Anthroposophy and Ecofascism 94

Continuing my commentary on the 28th paragraph of Peter Staudenmaier's Anthroposophy and Ecofascism.

For Peter Staudenmaier to make the historical judgment that Steiner railed against France with "rhetoric which matched that of Mein Kampf" would imply that he had read a sufficient amount of Steiner and Mein Kampf as to be able to compare the two. Had Peter Staudenmaier done this, he would perhaps notice that Steiner did not, in actual fact, rail against the French as is here claimed. The absence of any footnote indicating the source for this absurd statement is a fairly decent indication that Peter Staudenmaier has read very little of Steiner's own work. Indeed, we are not even told the secondary source from which Peter Staudenmaier might have borrowed this comparison. This fascist anti-French bigot is the same Rudolf Steiner who in 1919 chose French and English as the foreign languages to be taught in the first Waldorf School, and when asked why in 1924 explained:

"We have introduced French and English into the Waldorf School, because with French there is much to be learned from the inner quality of the language not found elsewhere, namely, a certain feeling for rhetoric, which it is very good to acquire; and English is taught because it is a universal world language, and will become so more and more."

Rudolf Steiner. The Kingdom of Childhood. New York: Anthroposophic Press, 1995. Page139. It is in answer to the last question in the question and answer section of the lecture of August 20th, 1924.