[lbo-talk] Walt Disney Nazi cartoon

Charles Brown cbrown at michiganlegal.org
Tue Feb 20 08:04:53 PST 2007


Chris Doss :

I kid you not: http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=1501335 896

^^^^^

How about this ?

http://www.spitfirelist.com/f301.html

18. Next, the program examines allegations of prewar Nazi activity on Disney's part. As Eliot explains in his book, Disney was the son of a Christian evangelist and was very anti-labor in his business dealings. (This was typical of Hollywood studio chiefs at the time.) These attitudes combined with resentment of the power of many of the Jewish American studio heads. Perhaps because of these views, Disney apparently began attending American Nazi party meetings in the company of Gunther Lessing, Disney's attorney and chief advisor on labor issues. "During the time Disney helped organize the independent filmmakers against the industry's mainstream, he also was accompanying Lessing to American Nazi party meetings and rallies.

19. "According to [former Disney employee] Arthur Babbitt, 'In the immediate years before we entered the war, there was a small but fiercely loyal, I suppose legal, following of the Nazi party. You could buy a copy of Mein Kampf on any newsstand in Hollywood. Nobody asked me to go to any meetings, but I did, out of curiosity. They were open meetings, anybody could attend, and I wanted to see what was going on for myself.

'On more than one occasion I observed Walt Disney and Gunther Lessing there, along with a lot of other prominent Nazi-afflicted [sic] Hollywood personalities. Disney was going to meetings all the time. I was invited to the homes of several prominent actors and musicians, all of whom were actively working for the American Nazi party. I told a girlfriend of mine who was an editor at the time with Coronet magazine who encouraged me to write down what I observed. She had some connections to the FBI and turned in my reports.'

20. "If Disney and Lessing were sympathetic to the American Nazi movement, their interest was most likely motivated by the desire to regain favor with the once-lucrative, Nazi-occupied countries where Disney films were now banned. To that end Walt was also committed to the 'America First' movement and became one of Hollywood's most active prewar isolationists. Under Lessing's tutelage, Disney discovered how the passions and power of political activism could be used as weapons for personal gain. And later on, for revenge." (Ibid.; pp. 120-121.)

21. In a footnote to the above passage Eliot adds, "In her memoirs, German filmmaker Leni Riefenstahl claims that after Kristallnacht she approached every studio in Hollywood looking for work. No studio head would even screen her movies except Walt Disney. He told her that he admired her work but if it became known that he was considering her, it would damage his reputation." (Ibid.; p. 121.)

22. Well before the end of World War II, Disney was instrumental in bringing governmental investigators into his anti-Communist activities.



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