German youth resistance in WWII

This is in response to those who are wishing to give the new Pope a free pass on his activities during WWII on the basis of his age. I mentioned yesterday in a few posts that I had known a few German immigrants who resisted Hitler during their youth, and this is a followup to those posts.

The four best known groups of young Nazi resistance are The White Rose, The Eidelweiss Pirates, The Swing Youth, and the Helmut Hubener Group. The White Rose was a group of college students, ranging in age from eighteen to their mid twenties. They were active in raising consiousness and propaganda work until 1943, when they were rooted out by the Gestapo, and members were incarcerated and killed.

The Eidelweiss Pirates were a group of kids who stood in opposition to, and took on members of the Hitler Youth. Made up of working class kids, aged thirteen and above(I was personally aquainted with a member), the Pirates hated the conformity and mission of the Hitler Youth movement. Operating out of multiple cities, they would confront the Hitler Youth in massive brawls that sometimes involved gunfire. Many were imprisoned, and some perished at the hands of the SS.

The Swing Youth were similar in makeup and ideology as the Eidelweiss Pirates. Hooked on American jazz culture, they stood in direct opposition to the rigid ideology of the Hitler Youth, and confronted members of the HJ at any opportunity. On the personal order of Himmler, many Swing Youth members were incarcerated for the duration of the war.

The Helmut Hubener group, founded by Helmut Hubener ranged in age from fourteen to sixteen. Motivated by their faith(LDS)and their sense of moral outrage, the Hubener Group printed leaflets, tangled with the Hitler Youth, and passed on the broadcasts of the BBC to German people yearning to here the truth. Captured in 1942, three members of the group were incarcerated, while their leader, Helmut, was executed on the personal order of Hitler himself, at the age of seventeen, thus being only two years older than Ratzinger at the time.

For more information:
<http://www.jlrweb.com/whiterose/>
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edelwei%DFpiraten>
<http://members.aol.com/baronvanc/swingyox.htm>
<http://historytogo.utah.gov/germanhero.html>
<http://www.renewamerica.us/forum/?date=030309>
Or do a google search on the key names, and check out Amazon.com for related books and DVDs.

I write all of this to point out that Ratzinger DID have a choice, and that his age should not excuse his actions. Youth of his age were fighting back both literally and figuretively out of a sense of moral outrage at what the Nazi regime was doing. Yes, they paid a heavy price, some of them the ulitimate price. However these youth, as most youth of their age, both then and now, knew a great evil when they were confronted with it, and chose to fight back, some out of deep religious convictions. Ratzinger, when confronted with the same choice, chose wrongly. He chose to go along with the Nazis to get along. He chose the way of moral cowardice. This, I feel, is a huge moral flaw to have in a man who has been elected to the highest office of the Catholic church. And to add insult to injury, the man has never repented for his actions.

I am not badmouthing Christians or Catholics here. I'm simply pointing out that the election of this man as Pope is rewarding moral cowardice, and sets a poor spiritual example for the church. My hope is that the Church will learn from this mistake, and do a much better job in choosing a Pope the next time.

BWA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! :rofl:

It's been about 2000 years and they haven't "learned" hardly anything.

Not many, but some of the worst. Indulgences, the Inquistion, they're gone now. But yes, their learning curve is a steep one, that they progress slowly upwards on.

It's just hard for me to qualify "not killing" or "not stealing" as learning.

Mother's Catholic, father's Southern Baptist. Makes me either Roman Baptist, or Southern Catholic. Talk about:crazy:

OK, so I'm trying to be optimistic here:evilgrin:

was its head for a long time, over 20 years. It was not a ceremonial position, and Ratzinger sent out many documents and disciplinary commands to those he saw as erring from the perfect doctrine. Priests and nuns must submit or be punished, up to and including excommunication. Of course, the proclamations and corrections also were intended for laypeople, for example those who might dare to support such a clearly non-doctrinally correct group as the Masons (see below).

The new name of the Inquisition - the old name wasn't popular, imagine that! - is the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. Since this is the 21st century, it has a web site (http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith). (Just imagine what the web site of the Inquisition would have been in earlier centuries when it was really in the news!)

Here are some tidbits from the CDF/Inquisition web site:



You can see "some texts by Cardinal Ratzinger" at the site, mostly homilies on various ceremonial occasions, here: http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/doc_rat_index.htm

On the home page there are also lists of "doctrinal documents" and "disciplinary documents." Many of these are in Latin and so not readily accessible to most people born in the last century, but a few are available in living languages. Here's a sample "disciplinary document":

n/t

Like I said earlier, I grew up around a few resistance members, and yes, they suffered for it. But their morality wouldn't let them make any other choice, and they never regretted it.

to badmouth someone who didn't.

Heroism, or even knowing how to be a hero, isn't everybody's forte. Martyrdom isn't a requirment. Not everyone is resistance.

For example, Kerry volunteered and Bush did the least possible to serve his country. I honor Kerry's service, but what can one say about Bush except that it didn't recommend him? SAme for Ratz. Hey, being Hitler Youth isn't a PLUS on the resume. Keeping your head down isn't a PLUS.

My in-laws and their family had German soldiers living in their house. They could have made the decision that would have gotten the entire family, if not all the men in the village, killed. Sometimes just surviving is enough heroism for one guy.

Yet Ratzinger actively helped Nazis. Sorry, but for somebody who was already on a path to priesthood(having been enrolled in the seminary in '39), who was supposedly such a moral and religious person, this is a very odd thing for him to do, joining the Hitler Youth. Others, like Hubener and Wobbe, were just as motivated by their religious convictions, and they joined the resistance. But Ratzinger didn't resist, he complied.

There are times when it the correct choice is to hunker down and survive, and there are times when one should resist. IMO, Ratzinger made a poor choice, especially for one as supposedly moral as he was. He took the cowards way out, rather than making a stand on morals and principles. I find that to be a noteworthy blemish on the character of the man who is now Pope.

but he joined. That's significant. Many, many German youth at the time neither resisted nor joined in. There was a middle path and he did not even choose that, the path of "least resistance."

How many many German youth from 1941-1945 refused to join the HJ. How many many German youth between 1939-1945 refused to be drafted into the Wehrmach?

Though it is hard to get an accurate account, the range is from five thousand to thirty thousand that joined the various German youth resistance movements. More unknown thousands fled the country or went underground to avoid serving in the German army.

What % would that be in a nation of 150 million?

people using words like moral cowardice in this respect should be f#cking ashamed of themselves. its very very easy to judge someone's actions as a kid during on of the nastiest regimes in history some 60+ years later.
I'm sure all those keyboard heros would've been soooo f#cking brave. just hope they'll never have to prove it.

Who in the face of the one of the most evil regimes in the history of the twentieth century didn't comply, nor actively help the Nazis. Instead, at the same age and upbringing as Ratzinger, they chose to resist evil. I had a number of neighbors growing up who were more heroic in this case than Ratzinger, for they chose to fight evil. Ratzinger, on the other hand, chose to aid it.

Sorry friend, but I can't give this new Pope a pass. We rightfully take Bush to task for his act of moral cowardice during the Vietnam war, why should we give this Pope a pass?

so what gives you the right to call him a coward?

Bush was an adult. this man was a kid.

Whether it happened when he was a kid or not.

If he had once said, "Am I proud I was in the HJ? was it something I wanted to do? No! I was young and afraid and wanted to protect my family. I regret the time I spent in the HJ, but at that time and in that place, I felt a 14-year-old boy had no choice." That's it. But, noooo...

However I started the protesting the Vietnam war when I was nine, stepping in between my abusive, shotgun wielding father and my mother when I was thirteen(and taking the consequential beatings), and saving lives and property as a voluteer firefighter when I was in my early twenties. I'm pretty certain of what I would have done in WWII Germany.

And even though this man was a kid as you say, kids as young as he, and younger, were defying the Nazis, and suffering the consequences, while Ratzinger kow-towed to them.

As far as what gives me the right, well, first off, the First Amendment. Secondly, having been through some hell and back myself, I think that also gives me the right. And having grown up around true heroes, who actively resisted Hitler and all he stood far, honoring their memory also gives me the right.

But again I ask, isn't it a bit hypocritical when we rightfully take Bush to task for taking the coward's way out in the Vietnam war, yet give Ratzinger a pass for doing the same thing in WWII. Sorry, but having a person as Pope who aided and abetted the Nazi regime leaves a bad taste in my mouth, especially coming after another Pope who actively resisted the same regime.

I just don't think you can call anyone who didn't actively fight the nazi's a coward, without knowing the exact position they were in.

the world who be very black and white with only a handful of hero's and billions of cowards.

why is it difficult to understand that many people figure a Pope would have a higher level of accountability than your average german?

As a youth, JP II stood up to the Nazis and suffered for it. As a youth, Ratzinger didn't. The difference is striking.

Most people don't say Ratzinger is irredeemable as a human being b/c he did what most German youth did, but "not being irredeemable" and "being Holy See" tend to be different standards in the eyes of most.

Nice, concise, correct statement. The issue in a nutshell, thanks!:yourock:

very interesting :hi:

There are many opportunities NOW to stand up against repression of an underground nature in the US, and I haven't found many takers.
As Jimi Hendrix (and with his attitude it's hardly surprising that he didn't live long) put it "and the wind cries Mary".

The truth is that Ratzinger DID have the choice to try to lay low, and it is also true that he might have gone on to become a great progressive reformer in the Church, in which case I suspect most DUers, except those who found him insufficiently radical, would forgive him easily. But the connexion between his complicity in Nazism and his rightwing repressive inclinations now is overwhelmingly tempting to draw, even though it is largely a red herring.

As for what FORBIDDEN "white collar militancy" forms there are now, for those who think themselves brave, please email me and I'll give you plenty of suggestions. Start by raising disfavored issues, like how the entire press and media AND DEMOCRATS were silent for months during the campaign on the flipflop spin, or why there is no national organization canvassing to end absolute poverty, similar to Greenpeace, or even to stop the Iraq war, or why for a quarter century after one long one in Puerto Rico, there were no law journal articles in the thousands of journals focusing on discrimination on the basis of politics, and many more.

But you can try to email me at cloudythescribbler@yahoo.com if you REALLY want to be brave, albeit probably uncelebrated.

against attrocities being commited around the world rather than caving into pressure to go along with it for his own wellbeing?

Just a thought...

He shouldn't be tried for war crimes.

But since there are one billion Catholics world wide, couldn't the Cardinals find one who didn't fight in support of the Third Reich?

Its time for it to stop.

Don

For someone to be chosen as the high cleric of a worldwide church would mean to some that his life has been lived in an outstandingly humane and holy manner. At least that's what I would have thought.

There is ALWAYS choice, and the choice could be and I'm sure would have been very dangerous for him.

He took the low road. And is now rewarded by some by being made Pope.

www.missionnotaccomplished.us (a day to reflect on all the lies, and all the excuses about the lies, and all the lying excusers of the liars)

An excellent account of someone who also had a choice. And chose defiance.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0312421133/qid=1114012745/sr=2-1/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_1/102-5269712-4850549

I found this portion of a review to be rather chilling in its parallels to our own society:

What was it about Germany that made the rise of Adolf Hitler and his murderous regime possible? That troubling question has occupied many fine minds over the last six decades, few more lucid and thoughtful than the late historian and journalist Sebastian Haffner. In this book, drawn from a manuscript he did not live to complete, Haffner examines the social and cultural conditions that made Germany ill-equipped for democracy and ripe for totalitarianism. Among these, Haffner writes, were a generational war between an apathetic adult population and a youth "familiar with nothing but political clamor, sensation, anarchy, and the dangerous lure of irresponsible numbers games"; a fatal fondness for the winner-and-loser dichotomy of sports and a rage for spectacle and entertainment; a resignation through which ordinary people came to "adapt to living with clenched teeth, in a manner of speaking," rather than stand up in protest.

A very interesting book; I consider it a must-read
.
It is about the rise of the Nazis during the Weimar Republic, not about Nazi Germany; it ends in 1933.

From the passage I cited it sounds eerily like the situation we find ourselves in now -- minus the depression. I fear that should that final element kick in, we could truly find ourselves on the road to all-out fascism.

You hit it on the head.

This is why his various excuses fall flat with me. All ex-hitler youth say they didn't like it. Blah blah blah. He's a coward, plain and simple.

an AWOL soldier that is leader of the "free" world and an ex-hilter youth, leading the christain world.

Strange times indeed. Be afraind, be very afraid.

A scion of the family that put Hitler in business leading the "free world", now aided and abetted by a former unrepentant member of the Hitler Youth leading the largest Christian congregation.

Somewhere, Hitler is laughing his head off.

and have joined the equally non-existent resistance in small-town Bavaria...

The first important decision he took in his adult life was to desert (and, yes, he would have been shot at gunpoint had the SS caught him). I dislike him for many reasons, but this was very brave.

First off, organizations such as the Eidelweiss Pirates and the Swing Youth were national organizations, with chapters in cities and towns across Germany. There were chapters in Bavaria, Munich(where Ratzinger attended seminary), Salzburg(18 miles from his hometown), Frankfurt and other towns across Bavaria. Ratzinger wouldn't have had to look very hard or very far to find the resistance movement.

Oh, a radios were quite common throughout Germany at the time, I've got a few examples of them myself, since I collect old radios.

And while he made the right decision in his adult life, he chose the wrong decision in his youth. And yes, those things do come back and haunt you.

order to spread their propaganda more effectively. They made sure, of course, that you couldn't use them to listen to the BBC.

If you don't know even that small fact about life in fascist Germany, maybe you should be more careful before making sweeping judgments like "Ratzinger wouldn't have had to look very hard or very far to find the resistance movement".

I'm sure they ran advertisements in a local paper...

And do you know how easy it is to change the crystal in order to tune in whatever you wish?

As far as finding people like the Pirates, or the Swing Youth, well, like my neighbor years ago said "Zey vere all ofer school, it vas, how you say, da cool ting to do as a youth. Besides, how could vun not resist, it vas da moral ting to do." I don't know, but it sounds like Ratzinger could have found the resistance if he had chosen to. But he, sad to say, chose otherwise.

Augustinus...

Do you have any links about the Edelweisspiraten having "chapters" in Bavaria? Or maybe a book? I find this very interesting, because so far I knew them only as a youth movement in North Rhine-Westphalia (where working-class traditions were still relatively strong).

The Swing Jugend (mainly in Hamburg and Berlin) were a little bit "jeunesse dorée", upper-class youth and I really doubt that Ratzinger could have joined them, given the social barriers at that time.

Of many different youth groups that operated all throughout Germany. Among others there were the Werner Steinbrink Group in Berlin, The Alfred Schmidt-Sas Group, the MeuteGroup in Leipzig, the Kittlebach Piraten in the Ruhr, the 07 Group in Munich, the White Rose Circle in Munich, and the Verband anti-Nazi movement in Bavaria.

For further reading, try these:

R. Blair, Holmes and Alan F. Keele, eds.,When Truth Was Treason: German Youth against Hitler, Editors ( Chicago, 1995).

Anton Gil. An Honorable Defeat (New York, 1994)

Detlev J.K Peukert, Inside Nazi Germany: Conformity, Opposition, and Racism in Everyday Life (New Haven, 1987).

"When Truth was Treason" seems to be a book about the Helmuth Hübener Group in Hamburg.

Anton Gil's "An Honorable Defeat" is about the White Rose.

Detlev Peukert has written several books about working-class youth resistance in Nazi-Germany, most notably about the Edelweisspiraten.

You are quoting:
"During the war, many youth groups were formed into resistance movements in opposition to Hitler. Such groups were, The Edelweiss Group, Werner Steinbrink Group in Berlin, The Alfred Schmidt-Sas Group, Die Meute Group in Leipzig, The Kittlebach Piraten in the Ruhr, The 07 Group in Munich, The White Rose Circle in Munich, and the Verband anti-Nazi movement in Bavaria."
http://members.aol.com/TeacherNet/Holocaust.html

It is my impression that they use the term "youth resistance" rather loosely.

Alfred Schmidt-Sas and Werner Steinbrink certainly were heroes. Alfred Schmidt-Sas was a music teacher in Leipzig. He lost his job in 1933 for being a member of the KPD (communist party). He was executed on April 9, 1943, at the age of 47, after several imprisonments in concentration camps.

Werner Steinbrink was 26 years old when the fascists killed him in Berlin-Plötzensee.

(his picture:)
http://www.holocaustchronicle.org/HolocaustScans/MedRes/1943/19430008000059

He belonged to the famous Jewish communist Baum-Group and was a leader of the communist youth organization (KJVD) in Berlin.

Edelweiss, Meute and Kittelbach Piraten all are working-class youth groups.

"Organisation 07" was a group of soldiers in Munich ("07" refers to "Wehrkreis VII", the military designation for Bavaria).

I couldn't find a "Verband anti-Nazi movement in Bavaria". So if it did exist at all, it certainly was a very small group.

I did find some information about some working-class youth groups in Nuremberg and Munich. In Munich they called themselves "Blasen" (blisters).

Like the working-class youth in other German towns they were 14-18 years old, already out of school, their fathers had left to fight in the war and their mothers had to work. This gave them some degree of freedom and made it easier for them to avoid the HJ.

The suggestion that Ratzinger should have joined one of these groups is, at best, sociologically naive. Belonging to the small-town catholic middle-class milieu of rural Bavaria he was neither close to the working-class nor to communist circles.

Somehow, be raised in a town dominated by German immigrants, I think I know the sociological and psychological workings of my people. While yes, there is a bit more rigid class structure in the old country, it was not a strait jacket that didn't allow any class mixing. That is a naive idea friend, one you should dissuade yourself of.

In addition, with his father being a police officer, Ratzinger's family was considered working class, and being virulently anti-Nazi, and suffering the consequences for it, I'm sure his family mixed fairly well with all sorts of classes, especially in a small rural town

I think that you are you are setting up strawmen in order that you can continue to grasp at straws. There was a resistance movement throughout Germany, one that even reached into the town of Traunstein. And Ratzinger had plenty of opportunity to join it. Instead, he took the safe way out. While I understand his motivations for doing so, combined with the fact that he is unrepentant over his actions says to me that this was a poor choice for the highest Catholic office in the world. It sends a bad message, and will further alienate many of the faithful.

If you wish to continue to make excuses for the man, feel free. But really now, in the face of facts, it is just so much hot air.

great, please come forward with it. Maybe you read about it in a book? So far I have been unable to find any information on the net (except about two small groups of working-class youth in Munich and Nuremberg).

And, please, I'm not "making excuses for the man" Ratzinger. I never would. I have a huge dislike for him ever since he condemned Leonardo Boff to a year of silence. But, yes, I am making excuses for the child.

You are probably right that taking into account only the income level Ratzinger's father would have to be considered "working-class". But as a policeman he was a state employee and probably had a petty bourgeois ethos.
You are also correct that the social barriers in a small town like Traunstein were easier to overcome, but this isn't the case for Munich. Ratzinger still went to school while all the members of the "Blisters" didn't: this alone makes it highly unlikely that he could ever have joined them. It's more likely that they would simply have beaten him up...

At least not the youth resistance in Traunstein. However I did find this: "Some locals in Traunstein, like Elizabeth Lohner, 84, whose brother-in-law was sent to Dachau as a conscientious objector, dismiss such suggestions. “It was possible to resist, and those people set an example for others,” she said. “The Ratzingers were young and had made a different choice.”

In 1937 another family a few hundred yards away in Traunstein hid Hans Braxenthaler, a local resistance fighter. SS troops repeatedly searched homes in the area looking for the fugitive and his fellow conspirators." <http://www.libertypost.org/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?ArtNum=92405>

In addition, I knew an immigrant from Bavaria in my home town who was part of the youth resistance in the late '30s, early '40s. And while the resistance movement was more prominent in regions further west, it was a nationwide phenomenon, and crossed all classes. One just has to look at the makeup of groups like the White Rose to see that.

In addition, Ratzinger's father probably wasn't a petite bourgeois. It seems that he was very much anti Nazi, and according to the article linked above, he was persecuted for it. Such actions have habit of breaking down social barriers for the entire family.

And while you wish to excuse the actions of the youth, I can't, for he had an informed choice to make. Such choices are what makes the man, and we see the man that Ratzinger has become. In addition, he has never repented for these actions. I think that is what is most galling to me.

So I suppose we will have to agree to disagree on this issue.

Regarding Braxenthaler and the Lohners, please see my post further down.

I certainly learned a lot about resistance in Nazi Germany (it was more widespread than I had imagined) and I want to thank you for that opportunity. It's regrettable that so little is known particularly about the extent of the youth resistance against fascism (perhaps because all the books are written by adults...?).

The Edelweisspiraten of Cologne, hanged by the Gestapo without trial on November 10, 1944:

... and any young person around Munich would very likely have been aware of their activities. So while these youths were standing up to Hitler, some at the costs of their lives, Ratzinger was guarding the BMW Nazi weapons factory where prisoners from Dachau concentration camp were being used as forced labor.

Gauging by the current Ratzinger's homophobia, misogyny and neo-fascism, he apparently didn't learn from the experience of being a firsthand wirness to evil and intolerance.

Stories of The White Rose:
http://www.jlrweb.com/whiterose/
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Holocaust/r...
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Academy/1148/july8.html
http://www.dw-world.de/dw/article/0,,783992,00.html

in a totalitarian society.

The Weisse Rose were students in Munich. Their activities were never directed at pupils, but mainly at their fellow students and academics. I doubt that "any young person around Munich would very likely have been aware of their activities".

As I said in an earlier post, the Edelweisspiraten were active in North Rhine-Westphalia (most notably in Cologne). I couldn't find any evidence of their presence in Munich or rural/small-town Bavaria.

The SS was guarding the slave workers in Dachau and in that BMW factory. Ratzinger was a "Flakhelfer" in an anti-aircraft unit.

There were youth resistance movements throughout Germany. As to Ratzinger's duties at the infamous BMW plant, you will note that in my previous post I stated that Ratzinger guarded the plant where prisoners were used as forced labor -- I did not say he personally guarded the prisoners themselves. The same argument could be made that Ratzinger never killed any allies himself, as all he did was maintenance on the AA guns and didn't actually pull the trigger. Tell that to the allied air forces who were shot down in raids over that same plant -- a fact which is well documented. Splitting hairs doesn't work with me. I have no interest in protecting Ratzinger from his past.

greatly appreciated. Or a book maybe? As I said, so far I have been unable to find any evidence.

And I don't think that the question if he guarded slave workers or not is "splitting hairs". There would be absolutely no excuse for that.

I've also provided a couple of bilbiographies you may find useful.

As for "splitting hairs", since Ratzinger was among those responsible for guarding the BMW plant which used Dachau concentration camp victims as labor (and as he was a firsthand witness to the marches of the prisoners) it really takes a pretzel-like logic to maintain that his defense of that plant and its association with Dachau are so totally divorced. He came, he saw, he witnessed -- yet he did nothing to resist. Whether he polished the guns while reciting the rosary is immaterial... he defended the plant and therefore the horrors that took place inside its walls.

http://members.aol.com/TeacherNet/Holocaust.html
Youth Resistance
During the war, many youth groups were formed into resistance movements in opposition to Hitler. Such groups were, The Edelweiss Group, Werner Steinbrink Group in Berlin, The Alfred Schmidt-Sas Group, Die Meute Group in Leipzig, The Kittlebach Piraten in the Ruhr, The 07 Group in Munich, The White Rose Circle in Munich, and the Verband anti-Nazi movement in Bavaria

http://alees.rutgers.edu/seminar-bibliog.html (bibliography)

http://muse.jhu.edu/demo/holocaust_and_genocide_studies/v017/17.1recent.html Kershaw, Ian. Popular Opinion and Political Dissent in the Third Reich: Bavaria 1933-1945. Oxford: Clarendon Press; New York: Oxford University Press, 2002 (2nd ed.). xxxiv + 433 pp. (bibliography)

Dachau prisoners, witnessed by Ratzinger, who were forced to work at the Munich BMW plant (w/pics) and references to the resistance, including some citizens of Dachau: http://members.aol.com/zbdachau/history/eng4.htm (one link of many reporting his witness to these atrocities)

As you were making some sweeping judgments about youth resistance in Bavaria, my hope was that you had read some books about it and could talk about the content. I didn't ask for bibliographies which give you only the book titles and contribute nothing to the discussion.

About the "youth resistance" quote, please see my earlier post:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=3512353&mesg_id=3521855

You asked. specifically:

"Any links about youth resistance movements in Bavaria would be
greatly appreciated. Or a book maybe? As I said, so far I have been unable to find any evidence."

So when I provide what you asked for (links and a bibliography) you again raise the bar. I won't play these types of games with any poster. You are free to search for any of the numerous posts I have made on this subject, replete with links to the information you are so quick to demand and equally quick to dismiss.

Let's take a closer look at your links:

http://alees.rutgers.edu/seminar-bibliog.html

There is one article about youth resistance:

Horn, Daniel. "Youth Resistance in the Third Reich: A Social Portrait," JSH 7 (1973), 26?50.

However, it is unclear if it contains any information about Bavaria.

And there is one book about dissent in Bavaria.

Kershaw, Ian. Popular Opinion and Political Dissent in the Third Reich: Bavaria, 1933?1945 (1983).

Thanks to the next link we learn that it has been re-edited in 2002.

http://muse.jhu.edu/demo/holocaust_and_genocide_studies/v017/17.1recent.html

Kershaw, Ian. Popular Opinion and Political Dissent in the Third Reich: Bavaria 1933-1945. Oxford: Clarendon Press; New York: Oxford University Press, 2002 (2nd ed.).

So I went to amazon.com and, yes, you can "look inside", in fact the complete index is there: nothing about youth resistance.

Your next link shows that it was indeed the SS and not some "Flaghelfer" pupils who were guarding the slave workers in Dachau.
"For the first time, groups of prisoners accompanied by their SS guards leave the camp to work in other arms and war supply factories."
http://members.aol.com/zbdachau/history/eng4.htm

There is only one link that does mention two supposed youth groups in Bavaria (the White Rose were students):

"During the war, many youth groups were formed into resistance movements in opposition to Hitler. Such groups were, The Edelweiss Group, Werner Steinbrink Group in Berlin, The Alfred Schmidt-Sas Group, Die Meute Group in Leipzig, The Kittlebach Piraten in the Ruhr, The 07 Group in Munich, The White Rose Circle in Munich, and the Verband anti-Nazi movement in Bavaria."
http://members.aol.com/TeacherNet/Holocaust.html

I analyzed the quote in detail in an earlier post:

It is my impression that they use the term "youth resistance" rather loosely.

Alfred Schmidt-Sas and Werner Steinbrink certainly were heroes. Alfred Schmidt-Sas was a music teacher in Leipzig. He lost his job in 1933 for being a member of the KPD (communist party). He was executed on April 9, 1943, at the age of 47, after several imprisonments in concentration camps.

Werner Steinbrink was 26 years old when the fascists killed him in Berlin-Plötzensee.

(picture)
http://www.holocaustchronicle.org/HolocaustScans/MedRes...

He belonged to the famous Jewish communist Baum-Group and was a leader of the communist youth organization (KJVD) in Berlin.

Edelweiss, Meute and Kittelbach Piraten all are working-class youth groups.

"Organisation 07" was a group of soldiers in Munich ("07" refers to "Wehrkreis VII", the military designation for Bavaria).

I couldn't find a "Verband anti-Nazi movement in Bavaria". So if it did exist at all, it certainly was a very small group.

I did find some information about some working-class youth groups in Nuremberg and Munich. In Munich they called themselves "Blasen" (blisters).

Like the working-class youth in other German towns they were 14-18 years old, already out of school, their fathers had left to fight in the war and their mothers had to work. This gave them some degree of freedom and made it easier for them to avoid the HJ.

The suggestion that Ratzinger should have joined one of these groups is, at best, sociologically naive. Belonging to the small-town catholic middle-class milieu of rural Bavaria he was neither close to the working-class nor to communist circles.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=3512353&mesg_id=3521855

At the whole populace of Munich. Their publication, "Leaves of the Rose" were disseminated throughout the town, with the train station at the center. Leaflets were posted and spread in a ten mile radius from that station. They were quite well known throughout the region. Check my links and sources above for further information.

... on numerous links regarding the White Rose. In fact, their resistance was of a very public, not military, nature. It wouldn't have been a resistance movement otherwise.

Rose? You must be kidding.

They were a group of students at the university. The Gestapo was looking for them. Certainly it would have been easy for a young pupil from out of town to make contact with them...

:eyes:

What I'm pointing out is that even in small town Bavaria, with contact in Munich and elsewhere, and a father who was a virulent anti Nazi, Ratzinger had plenty of oppotunity to learn of a resistance movement, and join one in he had so choosen.

I think his involvement on any level should preclude him from being the pope, end of story. Convicted felons can't be the president (at least in theory), even if they're changed people, even if their circumstances early in life made crime their only choice. Shouldn't someone who is being considered for the role as pope be held to an even higher standard than the president of the United States? What if Ratzinger had been forced into male prostitution as a child? Would they still consider him then? I doubt it.

The resistance groups have my greatest respect. Many of their members have paid the ultimate price for standing up for their ideals.

However - they were all older than Ratzinger; It is a huge difference between the late 30s and during the middle of the war. By 1943, when Ratzinger's class was drafted, the Gestapo had already taken out most groups. Also, the members of the youth resistance were older than 16. I do not believe that comparing a 14/16 year old in the 40s with 18/20 year olds in the 30s is fair. And take the situation in rural Bavaria into account.

Not all were older than Ratzinger, and certainly some were younger:

http://www.deutsche-welle.de/dw/article/0,1564,1391096,00.html

Ratzinger on every thread that shows the truth.

If the Pope is truly chosen by some sort of Divine Intervention, do you think God guided Ratzinger toward acquiescence to Hitler.

It seems to prove that this choice is plain politics, and politics at its most arrogant worst.

the clear difference between black and white.

Seems to be Ratzinger's school of thought.

seems a dark enough gray to me.

Plus, his letter to US Cardinals to deny Kerry Communion.

Plus, Ratzinger's support to reward Cardinal Law for covering up the Pedophilia scandal.

Plus, Ratzinger's intolerance at moving the Church in a more inclusive mode.

Plus, his obstruction to the Latin American Catholics who believe the Church should be more active in helping economic freedom and a distribution of wealth.

And on and on.

The truth is this, If you like Bush, you'll love Ratzinger.

A Catholic Fundie (with a Nazi background)

The only difference between Bush and Ratzinger, is when his country went to war, and was wrong, Ratzinger actually fought. And that's the truth.

Except for the headline and the text after "fundie", I totally agree.

Ratzinger went into the Hitler Youth in 1941, at the age of fourteen. At this time, and actually through the end of the war, youth resistance was quite active. If you will check my links in the OP, you will see that there were many youth Ratzinger's age and under who joined the resistance rather than the Hitler Youth. Also, if you check upthread note my post regarding various other youth resistance groups that were operating throughout Germany, including Bavaria. The town that Ratzinger came from wasn't terrbily rural, and he started attending seminary in '39 in Munich, which was being papered by the White Rose Society at the time, and also was the stomping grounds of the Verband youth resistance group.

Ratzinger had plenty of opportunities to prove his moral worth in this situation, but he didn't. While I understand the urge and need to hunker down in such a situation, I find it very disappointing that the church saw fit to make this man Pope, especially coming after a man who actually did resist the Nazis. I think that it sends the wrong message to the world, especially when there were many much more qualified candidates.

I question the "plenty"; in how far that is enough for condemnation is another matter. Also, one of the few things we know, is that he tried to get out of the HJ.

But to claim that Traunstein isn't "terribly rural" is pretty strange. The town is almost as rural as it gets.

The ability to evade the HJ was more a matter of the social background than anything else; I do not believe that there was any group operating in Traunstein. As to the 1939 Munich thing: do you have a link handy? To my knowledge he attended a seminary right there, in Traunstein.

Ratzinger didn't go to Munich for his education until after the war. However, as Munich was only a short distance away, I'm sure he had plenty of opportunity to visit.

And actually, the resistance did come to Traunstein. "Some locals in Traunstein, like Elizabeth Lohner, 84, whose brother-in-law was sent to Dachau as a conscientious objector, dismiss such suggestions. “It was possible to resist, and those people set an example for others,” she said. “The Ratzingers were young and had made a different choice.”

In 1937 another family a few hundred yards away in Traunstein hid Hans Braxenthaler, a local resistance fighter. SS troops repeatedly searched homes in the area looking for the fugitive and his fellow conspirators." <http://www.libertypost.org/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?ArtNum=92405>

It seems to me that Ratzinger did have ample opportunity to find out about, and join the resistance. Yet he chose not to. This is a very telling character trait, even in one so young.

The reason that I find this to be so objectionable in the new Pope is that it sends out a very bad message to the world, especially coming on the heels of a Pope who DID actively resist the Nazis. There were plenty of other qualified papal candidates, yet they chose one who co-operated with the regime that epitomizes evil in the twentieth century. Somehow I think that this isn't the message that such a religious order should send.

Ratzinger was a child. In order to become a "conscientious objector" you have to be at least 18 years old (conscription age). When Ratzinger was 18 years old, he deserted (at considerable personal risk as many deserters were shot by the SS).

Leonhard Lohner (1901-1961) spent 9 years in prisons and concentration camps.

He was a communist.

As was Hans Braxenthaler, a local leader of the KPD.

I can't see how Ratzinger, as a child, could have hidden communist resistance fighters. He was 10 years old when Braxenthaler died. His father certainly could have helped them, but you can't blame that on the child.

... is that despite having been a firsthand witness (and compliant if unwilling participant) to the evils of bigotry and oppression, Ratzinger learned nothing from it. It would be one thing if his renouncement of the Nazis weren't so undermined by his own misogyny, homophobia and iron-fisted intolerance.

Just as Ratzinger can claim he never fired a shot because he simply polished the AA guns, I suppose he can also claim such innocence when millions will die from AIDS-related illness. After all, he just said people can't use condoms, but he didn't force them to have sex!

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:eyes:

He was 14 his father wanted him to join and he did. That was how many years ago?

I think it's pretty obvious that this is just another chance to get all riled up over something that doesn't matter.

Give it a few weeks, and I am sure you will find something he has said or done recently that piss you off.

Ratzinger's father was a virulent anti-Nazi. He joined the Hitler Youth because it was compulsory. <http://www.libertypost.org/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?ArtNum=92405> And though he had plenty of examples of youth his age and younger refusing to join the Hitler Youth, and resisting Nazism in general, he chose the safe way out, and copromised his morals in the bargain.

As I've said earlier, I understand the survival mechanism that kicked in. However, I think that it sends the wrong message to the world to elect somebody who cooperated with the Nazis, especially coming on the heels of JPII, who actively resisted the Nazis.

It is the moral hypocrisy that is the outrage friend, a supposedly pious man, from an early age. Yet apparently not pious or moral enough to resist evil, even though there were examples of such resistance all around him. It is a telling character flaw.

I'd like to believe he had a choice. However, at age 14 young people are still minors and to a large degree subject to the will of their parents. The parents may have been aware of what happens to those who resist such as the above-mentioned groups and also aware that those who conform to Nazism do not suffer the same unenviable fate. The parents may have forced him into Hitler Youth believing it was in his (and their) best interest for survival.

I think the key is denouncement/repentence. Or the lack thereof.

And suffered because of it. As such, I don't think that they would have objected to Ratzinger joining the resistance. Yet he chose instead to go along. And the fact that he is unrepentant about this choice is indeed quite telling. <http://www.libertypost.org/cgi-bin/readart.cgi?ArtNum=92405>

Peer pressure at that time MAY have gone as far as death threats against those who would not join or those who resisted and/or their families as I understand that many of the kids who drank the kool-aid became some of the most single-minded, ruthless Nazis in the land.

After hearing bits of this on NPR and other such liberal news stations, it is good to read more. Thank you.

As far as the argument that "he was chosen by God, so quit harping on his long past", many of us have a different opinion of these "facts", equally reasoned and strongly held. Let's accept this and get on with trying to save what is left of the world from Mr.bush and his evil minions.

Hans and Sophie Scholl, members of the White Rose, voluntarily joined the Hitler Youth (in 1933, if memory serves), although they later dissented when confronted with many disturbing factors, such as, for example, having their Jewish friends excluded and restrictions being placed on what they could say or even what music they could play or listen to.

LAB