The debate: White Rose as symbol?

Can people be national “symbols” – untouchable? What is the definition of a hero? How should we proceed when a legend becomes entrenched?

Photo by Joshua Newton on Unsplash

In yesterday’s post, I briefly mentioned the brouhaha in 2002 over my accurate portrayals of the lives of Hans and Sophie Scholl. A subset of the Scholl clan took umbrage over this portrayal.

In short order, I learned several things very quickly. How a reporter – in this case from the Hohenloher Tagblatt – can and will twist and distort words to suit his audience. How people who tell you one thing in an interview will back-track when there’s money involved. Why it is incredibly important to document, document, document. When to walk away from an “argument” that the other party is using to gin up fake controversy, just for free publicity.

And why this matters.

This is the longest post I have written since January 6, 2022. It is coincidentally uploaded to be distributed on May 9, 2024, the 103rd anniversary of Sophie Scholl’s birth.

But it honors Traute Lafrenz – birthday May 3 – even more. Because if anyone encouraged me to look behind the curtain, to keep digging, it was Traute. She was likely hurt more by the Scholl legend than any other survivor. She would brook no nonsense about untouchable symbols. Traute, thank you.

If you are a scholar who hasn’t yet paid for a subscription, please contact us. I will be more than happy to give you a free month paid subscription so you can read this lo-ooong post and try to wrap your head around three questions:

• Can people be national “symbols” – untouchable?

• How do we proceed when a legend, such as the Inge Scholl legend about her siblings, has become entrenched because of government funding (both USA and Germany) and unwillingness of “historians” to challenge the legend? Especially, as is the case here, when the three major sources and driving forces behind the legend were all überzeugte (convinced) Nazis during the war? I am, of course, speaking of Inge Scholl, Franz Josef Müller, and Jürgen Wittenstein.

• What is the definition of a hero? And how should historians write about heroes?

Because believe it or not, a simple email discussion on those three questions erupted into a hideous dispute that spanned two months in 2002 and caused Dr. Armin Ziegler, one of the best historians on the planet – a retired economist who “fell into” White Rose scholarship upon retirement – to walk away from years of research.

From this point on, for paid subscribers only.