Serendipity: Mein Kampf Book Review

This semester I am writing a book chapter on the Canadian churches and the Second World War. As I recently scrolled through the United Church’s bi-weekly periodical entitled the Observer I found a book review for Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf (“My Struggle”). ​

The context for the review was the opening months of the war, with Canadians adjusting to a conflict that they had hoped to avoid. The paper’s aim was to educate its readers on current issues, and so the editor thought it important to provide a review of the book in the January 1940 issue.
 
On the one hand, I was not surprised with the book review being in the paper. The churches at that time had a robust vision for social and political engagement, and to carry out their mission there was a need for a well-informed membership. And to be well informed in that day meant reading Hitler’s ideology and intentions as described so vividly in Mein Kampf.
 
On the other hand, I was surprised to see it because we live in a cancel culture today that seeks to block people from reading anything distasteful, offensive, or dastardly. And to promote a knowledge of such works seems foreign to many.
 
For the record, I agree with the paper’s editor on the issue of "knowing your enemies." As a general principle, I prefer knowing to not knowing, even if it means being informed about something as deeply offensive as Hitler’s racist tropes and hateful plans.