capable of making.
The video discussing the physco –analysis of Hitler was very interesting and disturbing and ultimately left me with a more in depth understanding of Hitler’s screwed up ways. I found that the reasons Hitler did so many awful things was as a result of a bad experience during child development. The fact that because Hitler’s mom was such a clean freak affected him phycology during the potty training years made him into such a weird man to me seems unrealistic but interesting. I could not fathom such a thing as a child’s potty training years having such a large effect on the child’s future. Although I do trust Langer’s discoveries, I really don’t think you can attribute the level of freakiness that Hitler was on to his childhood, I think he was born screwed up with a mental problem and his childhood problems led to his mental problem becoming such a large problem that he felt it was necessary to kill millions of people. A lot of Langer’s discoveries I believed were very disturbing. I am positive that everyone in our class agrees that Hitler’s fetish for urination is extremely disturbing and really shows how screwed up of a man he really is. I found this most disturbing of all the disturbing facts discussed in this video because the level of perversion is beyond that I have ever known, and what makes it stranger is the fact that he was not interested in sex. It is human nature to want to have sex and not only does Hitler not have that interest, but he instead has a very strange interest that arouses him. All and all I thought Langer’s conclusions and predictions were very accurate and very impressive. The only thing I wondered was did Hitler want to kills Jews in part because his mom died while in the care of a Jewish doctor?
What I found immensely disturbing about Langer’s analysis was the influence of Hitler’s childhood on the man he became. Much of his analysis was based on Freudian thought, which many modern psychologists disagree with and see flaws in. However, the conclusions that Langer made that proved to be true show that this methodology of psychological profiling was effective. I find it a bit terrifying that his childhood made him such a messed up person. He was so molded by his abusive father, and his unhealthily close relationship with his mother. This, combined with his fears of death at a young age and his constant vulnerability created an outward projection of aggressive behaviors that turned the blame on others. It was a bit disturbing how accurate Langer’s conclusions turned out to be. He predicted that Hitler was uninterested in sexual intercourse, and this turned out to be true. He predicted that Hitler would become more reclusive as things started going wrong because he couldn’t face a critical crowd. But his most remarkable prediction was that Hitler would commit suicide, despite his constant fear of death. It is shocking that by tracking someone from their corrupted childhood when they were still a good person one can predict how that person will act as a sadistic dictator. Hitler was an exceptionally sadistic, cruel, and angry man whose internal issues and self hatred influenced the world. It is very impressive that Langer was able to gather all of this in a short period of time and with out historical retrospect.
Option # 2
After watching Inside the Mind of Hitler, I have never been so fascinated by the life and the mentality of an individual. It was interesting to learn that before Hitler the United States did not create psychological profiles on anyone and since then they create them on all major political leaders (allies and enemies). You also mentioned in class how these profiles are some of the confidential information leaked on wikileaks and I now understand why this is so harmful to our government. For me, the most shocking were Hitler’s sexual perversions and how he forced his niece of all people to “perform” for him. Hitler being sexually humiliated unmasked his feeling of being a weak and afraid man even though he was placed on the pedestal as such an upstanding leader. His way of dealing with the psychological consequences of his perversion was adapting the political ideology of anti Semitism. Dr. Walter Langer’s psycho-analysis was extremely personal and accurately especially considering he was never able to examine Hitler himself. It is unbelievable how one’s childhood can determine one’s adulthood and psychological wellbeing to such an extent. I found it laughable and unbelievable how they believed that Hitler’s adult actions could have stemmed from a possible mishap in the toilet training phase and if this is accurate then I am in awe. When Hitler covered his mother’s grave in Nazi memorabilia I was shocked because it seemed he was trying to honor his mother through killing Jews. Most of all I was impressed at how accurate Dr. Langer’s predictions were about Hitler under such a short period of time. He was able to predict that Hitler would refuse to be caught and defeated rather he would commit suicide and while Germany was failing he would become submissive and hide from the public eye. All in all I am extremely impressed with his psychological-analysis of such a complex and perverted person.
Choice #2
I found “Inside the Mind of Hitler” incredibly interesting and very informative because I learned more about the past and the mind of this ruthless ruler than I had with many other sources. Hitler had a very difficult past which I found very interesting because I never knew he had such a close relationship with his Mom. Hearing of his actions before and after she died of Breast Cancer was very interesting and could also prove one major point, Hitler was a bully because of his past. He wanted an escape from his past in which he was abused and had 2 brothers and his mom die. Hitler’s actions can be seen as retaliation to the world for his difficult childhood that scarred him for life. Another fact that I found incredibly interesting was his sexual perversions and tendencies. The fact that one on end of the spectrum he had an almost strictly asexual relationship with his lover, while also having his niece undress and fulfill many of his perversions was incredibly interesting. This shows that Hitler had the desire to humiliate others, while also possessing the desire for himself to also be humiliated. I was amazed at how many of Hitler’s actions could be predicted because of his childhood because of this psychoanalysis. I found the documentary very interesting and it gave me a much greater understanding of this ruthless human being.
#2 There is no doubt in my mind that the most disturbing part of Langer’s findings was about Hitler’s sexual habits with his niece Geli. I don’t think anyone could deny this. The whole idea of the urination is just so far beyond normalcy. What I thought was interesting about this, though was the connections Langer made to Hitler’s mother’s OCD like behaviors and toilet training. I found it interesting that Langer’s observations of Hitler seeking submission is found in an act that frustrated him so much as a child.
I think what intrigued me so much about Langer’s conclusions were how incredibly accurate they were. Freud’s idea of the messiah complex that Langer drew from so thoroughly exemplifies Hitler. On the outside Hitler exuded confidence and a feeling of glory and entitlement. I thought it was interesting that Langer could gather this just from the testimonies of different people. I also thought the Langer’s conclusion that Hitler would become more neurotic was also insightful and interesting, as it is very evident that this proved to be true. All of Langer’s conclusions seemed to be so obvious and yet only the psychoanalysis could discover them.
I was surprised firstly that so many aspects of Hitler seemed to stem from his childhood. I was unaware Hitler’s father was so abusive, and that would help to make sense of what would later occur. Much of his coldness towards other humans could be seen in a dehumanization effect that could have possibly stemmed from his father’s cruelness. Another powerful thing I saw was the whole idea of the Oedipal complex illuminated in Hitler’s life. It makes sense that he would turn to his mother in response to his father, but I was surprised to see Hitler’s life as such a flawless example of the Oedipal complex. I had known before that Hitler had been very attached to his mother and treated her grave as a sort-of Nazi shrine. If he was that desperately close to her, it does make sense to cling to her in that respect. I thought the idea of Hitler expressing his bottled-up psychological troubles and weakness through a possible sexual relationship with his niece was actually really interesting, albeit disturbing. I wouldn’t believe it myself, but the behavior that the young man described Hitler showing towards his young niece was disgusting and strange, and I really don’t think a man or woman could make it up. The whole idea of him being seen as weak towards a woman and releasing that towards the whole concept of his unbalanced psyche was actually really interesting. In general, this documentary took a lot of details that hadn’t made sense to me in general life and clarified. The predictions to me were very chilling, because they were all correct. He became more neurotic, as predicted, and they attempted to assassinate him, which was also accurate. In general, I didn’t expect Hitler to be so predictable. He always seemed completely erratic and random to me, doing whatever he chose to. But I was surprised to note that he seemed to be able to track easily in this documentary Hitler’s psychological jumps, and do so in ways that made coherent sense despite never legitimately sitting down with Hitler and interviewing him one-on-one.
#2
I found that Dr. Langer's psycho-analysis of Hitler accurately explained the causes that led to the development of Hitler's corrupted personality. Dr. Langer based his psycho-analysis on the Freudian idea that childhood is the period that shapes a person the most. He analyzed the circumstances of Hitler's childhood that contributed to Hitler's obsession with power and his immense hatred toward the Jews. In doing so, Dr. Langer deviates from the idea that Hitler was an inherently evil man from the moment he was born and instead portrays Hitler as a man whose mind was damaged by a cruel childhood.
It was interesting that Dr. Langer and his fellow psychiatrists were able to come up with many childhood experiences that shaped Hitler's mental state. For example, they cited that Hitler's abusive father, his abnormal closeness with his mother, and later her mother's death gave Hitler a truly negative perception of the world. In an interview, Hitler's family doctor said that Hitler was much more saddened by the death of his mother than his two sisters. Dr. Langer also said that the death of his three brothers caused her mother to become overprotective of him, which had a negative impact on him. Hitler's strange sexual behavior, especially his sexual experiences with his young niece, was also cited as a cause of his deranged mental state. Finally, Dr. Langer claims that Hitler's hatred of the Jews was caused by Hitler's need of something to distract him from the inadequacies of himself. Although impossible to prove, these causes seem very plausible.
Dr. Langer's predictions about Hitler's actions are the most shocking part of his report. He accurately predicted that dissatisfaction with Hitler's rule would lead to an assassination attempt on him. Dr. Langer also predicted that when Germany began losing the war Hitler would begin to show himself to the public less. This was different from a leader like Winston Churchill, who continued to rally the people during the darkest days of the war. Finally, Dr. Langer predicted that Hitler would commit suicide as Germany's defeat became imminent. Overall, the psycho-analysis of Hitler had merit because it found plausible explanations for Hitler's mental state and was able to predict his actions. The report showed the importance of the psycho-analysis of politicians which caused the CIA to create a new division for it.
As most others did, I decided to watch the video on Hitler and his psychological profile. What was most disturbing, and completely revolting, was the discovery of Hitler's complexes regarding sex and the Oedipus complex that would influence his introverted personality. I found what he forced upon his niece to be extremely disgusting. Having such issues arise from just an overly-clean mother unaware of the effect the potty-training time period would have on Hitler later in life was astounding - he turned out to be an angry, perverted man with unusual fetishes. At around 28:30 minuted into the video, a complete narrative of the "performance' Hitler forced his niece to do was given, which was by far the worst part of the video to watch. I can't even repeat what was explained in that part of the video in this response because of how uncomfortable it made me. In simple terms, his need for such a "performance" was both grotesque as well as intriguing to the viewer, as it must have been to the psychologists on the profiling team.
The conclusions Langer managed to create as to how Hitler would act in the future also surprised me, as they were spot on in every case presented. Langer accurately predicted that Hitler would speak to the public less and less frequently due to insecurities, rather than going out to rally his people together for the tough times of the war. He also predicted Hilter's suicide would come, as it was the only way he would lose the war. It is crazy to think how such information could be taken from indirect sources and how Langer could accurately pinpoint personality traits across an ocean, especially those leading to predictions about future actions. As a whole, this video was very surprising based on the discoveries made.
#2. I watched Inside the Mind of Hitler, and although there were many interesting and disturbing points made throughout the video, one stayed with me as especially disturbing was the sexual acts that he took part in with his niece. These acts that he partook in with his niece are not only disturbing, they are disgusting. The fact that he was a man who constantly preached to the masses that he controlled to ostracize the different, could go behind closed doors and ask his young niece to urinate on his face for sexual pleasure is absolutely appalling and hypocritical. The fact that he was aroused by acts of humiliation towards him by women tells a very different side of the sadistic Hitler the general population is familiar with. This side of Hitler is one of weakness, and desire to be put in his place by a woman. Such a personality trait is not commonly thought of when one thinks of a man who has ordered the genocide of millions of innocent people. This desire highlighted his weak inner self that he had been hiding for years. The one that was abused as a child. All of the inadequacies were then projected on the masses, in form of a war that Europe was not ready for, and a plan to rid the world of the "lesser" people, according to the man who has deviant sexual preferences. This interested me because it so greatly identified the hypocritical nature of the Nazi's. The same party that condemned homosexuals, had homosexuals throughout their ranks, even reaching the top of the Nazi hierarchy. That is why Hitler's utterly disturbing and disgusting sexual acts were what stood out to me during this video segment.
2)"Inside the Mind of Hitler" describes the work of Dr. Walter Langer, the psychologist assigned with the task of psychologically profiling Adolf Hitler. In the simplest terms, his work brought Hitler into a different light. With his intense fervor and passion for his country and cause coupled with all his atrocities, Hitler was viewed by many as a relentless manifestation of evil. In reality, however, he was just a troubled individual who sought to compensate for his childhood. Langer and his team were able to give psychological explanations for Hitler's most prominent tendencies. Of these, I found that the most intriguing and vital for understanding Hitler as a person were his strong public appearance, his sexual orientation, and his anti-semitism. In public, Hitler spoke to his people with a strong, intense voice and an air of confidence that drove all of Germany to do his bidding. This seemingly unbreakable confidence, as Langer explained, was an example of the Messiah complex. His only two brothers had perished and he had not, leading him to believe that he had a reason for living and "divine protection." However, Hitler was described as a frail, weak child who, due to his father's abusive nature, was driven into the arms of his overprotective mother. He was actually a weak individual and this was evident in his sexual activity. He never had sexual relations with his mistress, Eva, but rather his pleasure came from his niece. He enjoyed humiliation at the hands of a woman since he was sexually aroused when she urinated on him. Langer explains that Hitler resented this weakness, but instead of accepting it, he goes through what Freud called projection. Basically, he denies his weakness and finds a scapegoat to project his hatred on. In Hitler's case, he chose the Jews since antisemitism was already a commonplace idealogy.
With these explanations, Langer drew up a series of psychological conclusions on Hitler. In particular, I found it fascinating how Langer predicted how the war would end, two years before its acutal occurence. Drawing upon the fact that Hitler was a weak individual who hated his weakness, he postulated that Hitler could not accept defeat and failure. He infered that Hitler would not simply surrender, but rather he would drive Germany into the ground and ultimately commit suicide. These inferences are supported by the Scorched Earth policy, where soldiers were ordered to tear the city apart, and also Hitler's last stand in Berlin where he took his life instead of surrendering to Russian soldiers.
2. After watching “Inside the Mind of Hitler” I found myself coming away with a new respect for the pioneers of this ambiguous field of study, psychology. Freud is commonly known for his outlandish theories, such as the sexuality of young children, but the way with which Dr. Langer was able to apply Freudian psychology to understand the mind of Hitler is astounding. This leads me to believe that although Freud had some fairly taboo seeming ideas, perhaps he was quite right about certain things. However interesting the psychoanalysis proved to be, it was still quite disturbing. What disturbed me most were not what complexes Hitler had developed but rather what of his childhood that could have influenced him to take on such a malicious role in his adulthood. It’s a frightening thought to me that childhood, a time that is mostly quite hazy when summoned back to the forefronts of our minds, has such control over what we are to become in our future. I was more specifically very disturbed with Hitler’s father, and how it is very likely that he beat him, which may have contributed to his repressed emotion and feelings of weakness which he chose to cover with heinous dictatorship in his adulthood. Also, Langer’s conclusion of Hitler having a “Messiah complex,” meaning he thinks he’s Christ because he was “chosen” to live when his other brothers died. The fact that Hitler’s genocide of the Jews was actually like some sort of personal crusade for Hitler, is really quite disturbing. Langer’s conclusions overall were tremendously remarkable, he was able to be so precise as to predict Hitler’s actions 2 years before the end of the war- right down to his suicide. The way with which he also picked up on small clues and investigated Hitler’s past through his family doctor etc., and from that drew connections to certain complexes to match the myriad of Hitler’s mind is amazing. Langer was a very talented man and deserves greater recognition, perhaps those who doubted him when he predicted Hitler’s actions soon after regretted doing so.
In 1943, a team of American psychologists, headed by one Dr. Walter Langer, put together a psychological profile of Adolf Hitler, under the instruction of the CIA. They pinpointed many psychological perversions that Hitler possessed, perhaps most importantly, a seemingly extreme confidence level, that below the surface, was not a true presentation of how he felt, his projection of hatred onto the Jews based on a self-loathing personality, and his messiah complex. The real Hitler was not a confident man, however, he presented himself as extremely confident in order to uphold an image that went along with his messiah complex of being a “savior to the German people” (Dr. Gerald Post, expert in political profiling and leader of the CIA’s first publicly acknowledged profiling unit). In the segment, Dr. Post said, “Hitler carried with him this messianic self-concept, and that messianic self-concept was the compensatory overlay for the profound void within”, this supports the theory that, due to a difficult childhood, Hitler carried with him, this eternal emptiness that was so unbearable, that he had to seek attention and praise in order to feel something, to feel important; his self-confidence was a cover up to disguise to himself, the fact that he had no self acclamation in regards to any purpose for being and felt an extreme lack of importance and control. Attracting attention and praise, and raising himself to this level of importance in the lives of so many, portraying himself as a savior, a chosen one, was his subconscious was of compensating for his lack of feeling. Hitler also had many self-loathing qualities; these were due to his perversions, which were due to his childhood. His own ego was disgusted by his perversions, and therefore, projected this hatred on other people as a way of protecting itself. Hitler’s hatred was mostly projected onto the Jew. Dr. Walter Langer believed that this projection was Hitler’s “way to deal with the terrible psychological consequences of his perversions”, it was anti-Semitism, which “was a prevalent part of mainstream European culture”. In the end, Dr. Langer’s psychological profile of Hitler was very accurate, to the point where he predicted that Hitler’s psychosis would only progress and escalate to a climax of self-destruction ending in his suicide.
It has been accepted that the most probable cause of Hitler’s perversion was his exceptionally difficult childhood; it is this part that is most interesting to me, it always leads me back to this one fact, this one central question…many people have experienced difficult childhoods, but not all of those people end up like Hitler. What is it that gives one person the ability to normally adjust to society and function without severe psychological handicaps and complexes, and another, like Hitler, not to? What is missing in a person like Adolf Hitler that inhibits them from any form of rational thinking? I have personally concluded so far that Hitler had a total lack of emotional intelligence, defined as “skill in perceiving, understanding, and managing emotions and feelings”, “awareness of one's own emotions and moods and those of others, especially in managing people” (Dictionary.com); essentially, the ability to cope with one’s own feelings and emotions, while still maintaining the ability to function “normally” in society, coupled with the ability to be in-tune with other peoples’ emotions; being able to intuitively sense what other people are feeling and act accordingly. I wonder, perhaps it is, in a sense, like chemistry, where only the exact combination of events, abilities, disabilities, effects, emotions, complexes, and perversions, in concert with precise timing in terms of history and world events would have created the right circumstances for a personality like Hitler’s to be formed. I believe that only a very specific set of circumstances would allow for the shaping of a figure such as Hitler. In accordance with this belief, I see great importance in the field of psychological profiling as explained in this video, because it analyzes the whole situation, and not just the individual; it focuses on the chemistry of the entire circumstance in order to put together a profile that, in Hitler’s case, proved itself to be very accurate.
I found a majority of what was analyzed in Inside the Mind of Hitler rather unnerving but at the same time intensely fascinating. I was really not surprised to find that there was something psychologically wrong seeing the heineous crimes he was able to give orders to carry out and his messiah complex. Finding out exactly what triggered this twisted mind however was quite interesting. Langer followed a fruedian psychoanalysis, saying that it his sexual drives that ran his queer mind. He dove quite deep and took apart every little aspect of Hitler's mind. The first thing that really caught my attention was that this manipulating had probably started when he was being potty trained. The fact that he may not have properly been trained on top of the abuse by his father later on may have contributed to his awesome hate and hatred of being belittled and looked down upon. This really brings about the importance of the role of parents in something as small as potty training the toddler. Langer concluded that it was this self hate of his own weaknesses that he constantly suppressed that eventually grew into his abstinate anti-semitism. The self hate was instead channeled into the extreme abhorrence of the Jews. Langer was also able to come up with a wide range of hypothesis and imformation that was appalling. The fact that Hitler found his neice urinating on him exciting was very very disturbing (as agreed upon by many others). Even the small significance that the weak Hitler was the only one of his siblings to survive was used by Langer to conclude that this led to Hitler's Messiah complex. Langer was quite thorough and accurate with his conclusions. He predicted the growing withdrawl and reclusiveness of Hitler that came about later in Hitler's reign as he came upon more pressure. He even concluded that Hitler will commit suicide. This was by far the most interesting information. Langer greatly impressed me with his analysis and predictions solely based upon what he was able to gather from Hitler's past without actually meeting him. This also goes further to prove the success of Sigmund Frued in coming up with this type of Analysis of the mind that evidently works to break down the minds of one of the most complex, disturbed, and satanic men in history.
By far the most interesting thing that I found out by watching Inside the Mind of Hitler was the fact that Langer was able to predict exactly what he predicted. For example, Langer called Hitter’s suicide 2 years before the end of the war when his report was given to the CIA. Not only did Langer call the suicide but also the less common appearances publicly because of his increasing shame of his perversity. Speaking of his perversity, the “performances” that Hitler forced his niece to participate in were horrible. First of all it is his niece that he is participating with in these crude acts with and second of all it is just nasty that someone would even think of that let alone perform it.
Another interesting thing that I learned about Hitler through the report of Langer was how strong of an Oedipus complex he had. I know that everyone says “imagine if Hitler never existed” but all I could think of while watching the first part of this documentary was what if Hitler’s dad was normal. It is weird to me that a father could do all the stuff that Hitler’s father did to him and to the members of his family including the dog. It was also interesting that Hitler’s dad was almost as crazy as Hitler himself yet people don’t think anything of Hitler’s father when asked about insane men of the 2000th century.
The work that Langer completed was astounding with all research and accurate conclusions that went into making the report. It was also interesting I thought that this work had such a large impact on the future. With this one report, Langer set a standard for making a psycho-analysis for each and every major world leader. I would be interested to see exactly what these reports have done to help the CIA and other organizations lately.
Question number two) In my opinion psychoanalyzing hitler was in many ways very intriguing such as the scientists were able to predict how Hitler behaved. How he behaved with his mother just proved the Oedipus Complex to be true. His unnatural obsession with his mother began when he was just a boy and how his father was very abusive so Hitler had to turn to his mother for support and care. As a result he had proven that the Oedipus complex is true by his actions or desires in his mother that is truly and absolutely disgusting. In another part of the video it describes how he had sexual relations with his niece and his “sick” pleasures that were being done while he was with her. For one it is absolutely disgusting that Hitler would be sexually aroused by his niece urinating on his face. This act demonstrates how Hitler is weak in a sense and how he is being “put in his place” by a woman. This is extremely hypocritical seeing that he ordered the mass murder of Jews. These two acts are what stood out to me the most in Psychoanalyzing Hitler.
Question 2
Dr. Walter Langler’s investigation and psychological profile of Hitler was fascinating for a number of reasons. Firstly, the fact that the sheer accuracy of his work was able to predict his suicide is very interesting and impressive. Also, I found the “messiah complex”, which resulted in Hitler believing that God gave him this mission, a compelling theory as well as one that can be substantiated fairly well. What is even a futher object of interest is that Langler was able to formulate these theories without ever actually meeting Hitler, and only through accounts and documents of him. Given the limited amount of information given to them, the work that this team did is amazing and made strides in the field of psychoanalysis. What I found most disturbing was the investigation into Hitler’s sexual fantasies, notable his request for his niece to urinate on his face. While the theory of a sexually humiliating act being a reveal for his inner weak being is a compelling idea, the whole idea of it is unsettling. Overall, I found Langer’s concepts and theories very interesting, and the project very impressive.
Watching the video, Inside the Mind of Hitler, it became clear to me how much research must have taken place in order to psychoanalyze Hitler. It seemed to me that coming up with the conclusions was easy when all the history was compiled. Figuring out all the details, such as Hitler’s childhood and his fragmented past, led to an accurate depiction of what really went on inside Hitler’s head. At first Dr. Langer was very skeptical as to whether psychoanalysis of Hitler could really take place. He was in awe of how much information would need to be gathered. However, as he dug deep into books and primary sources he found some very shocking realities. The most interesting thing about the video, which also happened to be really creepy, was about Hitler’s relationship with his niece. Hitler was so tortured inside the mind that to get stimulated, he would have his young niece pee on him. I found this very shocking because 1. it is disgusting but also 2. I actually believed it. The experts had worked so hard and me, growing up with the connotation of Hitler having a twisted mind, it was not hard to believe at all, as disturbing as it was. I was surprised as to how accurate the scientists got when analyzing Hitler. Another thing that was very interesting was how they were able to predict Hitler’s messiah complex. Looking through his childhood and how he grew up, Langer was able to determine that Hitler believed he was a divine soul who was personally touched by God. I thought it was interesting that a man like Hitler would be affiliated with a personal religion at all. But the video continued to say that Hitler was not tied to a religious authority, but only tied to the messiah he had seen in himself. For him, his religion was the ‘mission’ given to him by God. It was amazing as to how much Langer was able to predict about Hitler. The amount of research and effort that must have gone into deriving conclusions such as these must have take hundreds of hours.
2. In the video Walter Langer looks at a perspective of Hitler that no one had ever tried to see before. He was able to analyze someone that he didn’t even know and had no chance of ever meeting. I found his discoveries fascinating and I was really surprised by how Hitler’s behavior was influenced by his childhood relationships, especially that of his father. His father was incredibly abusive and repeatedly beat him. Hitler was already a relatively weak child, but this relationship made him weaker and weaker and more prone to violence when he was older. I thought it was very interesting that Langer could connect this to his future obsession with war and overall violence. His dramatic tendencies to attack and kill are in a way simply his reactions to how powerless he once felt. I also was very impressed by how Langer was able to predict Hitler’s future actions, especially the fact that he was going to kill himself. It speaks to how resourceful and innovative Langer was in his line of field that he could use his research in a way where he was able to accurately understand Hitler’s motives and thought process. Hitler’s inner thoughts and feelings were a secret to almost everyone, and his maliciousness was incomprehensible. However, Langer’s psychoanalysis of the infamous ruler proved to be unmatched, and he was able to accurately discover things no one else before had thought of.
At the time, Langer’s task seemed to be an impossible one. Hitler expertly hid his past, the period of time that would give the most insight into his mind. However, after much research and deliberation, Langer seemingly hit the nail on the head. Hitler exhibited signs of basic Freudian complexes which developed into deep psychotic tendencies. These complexes allowed Langer to accurately predict Hitler’s actions. When watching Inside the Mind of Hitler, I was most disturbed by the seeming insignificant events that led to Hitler’s complexes.
To begin with Hitler’s main child hood problem was his father’s frequent beatings. These beatings which pushed Hitler closer to his mother seemed too common to yield someone as crazy as Hitler. Many people experience childhoods with abusive fathers and an even greater number of people seem to be extremely close with their mothers. This scares me because it shows that someone as crazy as Hitler isn’t so unique. Another scary concept is that something as simple as potty training can influence someone’s psyche. This makes me reevaluate my own childhood. Could my parents have done anything to negatively influence my psyche?
My biggest reassurance is that Hitler had some help from fate. He was in the right place at the right time which allowed him to take over Germany. Although Hitler type people may be more common than I would like, chances are they won’t be rising to power soon. Also chances are that few people will be subjected to the barrage of issues Hitler was.
Modern psychology is raising interesting questions about a topic that is surprisingly unknown to us- our own minds. For something that seems infinitely complex, it seems the development of the human mind falls somewhat startlingly into a pattern of changes and possibilities. The slew of psychological disorders that exist are often called "too general" to be widely applicable. But if our minds are truly simply a series of chemical reactions, is it so odd to predict that they work to produce common results?
Within the video, the re-enactment of the initial commission to profile Hitler seemed to convey a sense of impossibility about the task. Certainly, at the time psychology had not developed to its modern capabilities, and even many of our advanced analysis techniques could not be applied to a Fuhrer who would most certainly be unavailable for questioning. The team was forced to work with uncertain accounts and dubious evidence.
To an extent, I think the discovery and question of Hitler's family doctor was a great piece of luck. His confirmation of Hitler's suspected relationship with his mother let them support their conclusion with a vital piece of hard evidence- the kind the team never truly expected to get. Admittedly the analysis seems nearly too perfect, as any number of fairly common reasons could bring a man to cry over his wife's death. The presumption of Oedipus complex seems to be drawn whenever the psychologist is attempting to demonize the subject of the analysis. As dehumanizing Hitler was likely a desired outcome of the analysis, it surprises me less that it was attributed to him.
Even more dubious was the supposed "toilet training period disruption" that led to Hitler's sadism, aggression, and asexuality. Drawn in hindsight, their conclusions seem to follow logic. However, I feel it would have been hard to have those psychologists bet any amount of money on Hitler at birth without the benefit of hindsight. The asexuality and love affair with his niece again follows the demonization pattern, as it could be used as another object to degrade Hitler's image.
In support of the conclusions, however, Hitler was an uncommonly cruel and powerful man. As such, it could be believed that he had some uncommon psychological problems. The analysis called him 'weak,' something that likely pleased any who read the report. However, compensating violently with an outward strength would explain Hitler's drive at the head of the Nazi party. His Messiah complex would certainly explain his visionary-like approach to the war and Holocaust. The parallel with Christ was inaccurate- Hitler likely did not identify himself with any benevolent being. More likely, he simply drew on the dream of omnipotence.
Langer's final conclusion, that Hitler would withdraw with the decline of the German front, was perhaps his most astounding. It is this conclusion, despite any presumed evidence, that gives the entire report its credibility. As such, I must give Langer's conclusions their due place as serendipitously, and perhaps calculatedly, correct.
Dr. Langer’s psychoanalysis of Hitler showed that he was the archetypal serial killer. And just like serial killers are disturbing, everything about Hitler’s background is disturbing as well. The unusual relationship he had with his mother, the abusive relationship with his father and the borderline incestuous relationship with his niece and other close relatives (although the factuality of this is uncertain) all led to the destructive patterns which gave rise of the most powerful man in Europe during the early 20th century. Personally, I find the information on Hitler’s sexuality to be the most disturbing. I mean, it must’ve been a field day for Freudian psychoanalytical psychologists once they discovered some of the facts of Hitler’s early life. He is the most well known person to have such a classic case of the Oedipus complex. Somehow, these early sexual frustrations led to him becoming asexual (as claimed by those close to him) later in life. In summary, we’re talking about the mind of a genocidal madman, a better question to ask is “what was normal about Hitler?”
2. I found the most disturbing thing by far was the relationship between Hitler and his niece as told by Otto. This relationship shows how very, very messed up Hitler's child hood was. For his father and his relationship with his mother to have screwed him up so much is unreal. Then for Langer to be able to take such information and accurately predict the actions of Hitler and others in his staff is amazing. He said that an assassination from the officer corps was coming and sure enough, an assassination plot hatched and failed. Then he predicted Hitler would kill himself and become reclusive once he started to lose. Once again he was spot on and Hitler did kill himself. This skill of psycho-analyzing is a powerful tool and I'm very glad our nation was able to discover its full potential and use it effectively.
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