Fool revolt
In the Cologne fool's revolt of 1935, the organized Cologne carnival opposed the alignment of the carnival celebrations, which was planned through affiliation with the Nazi organization Kraft durch Freude (KdF). Contrary to earlier representations, the fool's revolt is hardly seen today as an act of resistance against National Socialism , but merely as a defense of the traditional organizational form of the carnival festival assigned to the carnival associations.
procedure
On May 22, 1935, the Nazi alderman Wilhelm Ebel proclaimed the founding of the "Association of Cologne Carnival eV" in the Cologne daily newspapers. This consisted of representatives of the city administration, the NSDAP , the police and the KdF. The aim was to clear up "grievances" in Cologne Carnival, also with regard to the difficult economic situation of the festival organizers, who Ebel also accused of self-interest and incompetence.
The incumbent President of the Prinzengarde , Thomas Liessem , himself a member of the NSDAP since 1932, immediately conceived a counter-writ, which was supported and published jointly by all major carnival societies. They demanded the withdrawal of Ebel's slander and otherwise threatened to completely stop their activities for the carnival festival. The Cologne press, with the exception of the Nazi organ West German Observer , supported these demands. When on May 27, 1935 there was a large joint gathering of all carnival societies and many Cologne citizens in the presence of the police and party representatives, Liessem announced before the opening that Gauleiter Josef Grohé had distanced himself from Ebel's plan and asked him to to dissolve the intended association and to leave all carnival matters in the hands of the carnival societies.
The carnivalists for their part founded a “Cologne Carnival Festival Committee” chaired by Liessem.
After this event, known as the “fool's revolt”, there were no further attempts to harmonize or take over by the KdF organization in the Cologne Carnival.
background
The NSDAP planned the organizational, political, economic and ideological integration of the Rhenish Carnival into its totalitarian idea at an early stage. In November 1933, she instructed the carnival to be presented as a German national good in connection with the demonic "Vase Night", but to deny the church's relationship to the festival. Political jokes and criticism were forbidden to the carnivalists. The Cologne Rose Monday procession was no longer centrally organized by the carnival societies, but by the “Citizens' Committee for the Cologne Carnival”, chaired by Alderman Ebel. Two SA men were responsible for its management.
The measures taken by the NSDAP, which took over the carnival politically and historically, were initially received positively by the representatives of many large carnival clubs. Even before Hitler came to power , the negative attitudes of many people towards the multi-party system of the Weimar Republic , the Versailles peace treaty, and skepticism about the peace intentions of the League of Nations had been taken up by the carnival. Even before 1933, there were reform approaches that wanted to bring the carnival back to a "popular character".
The first anti-Semitic carnival float took part in the Carnival Monday procession in 1934: Taken from a Veedelszoch , it represented a group of Orthodox Jews who, under the heading “The last are leaving”, made “just a little excursion to Liechtenstein and Jaffa” - a clear allusion on expulsion and voluntary emigration of the Jewish population. Regular anti-Semitic representations followed in the next few years without leading carnivalists distancing themselves from them.
The National Socialists also succeeded in adapting the Cologne Carnival to homophobic elements of their ideology without much effort: the dance marieches traditionally portrayed by men and the male Cologne virgin were replaced by actresses in 1938 and 1939. After the war this was only revised for the virgin - the female dance marieches stayed.
After the KdF's takeover of the carnival had formally failed, the members of the festival committee arranged in detail with the organization: “Kraft durch Freude” donated for the Rose Monday procession, organized the construction of the stands and large parts of the tourist marketing of the Rose Monday procession. Members of the festival committee moderated KdF carnival sessions and awarded carnival medals to local NS figures.
Content carnival resistance to the Nazi ideology existed in individual cases: The Büttenredner Karl Küpper as "d'r Verdötschte" (Kölsch for "The Man") in the session carnival on the road, positioned himself openly against the Nazis and made despite threat and speech ban make fun of them on stage. A subversively published satire on the official Cologne Carnival Monday newspaper in 1938 also sharply criticized the Nazi system. She portrayed Joseph Goebbels on the title page as "His Tollity Jüppche I".
Interpretations
In the post-war period , the behavior of the “Festival Committee” under its President Thomas Liessem was interpreted as clever tactics and a steadfast demeanor against the pressure of the NSDAP to take over the Cologne Carnival. First attempts to critically come to terms with the legend of the fool's revolt failed due to resistance in Cologne politics and in the Cologne Carnival Festival Committee . In the second half of the 20th century, the "resistance" of the Cologne Carnival against National Socialism was relativized in historical terms and also presented realistically by the Cologne Carnival Festival Committee, for example in the Cologne Carnival Museum .
swell
- Hildegard Brog - Whatever happens: D'r Zoch kütt! The history of the Rhenish carnival. Campus Verlag, Frankfurt 2000, ISBN 3-593-36387-9 , pp. 219-247.
- CONTEMPORARY HISTORY: Heil Hitler and Alaaf . In: Der Spiegel . No. 9 , 1998 ( online - Feb. 23, 1998 ).
- Jürgen Meyer: De Nazis nit op d'r tie trodde . In: The daily newspaper . February 7, 2005 ( online [accessed April 13, 2008]).
- Jürgen Meyer: Organized carnival and "fool's revolt" under National Socialism . In: History in Cologne (GiK) . No. 42 . Cologne 1997, p. 69-86 .
Individual evidence
- ^ WDR documentation: Heil Hitler and alaaf! Carnival in the Nazi era . 8:15 p.m. on January 16, 2008.
- ↑ Michael Euler-Schmidt, Marcus Leitfeld: The Cologne Rose Monday Parade 1823-1948 . Ed .: Festival Committee of the Cologne Carnival of 1823 eV 1st edition. Bachem Verlag, Cologne 2007, ISBN 978-3-7616-2062-5 , p. 174-178 .
- ↑ For example by the carnival historian Joseph Klersch, quoted in: Hildegard Brog, p. 219.