Thread by @Halle07031904

ANIMAL WELFARE IN THE THIRD REICH
1/The preoccupation with animal protection in National Socialist Germany was evident in several social institutions. It started in 1933 and continued almost until the end of World War II. In 1934,the new government hosted an international +

conference on animal protection in Berlin. Over the speaker's podium were the words "Entire epochs of love will be needed to repay animals for their value and service". In1936 the German Society for Animal Psychology was founded, and in 1938 animal protection was accepted as a +

subject to be studied in German public schools and universities.

2/ Let’s remember some laws and articles about Animal Protection and NS.
The famous National Socialist Graf E. Reventkow published in the Reichswart, the official publication of the "Union of Patriotic Europeans",the lead article "Protection and Rights for the Animal". National+

Socialism, he writes, has for the first time in Germany begun to show Germans the importance of the individual's duty toward the animal.
The friend of animals knows to what inexpressible extent the mutual understanding between man and animal and feelings of togetherness can be +

developed, and there are many friends of animals in Germany, and also many who can not accept animal torture out of simple humanitarian reasons. In general however, we still find ourselves in a desert of unfeeling and brutality as well as sadism.

There is much to be done and we would first like to address vivisection, for which the words "cultural shame" do not even come close; in fact it must be viewed as a criminal activity.

3/ The German friends of animals and anti-vivisectionists placed their hopes upon the Chancellor of the Reich and his comrades in arms who were, as we know, friends of animals. Their trust were not betrayed! The New Germany brought proof that it was not only the hearth but +

bringer of a new, higher, more refined, culture: Vivisection, a cultural shame in the whole civilized world, against which the Best in all states fought in vain for decades, was banned in the New Germany of Hitler!

4/ The National Socialist German Workers' Party (NSDAP ) press release stated:
"The Prussian minister-president Göring has released a statement stating that starting 16 August 1933 vivisection of animals of all kinds is forbidden in Prussia. He has requested that the concerned +

ministries draft a law after which vivisection will be punished with a high penalty. Until the law goes into effect, persons who, despite this prohibition, order, participate or perform vivisections on animals of any kind will be deported to labor camps."

A similar ban was proclaimed in Bavaria. The formal laws were imminent - thanks to the energetic initiative of chancellor Adolph Hitler.

5/ Among all civilized nations, Germany was the first to put an end to the cultural shame of vivisection. The New Germany not only liberated man from the curse of materialism, sadism, and cultural Bolshevism, but gave the cruelly persecuted, tortured, and until then, wholly +

defenseless animals their rights. Animal friends and anti-vivisectionists of all states joyfully welcomed this action of the National Socialist government of the Third Reich.

What Reichschancellor Adolph Hitler and Minister-President Göring did for the protection of animals should have set the course for the leaders of all civilized nations.

6/In “Die Weisse Fahne”we can read: “It's a deed which will bring the New Germany innumerable new elated friends in all nations.Millions of friends of animals and anti-vivisectionists of all civilized nations thank these 2 leaders from their hearts for this exemplary civil deed!+

Buddha -continues the article-, the Great loving spirit of the East, says: "He who is kind-hearted to animals, heaven will protect!" May this blessing fulfill the leaders of the New Germany, who have done great things for animals, until the end. May the blessing hand of fate +

protect these bringers of a New Spirit, until their god given earthly mission is fulfilled!”

7/ As we can notice, the Reich's Animal Protection Law included a ban on vivisection with no exceptions. The Third Reich leaded all civilized nations in the area of animal welfare.
Currently, it seems that civilized nations have forgotten to create laws to protect animals.

The National Socialists also banned commercial animal trapping, imposed severe restrictions on hunting, and regulated the shoeing of horses. In 24 November 1933, National Socialist Germany enacted another law, Reichstierschutzgesetz (Reich Animal Protection Act), for protection +

of animals. This law listed many prohibitions against the use of animals, including their use for filmmaking and other public events causing pain or damage to health, feeding fowls forcefully and tearing out the thighs of living frogs.

The legislative text said that by the law the animal was to be "protected for itself" ("um seiner selbst willen geschützt")and made "an object of protection going far beyond the hitherto existing law" ("Objekt eines weit über die bisherigen Bestimmungen hinausgehenden Schutzes").

On February 23 1934, a decree was enacted by the Prussian Ministry of Commerce and Employment which introduced education on the animal protection laws at primary, secondary and college levels.

According to an article published in Kaltio, one of the main Finnish cultural magazines, National Socialist Germany was the first in the world to place the wolf under protection.

On September 9, 1937, a decree was published by the Ministry of the Interior which specified guidelines for transportation of animals. In 1938, animal protection was accepted as a subject to be taught in public schools and universities in Germany.

The National Socialists were more advanced in this field, like in many others.