Alma_Animal
17-mar-2010, 19:14
.
Part 1
From VegSource: http://www.vegsource.com/news/2010/03/why-hitler-was-not-a-vegetarian.html
----------------------
One of the comments often aimed at those such as myself, who write about famous vegetarians of the past--and how many of them were paragons of virtue who practiced non-violence and compassion--is the following: " But wasn't Hitler a vegetarian?' one such example began when in 1991 I wrote to the New York Times commenting on the vegetarianism of Isaac Bashevis Singer and how this important feature of Singer's life had been glossed over in his recent obituary. I had interviewed Singer for my book Famous Vegetarians and Their Favorite Recipes and he had been vehement on the issue of respect for animals.
Two weeks later, under the headline: 'The Vegetarian Road to World Peace,' the Times published a reply to my letter from the well known author and New Yorker essayist, Janet Malcolm. It is worth quoting in full: "Rynn Berry's fine letter about Isaac Bashevis Singer's vegetarianism reminded me of the comment Mr. Singer made at a luncheon to a women who noticed approvingly that he had refused to eat the meat course, and who said that her health had improved when she, too, gave up meat. 'I do it for the health of the chickens,' Mr. Singer said.
Mr. Singer's belief, quoted by Mr. Berry, "that everything connected with vegetarianism is of the highest importance, because there will never be any peace in the world so long as we eat animals,' may have puzzled readers. What does eating or not eating meat have to do with world peace?
" Milan Kundera gives us the answer on page 289 of The Unbearable Lightness of Being :
'True human goodness, in all its purity and freedom, can come to the fore only when its recipient has no power. Mankind's true moral test (which lies deeply buried from view) consists of its attitude toward those who are at its mercy: the animals. And in this respect, mankind has suffered a fundamental debacle, a debacle so fundamental that all others stem from it.'
Janet Malcolm's response to my letter drew a reply from another Times reader. Under the headline "what about Hitler?" the writer castigated Ms. Malcolm for implying that the universal acceptance of vegetarianism will bring about world peace because, 'Adolf Hitler was a vegetarian all his life and wrote extensively on the subject."
To me this response was all-too-predictable; for I have yet to give a talk on vegetarianism in which the tasteless question of Hitler's vegetarianism has not been raised. Invariably, at every bookstore signing, at every lecture, on every phone-in talk show, at least one person has asked me half mockingly: "Is Hitler in your book?" or "Why didn't you put Hitler in your book?"
Following the latest letter on September, 1991, the New York Times published two rejoinders to this question. Under the headline, "Don't Put Hitler Among the Vegetarians," the correspondent(Richard Schwartz, author of Judaism and Vegetarianism ) pointed out that Hitler would occasionally go on vegetarian binges to cure himself of excessive sweatiness and flatulence, but that his main diet was meat-centered. He also cited Robert Payne, Albert Speer, and other well-known Hitler biographers, who mentioned Hitler's predilection for such non-vegetarian foods as Bavarian sausages, ham, liver, and game. Furthermore, it was argued, if Hitler had been a vegetarian, he would not have banned vegetarian organizations in Germany and the occupied countries; nor would he have failed to urge a meatless diet on the German people as a way of coping with Germany's World War II food shortage.
Under the headline, "He Loved His Squab," another correspondent cited a passage from a cookbook that had been written by a European chef, Dione Lucas, who was an eyewitness to Hitler's meat-eating. In her Gourmet Cooking School Cookbook (1964), Lucas, drawing on her experiences as a hotel chef in Hamburg during the 1930s, remembered being called upon quite often to prepare Hitler's favorite dish, which was not a vegetarian one.
"I do not mean to spoil your appetite for stuffed squab," she writes, "but you might be interested to know that it was a great favorite with Mr. Hitler, who dined at the hotel often. Let us not hold that against a fine recipe though."
Not even the august New York Times has a staff large enough to verify all the facts in the letters published in the Letters to the Editor section; so I decided to look up the specific passages in Payne's biography of Hitler and Dione Lucas's The Gourmet Cooking School Cookbook that cast doubt on Hitler's vegetarianism. Sure enough, Robert Payne, whose biography of Hitler, The Life and Death of Adolf Hitler, has been called definitive, scotches the rumor that Hitler might have been a vegetarian. According to Payne, Hitler's vegetarianism was a fiction made up by his propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels to give him the aura of a revolutionary ascetic, a Fascistic Gandhi, if you will. It is worth quoting from Payne's biography directly:
"Hitler's asceticism played an important part in the image he projected over Germany. According to the widely believed legend, he neither smoked nor drank, nor did he eat meat or have anything to do with women. Only the first was true. He drank beer and diluted wine frequently, had a special fondness for Bavarian sausages and kept a mistress, Eva Braun, who lived with him quietly in the Berghof. There had been other discreet affairs with women. His asceticism was fiction invented by Goebbels to emphasize his total dedication, his self-control, the distance that separated him from other men. By this outward show of asceticism, he could claim that he was dedicated to the service of his people."
"In fact, he was remarkably self-indulgent and possessed none of the instincts of the ascetic. His cook, an enormously fat man named Willy Kanneneberg, produced exquisite meals and acted as court jester. Although Hitler had no fondness for meat except in the form of sausages, and never ate fish, he enjoyed caviar. He was a connoisseur of sweets, crystallized fruit and cream cakes, which he consumed in astonishing quantities. He drank tea and coffee drowned in cream and sugar. No dictator ever had a sweeter tooth."
So there we have it: Hitler doted on Bavarian sausages and caviar. Not even the loosest definition of vegetarianism could be stretched to fit these gastronomic abominations. Yet, because non-vegetarians often have an elastic definition of what constitutes a vegetarian, they think that people like Hitler who eat fish, pigeon and sausages are vegetarians. By this criterion, even jackals and hyenas, who eat fruits and vegetables between kills, could be classified as vegetarians. Dr. Roberta Kalechofsky makes a similar point in her essay entitled "Hitler's Vegetarianism: A Question of How You Define Vegetarianism"2 :
"Biographical material about Hitler's alleged or qualified vegetarianism are contradictory. He was sometimes described as a 'vegetarian,' but his fondness for sausages, caviar, and occasionally ham was well known. On the other hand, on the basis of foods he was known to like or eat, 'red meat' is never listed. His alleged vegetarianism was often coupled with a description of him as an ascetic individual. For example, the April 14th, 1996 Sunday magazine edition of the New York Times, celebrating its 100th anniversary, included this early description of Hitler's diet in an article previously published on May 30, 1937, "At Home With The Fuhrer.'
"It is well known that Hitler is a vegetarian and does not drink or smoke. His lunch and dinner consist, therefore, for the most part of soup, eggs, vegetables and mineral water, although he occasionally relishes a slice of ham and relieves the tediousness of his diet with such delicacies as caviar..."
"The New York Times definition of 'vegetarian,' which included foods such as ham is quite a stretch of definition of 'vegetarian.'3
Quite a strech indeed! Even as early as 1911, the 11th edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica (one of the most widely consulted reference works) defined vegetarianism as follows "vegetarianism, a comparatively modern word, which came into use about the year 1847, as applied to the use of foods from which fish, flesh and fowl are excluded."4 So there really is no excuse for an editor of the New York Time writing in the 1930's to be so misinformed as to have called Hitler a vegetarian.
Nevertheless, modern biographers who should also know better, have enshrined the myth that Hitler was a vegetarian simply because they have failed to do their homework in this regard; so their books, while scholarly in other respects, are flawed. Even medical doctors who have penned biographies of Hitler are laughably misinformed about the vegetarian diet that they write about with such an air of pompous authority. To take only the most recent example: Fritz Redlich, MD., in his book Hitler, Diagnosis of A Destructive Prophet, says " Several Hitler associates, amongst them Otto Wagener, reported that Hitler became a vegetarian after the death of his niece Angela (Geli) Raubal in 1931. As a teenager, and young man, Hitler certainly ate meat. He also ate meat during his service in World War I and probably before his imprisonment at Landsberg. Hitler's vegetarianism was quite strict. 5 He praised raw food but did not adhere to a diet of uncooked foods, which was a fad at the time. He avoided any kind of meat, with the exception of an Austrian dish he loved, Leberknodl (liver dumpling)."6 It's typical that Dr. Redlich doesn't feel called upon to explain how Hitler could be a strict vegetarian and still indulge his passion for liver dumplings!
Part 1
From VegSource: http://www.vegsource.com/news/2010/03/why-hitler-was-not-a-vegetarian.html
----------------------
One of the comments often aimed at those such as myself, who write about famous vegetarians of the past--and how many of them were paragons of virtue who practiced non-violence and compassion--is the following: " But wasn't Hitler a vegetarian?' one such example began when in 1991 I wrote to the New York Times commenting on the vegetarianism of Isaac Bashevis Singer and how this important feature of Singer's life had been glossed over in his recent obituary. I had interviewed Singer for my book Famous Vegetarians and Their Favorite Recipes and he had been vehement on the issue of respect for animals.
Two weeks later, under the headline: 'The Vegetarian Road to World Peace,' the Times published a reply to my letter from the well known author and New Yorker essayist, Janet Malcolm. It is worth quoting in full: "Rynn Berry's fine letter about Isaac Bashevis Singer's vegetarianism reminded me of the comment Mr. Singer made at a luncheon to a women who noticed approvingly that he had refused to eat the meat course, and who said that her health had improved when she, too, gave up meat. 'I do it for the health of the chickens,' Mr. Singer said.
Mr. Singer's belief, quoted by Mr. Berry, "that everything connected with vegetarianism is of the highest importance, because there will never be any peace in the world so long as we eat animals,' may have puzzled readers. What does eating or not eating meat have to do with world peace?
" Milan Kundera gives us the answer on page 289 of The Unbearable Lightness of Being :
'True human goodness, in all its purity and freedom, can come to the fore only when its recipient has no power. Mankind's true moral test (which lies deeply buried from view) consists of its attitude toward those who are at its mercy: the animals. And in this respect, mankind has suffered a fundamental debacle, a debacle so fundamental that all others stem from it.'
Janet Malcolm's response to my letter drew a reply from another Times reader. Under the headline "what about Hitler?" the writer castigated Ms. Malcolm for implying that the universal acceptance of vegetarianism will bring about world peace because, 'Adolf Hitler was a vegetarian all his life and wrote extensively on the subject."
To me this response was all-too-predictable; for I have yet to give a talk on vegetarianism in which the tasteless question of Hitler's vegetarianism has not been raised. Invariably, at every bookstore signing, at every lecture, on every phone-in talk show, at least one person has asked me half mockingly: "Is Hitler in your book?" or "Why didn't you put Hitler in your book?"
Following the latest letter on September, 1991, the New York Times published two rejoinders to this question. Under the headline, "Don't Put Hitler Among the Vegetarians," the correspondent(Richard Schwartz, author of Judaism and Vegetarianism ) pointed out that Hitler would occasionally go on vegetarian binges to cure himself of excessive sweatiness and flatulence, but that his main diet was meat-centered. He also cited Robert Payne, Albert Speer, and other well-known Hitler biographers, who mentioned Hitler's predilection for such non-vegetarian foods as Bavarian sausages, ham, liver, and game. Furthermore, it was argued, if Hitler had been a vegetarian, he would not have banned vegetarian organizations in Germany and the occupied countries; nor would he have failed to urge a meatless diet on the German people as a way of coping with Germany's World War II food shortage.
Under the headline, "He Loved His Squab," another correspondent cited a passage from a cookbook that had been written by a European chef, Dione Lucas, who was an eyewitness to Hitler's meat-eating. In her Gourmet Cooking School Cookbook (1964), Lucas, drawing on her experiences as a hotel chef in Hamburg during the 1930s, remembered being called upon quite often to prepare Hitler's favorite dish, which was not a vegetarian one.
"I do not mean to spoil your appetite for stuffed squab," she writes, "but you might be interested to know that it was a great favorite with Mr. Hitler, who dined at the hotel often. Let us not hold that against a fine recipe though."
Not even the august New York Times has a staff large enough to verify all the facts in the letters published in the Letters to the Editor section; so I decided to look up the specific passages in Payne's biography of Hitler and Dione Lucas's The Gourmet Cooking School Cookbook that cast doubt on Hitler's vegetarianism. Sure enough, Robert Payne, whose biography of Hitler, The Life and Death of Adolf Hitler, has been called definitive, scotches the rumor that Hitler might have been a vegetarian. According to Payne, Hitler's vegetarianism was a fiction made up by his propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels to give him the aura of a revolutionary ascetic, a Fascistic Gandhi, if you will. It is worth quoting from Payne's biography directly:
"Hitler's asceticism played an important part in the image he projected over Germany. According to the widely believed legend, he neither smoked nor drank, nor did he eat meat or have anything to do with women. Only the first was true. He drank beer and diluted wine frequently, had a special fondness for Bavarian sausages and kept a mistress, Eva Braun, who lived with him quietly in the Berghof. There had been other discreet affairs with women. His asceticism was fiction invented by Goebbels to emphasize his total dedication, his self-control, the distance that separated him from other men. By this outward show of asceticism, he could claim that he was dedicated to the service of his people."
"In fact, he was remarkably self-indulgent and possessed none of the instincts of the ascetic. His cook, an enormously fat man named Willy Kanneneberg, produced exquisite meals and acted as court jester. Although Hitler had no fondness for meat except in the form of sausages, and never ate fish, he enjoyed caviar. He was a connoisseur of sweets, crystallized fruit and cream cakes, which he consumed in astonishing quantities. He drank tea and coffee drowned in cream and sugar. No dictator ever had a sweeter tooth."
So there we have it: Hitler doted on Bavarian sausages and caviar. Not even the loosest definition of vegetarianism could be stretched to fit these gastronomic abominations. Yet, because non-vegetarians often have an elastic definition of what constitutes a vegetarian, they think that people like Hitler who eat fish, pigeon and sausages are vegetarians. By this criterion, even jackals and hyenas, who eat fruits and vegetables between kills, could be classified as vegetarians. Dr. Roberta Kalechofsky makes a similar point in her essay entitled "Hitler's Vegetarianism: A Question of How You Define Vegetarianism"2 :
"Biographical material about Hitler's alleged or qualified vegetarianism are contradictory. He was sometimes described as a 'vegetarian,' but his fondness for sausages, caviar, and occasionally ham was well known. On the other hand, on the basis of foods he was known to like or eat, 'red meat' is never listed. His alleged vegetarianism was often coupled with a description of him as an ascetic individual. For example, the April 14th, 1996 Sunday magazine edition of the New York Times, celebrating its 100th anniversary, included this early description of Hitler's diet in an article previously published on May 30, 1937, "At Home With The Fuhrer.'
"It is well known that Hitler is a vegetarian and does not drink or smoke. His lunch and dinner consist, therefore, for the most part of soup, eggs, vegetables and mineral water, although he occasionally relishes a slice of ham and relieves the tediousness of his diet with such delicacies as caviar..."
"The New York Times definition of 'vegetarian,' which included foods such as ham is quite a stretch of definition of 'vegetarian.'3
Quite a strech indeed! Even as early as 1911, the 11th edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica (one of the most widely consulted reference works) defined vegetarianism as follows "vegetarianism, a comparatively modern word, which came into use about the year 1847, as applied to the use of foods from which fish, flesh and fowl are excluded."4 So there really is no excuse for an editor of the New York Time writing in the 1930's to be so misinformed as to have called Hitler a vegetarian.
Nevertheless, modern biographers who should also know better, have enshrined the myth that Hitler was a vegetarian simply because they have failed to do their homework in this regard; so their books, while scholarly in other respects, are flawed. Even medical doctors who have penned biographies of Hitler are laughably misinformed about the vegetarian diet that they write about with such an air of pompous authority. To take only the most recent example: Fritz Redlich, MD., in his book Hitler, Diagnosis of A Destructive Prophet, says " Several Hitler associates, amongst them Otto Wagener, reported that Hitler became a vegetarian after the death of his niece Angela (Geli) Raubal in 1931. As a teenager, and young man, Hitler certainly ate meat. He also ate meat during his service in World War I and probably before his imprisonment at Landsberg. Hitler's vegetarianism was quite strict. 5 He praised raw food but did not adhere to a diet of uncooked foods, which was a fad at the time. He avoided any kind of meat, with the exception of an Austrian dish he loved, Leberknodl (liver dumpling)."6 It's typical that Dr. Redlich doesn't feel called upon to explain how Hitler could be a strict vegetarian and still indulge his passion for liver dumplings!