THE MASS PSYCHOLOGY OF FASCISM QUOTES
COMPILED BY LUCY WARNER
JULY 13, 2017


https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/1147698-die-massenpsychologie-des-faschismus
The Mass Psychology of Fascism by Wilhelm Reich

The Mass Psychology of Fascism Quotes (showing 1-30 of 34)

“Even more essential, however, is the identification of the individuals in the masses with the "führer." The more helpless the "mass-individual" has become, owing to his upbringing, the more pronounced is his identification with the führer, and the more the childish need for protection is disguised in the form of a feeling at one with the führer. This inclination to identify is the psychological basis of national narcissism, i.e., of the self-confidence that individual man derives from the "greatness of the nation." The reactionary lower middle-class man perceives himself in the führer, in the authoritarian state. On the basis of this identification he feels himself to be a defender of the "national heritage," of the "nation," which does not prevent him, likewise on the basis of this identification, from simultaneously despising "the masses" and confronting them as an individual. The wretchedness of his material and sexual situation is so overshadowed by the exalting idea of belonging to a master race and having a brilliant führer that, as time goes on, he ceases to realize how completely he has sunk to a position of insignificant, blind allegiance.

The worker who is conscious of his skills—he, in short, who has rid himself of his submissive structure, who identifies with his work and not with the führer, with the international working masses and not with the national homeland—represents the opposite of this. He feels himself to be a leader, not on the basis of his identification with the führer, but on the basis of his consciousness of performing work that is vitally necessary for society's existence.”
― Wilhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism
tags: 1969, authoritarian-family, authoritarian-ideology, authoritarianism, belonging, führer, master-race, national-heritage, national-narcissism, nationalistic-self-confidence 3 likes Like

“Thus we arrive at the problem of the relation of religion to the negation of sexual desire. Sexual debility results in a lowering of self-confidence. In one case it is compensated by the brutalization of sexuality, to maintain sexual repression, in the other by rigid character traits. The compulsion to control one's sexuality, to maintain sexual repression, leads to the development of pathologic, emotionally tinged notions of honor and duty, bravery and self-control. But the pathology and emotionality of these psychic attitudes are strongly at variance with the reality of one's personal behavior. The man who attains genital satisfaction, is honorable, responsible, brave, and controlled, without making much of a fuss about it. These attitudes are an organic part of his personality. The man whose genitals are weakened, whose sexual structure is full of contradictions, must continually remind himself to control his sexuality, to preserve his sexual dignity, to be brave in the face of temptation, etc. The struggle to resist the temptation to masturbate is a struggle that is experienced by every adolescent and every child, without exception. All the elements of the reactionary man's structure are developed in this struggle. It is in the lower middle classes that this structure is reinforced most strongly and embedded most deeply. Every form of mysticism derives it's most active energy and, in part, also it's content from this compulsory suppression of sexuality.”
― Wilhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism
tags: 1942, authoritarian-family, authoritarian-ideology, authoritarianism, duty, honor, maturation, religion-and-sexuality, self-confidence, sex-negativity, sexual-repression, suppression 3 likes Like

“Open avowal of dictatorship is much less dangerous than sham democracy. The first one can fight; sham democracy is insidious.”
― Wilhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism
tags: democracy, dictatorship 2 likes Like

“Ignorance of the character structure of masses of people invariably leads to fruitless questioning. The Communists, for example, said that it was the misdirected policies of the Social Democrats that made it possible for the fascists to seize power. Actually this explanation did not explain anything, for it was precisely the Social Democrats who made a point of spreading illusions. In short, it did not result in a new mode of action. That political reaction in the form of fascism had 'befogged,' 'corrupted,' and 'hypnotized' the masses is an explanation that is as sterile as the others. This is and will continue to be the function of fascism as long as it exists. Such explanations are sterile because they fail to offer a way out. Experience teaches us that such disclosures, no matter how often they are repeated, do not convince the masses; that, in other words, social economic inquiry by itself is not enough. Wouldn't it be closer to the mark to ask, what was going on in the masses that they could not and would not recognize the function of fascism? To say that, 'The workers have to realize...' or 'We didn't understand...' does not serve any purpose. Why didn't the workers realize, and why didn't they understand? The questions that formed the basis of the discussion between the Right and the Left in the workers' movements are also to be regarded as sterile. The Right contended that the workers were not predisposed to fight; the Left, on the other hand, refuted this and asserted that the workers were revolutionary and that the Right's statement was a betrayal of revolutionary thinking. Both assertions, because they failed to see the complexities of the issue, were rigidly mechanistic. A realistic appraisal would have had to point out that the average worker bears a contradiction in himself; that he, in other words, is neither a clear-cut revolutionary nor a clear-cut conservative, but stands divided. His psychic structure derives on the one hand from the social situation (which prepares the ground for revolutionary attitudes) and on the other hand from the entire atmosphere of authoritarian society—the two being at odds with one another.”
― Wilhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism
tags: 1969, authoritarianism, fascism, internal-conflict, rise-of-nazis 2 likes Like

“It was one of the greatest errors in evaluating dictatorship to say that the dictator forces himself on society against its own will. In reality, every dictator in history was nothing but the accentuation of already existing state ideas which he had only to exaggerate in order to gain power”
― Wilhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism
tags: dictator, dictatorship, history 1 likes Like

“Race theorists, who are as old as imperialism itself, want to achieve racial purity in peoples whose interbreeding, as a result of the expansion of world economy, is so far advanced that racial purity can have meaning only to a numbskull.”
― Wilhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism
tags: 1969, antisemitism, ethnic-nationalism, fascism, globalization, imperialist, interbreed, miscegenation, multiculturalism, nazism, race-theory, racial-purity, racism, white-supremacy 1 likes Like

“One cannot equate "capitalism" and "democracy.”
― Wilhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism
tags: capitalism, democracy 1 likes Like

“The socially irresponsible man is the man absorbed in sexual conflicts.”
― Wilhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism
1 likes Like

“It is of the essence of any party to gain its orientation not from truths but from illusions which usually correspond to the irrational mass structure. Scientific truths only interfered with the habit of the party politicians of avoiding difficulties with the aid of illusions.”
― Wilhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism
tags: illusions, irrationality, politicians, politics, science, scientific-truths 1 likes Like

“Power, no matter what kind of power it is, without a foundation in truth, is a dictatorship, more or less and in one way or another, for it is always based on man's fear of the social responsibility and personal burden that "freedom" entails.”
― Wilhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism
1 likes Like

“Sentences like the following are found in many mystical and reactionary writings though not as clearly formulated as by Hutten:

''Kulturbolschewismus is nothing new. It is based on a striving which humanity has had since its earliest days: the longing for happiness. It is the eternal nostalgia for paradise on earth . . . The religion of faith is replaced by the religion of pleasure.''

We, on the other hand, ask: Why not happiness on earth? Why should not pleasure be the content of life? If one were to put this question to a general vote, no reactionary ideology could stand up.

The reactionary also recognizes, though in a mystical manner, the connection between mysticism and compulsive marriage and family:

''Because of this responsibility (for the possible consequences of pleasure), society has created the institution of marriage which, as a lifelong union, provides the protective frame for the sexual relationship.''

Right after this, we find the whole register of "cultural values" which, in the framework of reactionary ideology, fit together like the parts of a machine:

''Marriage as a tie, the family as a duty, the fatherland as value of its own, morality as authority, religion as obligation from eternity.''

It would be impossible better to describe the rigidity of human plasma!”
― Wilhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism
tags: authority, family, fatherland, freedom, happiness, human, humanity, ideology, marriage, mysticism, obligation, pleasure, reactionary-politics, religion, responsability, sexual-freedom, sexuality, striving, ties 1 likes Like

“That the idea of God represents the conscience, the internalized admonitions and threats from parents and educators, is a well-known fact. What is less well known is the fact that, from an energy point of view, the belief in and the fear of God are sexual excitations which have changed their content and goal. The religious feeling, then, is the same as sexual feeling, except that it is attached to mystical, psychic contents. This explains the return of the sexual element in so many ascetic experiences, such as the nun's delusion that she is the bride of Christ. Such experiences rarely reach the stage of genital consciousness and thus are apt to take place in other sexual channels, such as masochistic martyrdom.”
― Wilhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism
tags: asceticism, delusion, god, martyrdom, masochism, religion, sexual-excitement, sexual-feelings 1 likes Like

“Hence, what he wants—and it is openly admitted—is to implement nationalistic imperialism with methods he has borrowed from Marxism, including its technique of mass organization. But the success of this mass organization is to be ascribed to the masses and not to Hitler. It was man's authoritarian freedom-fearing structure that enabled his propaganda to take root. Hence, what is important about Hitler sociologically does not issue from his personality but from the importance attached to him by the masses. And what makes the problem all the more complex is the fact that Hitler held the masses, with whose help he wanted to carry out his imperialism, in complete contempt.”
― Wilhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism
tags: 1969, authoritarianism, contempt, freedom, hitler, imperialism, marxism, mass-organizations, nationalism 1 likes Like

“Work democracy cannot be imposed on people as a political system. It depends on the consciousness on the part of the working people in all professions of their responsibility for the social process. This consciousness may be present or it may grow in an organic manner, like a tree or an animal organism. The growth of this consciousness of social responsibility is the most important prerequisite for the prevention of the cancer-like growth of political systems in the social organism. If they are allowed to grow, they will sooner or later bring about social chaos. Furthermore, such consciousness of responsibility alone will, in the course of time, bring the institutions of human society into harmony with the natural functions of work democracy. Political systems come and go without stopping or fundamentally changing the social process. But the pulse of human society would stop
and not return should the natural life functions of love, work and knowledge cease for only one day. Natural love, vitally necessary work and scientific search are rational life functions. They can inherently be nothing but rational. Consequently, they are diametrically opposed to any kind of irrationalism. Political irrationalism which infests, deforms and destroys our lives, is — in the strictly psychiatric sense—a perversion of social life, caused by the ostracizing of the natural life functions and by their exclusion from the determination of social life.”
― Wilhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism
tags: consciousness, knowledge, love, social-responsibility, work, work-democracy 1 likes Like

“It did not take National Socialism long to rally workers, most of whom were either unemployed or still very young, into the SA [Sturmangriff, Stormtroopers, "brown shirts"]. To a large extent, however, these workers were revolutionary in a dull sort of way and still maintained an authoritarian attitude. For this reason National Socialist propaganda was contradictory; it's content was determined by the class for which it was intended. Only in its manipulation of the mystical feelings of the masses was it clear and consistent.

In talks with followers of the National Socialist party and especially with members of the SA, it was clearly brought out that the revolutionary phraseology of National Socialism was the decisive factor in the winning over of these masses. One heard National Socialists deny that Hitler represented capital. One heard SA men warn Hitler that he must not betray the cause of the "revolution." One heard SA men say that Hitler was the German Lenin. Those who went over to National Socialism from Social Democracy and the liberal central parties were, without exception, revolutionary minded masses who were either nonpolitical or politically undecided prior to this. Those who went over from the Communist party were often revolutionary elements who simply could not make any sense of many of the German Communist party's contradictory political slogans. In part they were men upon whom the external features of Hitler's party, it's military character, its assertiveness, etc., made a big impression.

To begin with, it is the symbol of the flag that stands out among the symbols used for purposes of propaganda.”
― Wilhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism
tags: 1969, authoritarianism, fascism, nazis, pageantry, political-maneuvering, propaganda 1 likes Like

“The basic religious idea in all patriarchal religions is the negation of the sexual needs. Only in very primitive religions were religiosity and sexuality identical. When social organization passed from matriarchy to patriarchy and class society, the unity of religious and sexual cult underwent a split; the religious cult became the antithesis of the sexual. With that, the cult of sexuality went out of existence. It was replaced by the brothel, pornography and backstairs-sexuality. It goes without saying that when sexual experiences ceased to be one with the religious cults, when, instead, they became antithetical to them, religious excitation assumed a new function: that of being a substitute for the lost sexual pleasure, now no longer affirmed by society. Only this contradiction inherent in religious excitation makes the strength and the tenacity of the religions understandable: the contradiction of its being at one and the same time antisexual and a substitute for sexuality.”
― Wilhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism
tags: cults, patriarchal-society, pornography, religion, religiosity, sexuality, society 1 likes Like

“National Socialism made use of various means in dealing with various classes, and made various promises depending upon the social class it needed at a particular time. In the spring of 1933, for example, it was the revolutionary character of the Nazi movement that was given particular emphasis in Nazi propaganda in an effort to win over the industrial workers, and the first of May was "celebrated," but only after the aristocracy had been appeased in Potsdam. To ascribe the success solely to political swindle, however, would be to become entangled in a contradiction with the basic idea of freedom, and would practically exclude the possibility of a social revolution. What must be answered is: Why do the masses allow themselves to be politically swindled? The masses had every possibility of evaluating the propaganda of the various parties. Why didn't they see that, while promising the workers that the owners of the means of production would be disappropriated, Hitler promised the capitalists that their rights would be protected?”
― Wilhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism
tags: 1933, 1969, authoritarianism, freedom, hitler, lower-middle-class, mass-psychology, may-day, nazis, political-maneuvering, political-swindle, propaganda, rise-of-nazis, self-deception 1 likes Like

“Sadistic brutality and mystical feeling go always hand in hand when the normal capacity for orgastic experience is lacking. This was as true of the inquisitors of the medieval church, of the cruel and mystical Philip II of Spain, as it is of any modern mass murderer.”
― Wilhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism
tags: brutality, mass-murder, mysticism, religion, sadism, sexuality, violence 0 likes Like

“Mystical organizations are only a crystallization of facts which can be found, in a more diffuse and less tangible form, in all strata of people. The degree of mystical, sentimental and sadistic feelings corresponds exactly to the degree of the disturbance of natural orgastic experience. Close observation of the audience of a trashy thriller or of a boxing match teaches more about these problems than a hundred handbooks of sexology.”
― Wilhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism
tags: boxing-matches, disturbances, mysticism, sadism, sentimentalism, sexology, sexuality, thrillers 0 likes Like

“Religiosity that is hostile to sex is the product of authoritarian society.”
― Wilhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism
tags: 1969, authoritarian-family, authoritarianism, sex-economy, sex-negativity, sexual-anxiety, slave-religion 0 likes Like

“The reactionary of any kind condemns sexual pleasure because it stimulates and repulses him at the same time. He is unable to solve the conflict within him between sexual demands and moralistic inhibitions. The revolutionary refutes the perverse, unhealthy kind of pleasure, because it is not his kind of pleasure, because it is not the sexuality of the future, but the sexuality which results from the conflict between instinct and morals, the sexuality of authoritarian society, a debased, smutty, pathological sexuality.”
― Wilhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism
tags: authoritarianism, freedom, moralism, pleasure, reactionary-politics, revolutionary-thinking, sexual-freedom, sexual-pleasure, sexual-violence 0 likes Like

“Nor will arguments be of any use against a fascist who is narcissistically convinced of the supreme superiority of his Teutonism, if only because he operates with irrational feelings and not with arguments. Hence, it would be hopeless to try to prove to a fascist that black people and Italians are not racially "inferior" to the Teutons. He feels himself to be "superior," and that's the end of it. The race theory can be refuted only by exposing its irrational functions, of which there are essentially two: that of giving expression to certain unconscious and emotional currents prevalent in the nationalistically disposed man and of concealing certain psychic tendencies.”
― Wilhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism
tags: 1969, fascism, irrationality, narcissism, nationalism, race-theory, racial-superiority, racism, white-supremacy 0 likes Like

“Yet alongside this rebellion against the father, a respect for and acceptance of his authority continued to exist. This ambivalent attitude toward authority—rebellion against it coupled with acceptance and submission—is a basic feature of every middle-class structure from the age of puberty to full adulthood and is especially pronounced in individuals stemming from materially restricted circumstances.”
― Wilhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism
tags: 1969, authoritarian-family, authoritarianism, lower-middle-class, patriarchy, trumpism 0 likes Like

“Would it not be logical to ask, what is it in the masses themselves that made it impossible for them to recognize the function of fascism? The typical formulae, "The workers must realize . . ." or "We did not understand . . ." are of no help. Why did the workers fail to realize and why did we not understand? Another sterile explanation formed the basis of the discussion between the Left and the Right wings in the workers' movement: The Right contended that the workers were not willing to fight; the Left countered by saying that it was not so, that the workers were revolutionary and the contention of the Right was a betrayal of the revolution. Both statements, with their either-or alternatives, were mechanistically rigid. What would have corresponded to reality would have been the finding that the average worker is neither unequivocally revolutionary nor is he unequivocally conservative. Rather, he is in a conflict: on the one hand, his psychological structure derives from his social position, which tends to make him revolutionary, on the other hand, from the total atmosphere of authoritarian society, which tends to make him conservative. Thus, his revolutionary and his conservative tendencies are in conflict with each other.”
― Wilhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism
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“In the early stages the sexual needs will have the upper hand, in later stages the compulsive moralistic inhibition. At times of political upheavals of the total social organization, the conflict between sexuality and compulsive morality becomes most acute. This will impress some people as the "collapse of morality," other people as "sexual revolution." At any rate, the idea of the "decline of culture" is the perception of the breakthrough of natural sexuality. The only reason why it is experienced subjectively as "decline" is the fact that it threatens the compulsive moralistic way of living. What happens objectively is only the downfall of the sexual dictatorship which maintains the compulsive moralistic forces in the individuals in the interest of authoritarian marriage and family.”
― Wilhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism
tags: morality, sexuality 0 likes Like


“When, then, the Social Democrat worker found himself in the economic crisis which degraded him to the status of a coolie, the development of his revolutionary sentiments was severely retarded by the conservative structuralization that had been taking shape in him for decades. Either he remained in the camp of the Social Democrats, notwithstanding his criticism and rejection of their policies, or he went over to the NSDAP [Nazi party] in search of a better replacement. Irresolute and indecisive, owing to the deep contradiction between revolutionary and conservative sentiments, disappointed by his own leadership, he followed the line of least resistance. Whether he would give up his conservative tendencies and arrive at a complete consciousness of his actual responsibility in the production process, i.e., at a revolutionary consciousness, depended solely on the correct or incorrect leadership of the revolutionary party. Thus the communist assertion that it was the Social Democrat policies that put fascism in the saddle was correct from a psychological viewpoint. Disappointment in Social Democracy, accompanied by the contradiction between wretchedness and conservative thinking, must lead to fascism if there are no revolutionary organizations. For example, following the fiasco of the Labor party's policies in England, in 1930–31, fascism began to infiltrate the workers who, then, in the election of 1931, cut away to the Right, instead of going over to communism.”
― Wilhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism
tags: 1931, 1969, authoritarian-family, authoritarian-ideology, democracy, fascism, revolutionary-spirit, social-democrats 0 likes Like

“When the entire social organization is plunged into a state of political upheaval, the conflict between sexuality and compulsive morality will of necessity reach an acute peak. Some will view this state of affairs as moral degeneration, while others will see it as a "sexual revolution." In any event, it is the breakthrough of natural sexuality that is looked upon as "cultural degeneration." This breakthrough is felt to be a "degeneration" only because it constitutes a threat to compulsive morality. Viewed objectively, it is only the system of sexual dictatorship that breaks down, a system devised to preserve compulsive moralistic values in the individual in the interest of authoritarian marriage and family.”
― Wilhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism
tags: 1969, authoritarian-family, authoritarian-marriage, authoritarianism, compulsive-morality, cultural-degeneration, natural-sexuality, patriarchy, race-theory, sexual-revolution 0 likes Like

“This idealization of motherhood is essentially a means of keeping women from developing a sexual consciousness and from breaking through the barriers of sexual repression, of keeping alive their sexual anxieties and guilt feelings. The very existence of woman as a sexual being would threaten authoritarian ideology; her recognition and social affirmation would mean its collapse.”
― Wilhelm Reich, The Mass Psychology of Fascism
tags: authoritarian-ideology, motherhood, sexual-consciousness, sexual-repression, woman