Trust No Fox

This book is called Trau keinem Fuchs auf grüner Heid und keinem Jud bei seinem Eid (Trust No Fox in the Green Meadow and No Jew on His Oath). The author was an 18 year old student called Elvira Bauer, an ardent supporter of Nazi ideology. It went into print in 1936, seven editions and around 100,000 copies were published by Stürmer-Verlag; a publishing house owned by Julius Streicher, who also published ‘Der Stürmer’ an anti-Semitic newspaper. The book was part of Nazi anti-Jewish propaganda and used as an educational tool with the intention of indoctrinating children into Nazi ideology.

Children were exposed to the book from around 6 years of age, it became widely used in schools, and was purchased by parents. The book is strongly anti-Semitic, Bauer contrasts the ideal Nazi Aryan who is portrayed as a creation of God, honest, handsome, and hard-working, with racist Nazi stereotypes of Jewish people. Jewish people are associated with the sly fox, and the Devil, they are portrayed as ugly, money hoarding and untrustworthy. The illustrations include images of Jewish people as an angry doctor, a loan shark, and as sexual predators who pose a danger to Aryan girls. Illustrations also show non-Jewish children reading the Der Stürmer newspaper, and jeering at Jewish children who have been expelled from school. The Hitler Youth is glorified and seen marching through the countryside. The book ends with the illustration of Jewish people walking underneath a sign which says 'One way road. Hurry, hurry. The Jews are our misfortune.' The book was presented as evidence during the Nuremberg Trials. It demonstrates the use of picture books and children’s literature to indoctrinate children into Nazi ideology, especially anti-Semitism, prior to the Wannsee Conference of 1942.

How far can propaganda be used to explain the anti Semitism that was present in Europe during this time?

Sources:

Baum, Steven (2012) Antisemitism Explained Maryland: University Press of America.

Johnson, Eric (2008) ‘Under Ideological Fire: Illustrated Wartime Propaganda for Children’, in Goodenough, E and Immel, A (eds.) Under Fire: Childhood in the Shadow of War, Michigan: Wayne State University Press, pp. 59-76.

Mills, Mary (1999) ‘Propaganda and Children During the Hitler Years’ (12 October 1999), Yad Vashem [Online]. Available at: http://www.yadvashem.org/download/education/conf/Millsishedwithoutpic.pdf (Accessed 18 January 2015).

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