Name: Du Han Yuan (04) Date: 30/06/09

Class: 2O4

Racism and discrimination

a) The police and courts were controlled by the Nazis and they will ignore crimes by
Nazis agents and people who opposes Nazis will not receive fair trials. There were
anti-jewish exhibition and Jews were arrested and put into concentration camps for no
reason.

b) Sports was ignored as political studies and propaganda speeches were much more
prominent during those days.

c) America was opposed to Nazis policies and wanted to boycott the games.

d) Some American athletes chose to compete as they did not know the purpose of
Nazi persecution of Jews. Other athletes supported going to the Olympics as the
United States traditionally sent one of the largest groups to the Games and did not
want the 1936 Games to be an exception.

e) The “Jim Crow” laws are laws that discriminate against African Americans with
concerns to attendance in public schools, and the use of facilities such as restaurants,
theatres, hotels, cinemas and public baths. Trains and buses were segregated and in
many states, marriage between whites and African American people were banned.
There is no evidence that racism, anti-Semitism, and discriminatory practices in the
United States affected American opinions about U.S. participation in the 1936
Olympics. However, some people boycott the Games because of the discrimination
that was going on in Germany.

Propaganda

a) The german government in response to international pressure, included a jew into

the team. This eased the tensions. Goebbels went very far in order to impress the other
countries and they were amazed by what Goebbels did.

b) The effort succeeded only to a small extent. The Germans made Germany appear as
a quiet and peaceful place. However, the outsiders were not taken in. They were
shocked and appalled by the almost fanatical devotion of the people to Hitler and by
the overt presence of the army and SS soldiers who were patrolling or standing guard
everywhere. The Germans were hiding what they were doing to the Jews, how they
were treated, how their rights were removed and how their freedom was restricted.

c) They thought that the games would be good to show off the superiority of the
Aryan race. When the games ended, germany got the most medals and this shows that
the Aryans were better that other races.

d) There were Swastika flags all over the stadium which shows the Aryan superiority.

Source Based Questions

a) The source says that the westerns were thinking that by holding the Olympic
games, Germany will become more open and less repressive. From this, I can infer
that the Western powers perception towards Nazis Germany was that Germany was
not an open country and had a repressive society. The Western Powers were pressured
into boycotting the Olympics in protest against the Nazis’ repressive regime and anti-
Jewish policies. There were Nazis flags everywhere in order to show the power of
Germany as the western powers did not think well of Nazis germany.

b) This source is reliable to a large extent. This source was written by an American
Journalist, and the purpose of this source is to provide coverage for the Berlin
Olympic Games. According to my contextual knowledge, the relationship between
western powers and Germany was not good. There was also international pressure to
boycott the Games in protest against the Nazis’ repressive regime and anti-Jewish
policies. Hence, the American Journalist would not have been bias towards the
Germans and would have written only about the things that he saw. The source states
that the Nazis’ have run the Games on a lavish scale. According to my contextual
knowledge, this is true. Goebbels built a brand new stadium to hold 100,000 people
just for the Games. It was facilitated by the most modern electric lighting. Television
cameras were also brought in for the first time. No expense was spared in the
preparations for the games. Hence, I think that this source is reliable and is factual.