The view of Hitler beating his dog in the 'Rise of Evil' exemplifies our image of him as psychopathic maniac. In fact there is no evidence of this and all indications was that he was an animal lover. This also seemed to be the case on some of the more notorious 'criminals' in the Nazi party.

It seems a bit of a contradiction that they treated animals better than many people. Is there a psychological explanation to this? Was there a 'Hell is people' sort of attitude originating from a bad experiences in childhood driving them to creatures they could trust and love?

Perhaps it was all Nazi propaganda, or a sort of feudal law to avoid the peasants killing game. There was little enforcement of the animal welfare rules for vivisection as well. Food for thought though!

There was widespread support for animal welfare in Nazi Germany and the Nazis took several measures to ensure protection of animals. Many Nazi leaders including Adolf Hitler and Hermann Göring were supporters of animal protection. Several Nazis were environmentalists, and species protection and animal welfare were significant issues in the Nazi regime. Heinrich Himmler made efforts to ban the hunting of animals.Göring was an animal lover and conservationist.The current animal welfare laws in Germany are more or less modification of the laws introduced by the Nazis.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Animal_...n_Nazi_Germany

Don´t know and don´t care (that he industrialized murder looking at the pence is all I need to know, see the Wannsee Conference, where the high price of bullets to the brain through killing squads versus the much cheaper and more mass effective gas was the main theme for the "Final Solution": http://www.ushmm.org/outreach/wannsee.htm the summary hair rising protocol here: http://www.writing.upenn.edu/~afilreis/Holocaust/wansee-transcript.html), but, this said:

He indeed was well known for his love to his dogs, and he initiated an "animal love" culture that for us Germans has stuck and still is valid (though most don´t know where it originated):

Germans are the worlds greatest caretakers of animals that are abandoned or mistreated, they spend zillions of Euros and huge personal efforts to make this planet a paradise for animals (as you can see, I am also infected: http://ohlmer.es/blog/90 & http://ohlmer.es/blog/112).

Here in Mallorca, Spain *all animal refuges* are run by Germans, in my little village we have a lady that inherited 15 M Euros with the obligation to feed, sterilize and take care of the village cats (more than inhabitants) til the end of her life, she is also ... German...

There is a true and factual base to these theories from my experience, but I doubt you should Hitler view under this angle (like my grandpa always said: "He was´nt *all* bad, he constructed the "Autobahn" (motorways)... and he *really* loved his dogs!").

Rattler

the phenomenon is called transference. you should be able to google the information without too much difficulty but i doubt you're going to get a decent, rational debate on it here, or most forums for that matter. the point about the german autobahn system often gets brought up on sites devoted to cars and it invariably leads to a heated fight and much namecalling.