In this final article in the series on the links between inspiration, motivation and hypnosis, I want to reiterate that the main purpose of the articles is to spread awareness and a basic understanding of hypnotism, in the hope that it will be less marginalized and can be used to a better effect for the benefit of all. In order to do that, I feel I must point out some of the dangers of misuse.
Adolf Hitler was born in 1889 in Austria. In 1908 he moved to Vienna where he rented a room. During the five years that he spent in the city he was a regular visitor to the municipal library.
One of the books that is believed to have particularly interested Hitler was the work of the French psychologist Gustave Le Bon. Le Bon (1841-1931), had written a book entitled Psychology of the masses. It had been translated into German in 1908, and records show that a copy was delivered to the library frequented by Hitler that same year.
Le Bon’s book describes his theories about crowds and their behavior. He had identified that group behavior could be manipulated by hypnotic suggestion and that few individuals in a crowd possessed strong enough personalities to resist such suggestion.
It describes how an individual in a crowd is little more than a grain of sand among other grains of sand, which the wind blows up at will. He identified that individuals, when they were part of a crowd, became automatons, no longer guided by their own will.
You only need to see a newsreel of Hitler showing up at a rally to recognize that he is using mass suggestion. It shows how the delivery is made in a positive and confident way. His use of repetition is also notable. He uses the same words over and over again. Consider why he repeatedly says ‘Jew, Jew, Jew’. Hitler had learned that repeating a word three times had an identifiable effect on a crowd. Add and repeat, ‘blame, blame, blame’, and you have mass hypnosis being used for sinister purposes.
The work of other psychologists such as Moscovici shows how crowds initially look at and listen to a speaker. Through the use of certain words and behavior, a speaker can very quickly establish a relationship with an audience. Repeated exposure to the same speaker can result in being viewed with admiration bordering on adoration. Every word spoken is accepted as the complete truth.
Audience members are likely to reject any attack or criticism of the speaker’s name. Eventually, they refuse to believe that the person might be capable of committing any crime or wrongdoing. In the case of Hitler, many followers, despite learning the truth about the concentration camps, continued to believe that Hitler was unaware of these horrors. In Russia, Lenin, and later Stalin, were equally capable of commanding mass audiences.
History is peppered with examples of mass hysteria, when ordinary individuals have been dragged into a mob. During the last 18 years of the 20th century there were approximately 3,000 lynchings in America. Nearly 300,000 people participated in these mob proceedings.
Mass suggestion still takes place to this day. Watch how newspapers and television can quickly foment hysteria over little more than a football game.
Human behavior changes little. The mass hysteria that Le Bon described in his late Victorian writings still rings true today. He need only consider the behavior of the people in a riot to realize that they have surrendered their individual will to the mass consciousness.
Today’s comedians use an aspect of the same phenomenon to enhance their performance. An audience member will start laughing. Before long two, then three and four are doing it. Halfway through the performance, the entire audience is laughing uncontrollably. Please watch some of the short videos on my website if you want to see a positive use of the phenomena in action. During many of my performances, I’m convinced that some audience members don’t know why they’re laughing, but somehow feel an irresistible urge to.
Hitler described in his writings how, ‘What you say to people collectively in that receptive state of fanatical abandon remains in their minds like an order given to someone under hypnosis, which cannot be erased and resists all logical argument.’
There have been few in history who have brought the world such horrible pain and suffering as the psychopath known as Adolf Hitler. Whatever his thoughts on the man, and of course he is entitled to them, there is no denying his popularity with most Germans at the time. My only wish is that it somehow helps you better understand why what happened happened.
I end by reiterating an important point I made in article one: the enormous benefits people can gain from understanding what hypnotism is and how it works far outweighs the reasons people often give for keeping it ‘secret’.
