JLA, as a historian, I find myself puzzled by your assertion that "moral decline" facilitated the success of Nazism. Would you kindly elaborate on your thought?
As a bare assertion, it sounds a little too close to the line the Nazis themselves took. It was their big pitch that Germany was in a "moral decline," sapped from within by Jews, homosexuals, feminists (there were proportionately far more women in the legislature of the Weimar Republic than there are in the US Congress today), "cosmpolites", "decadent" artists, "mongrel" foreigners, & so forth.
Weimar certainly had its problems -- by no means all of its own making. At the same time, it was a period of truly extraordinary cultural vitality, creativity, and productivity - unmatched anywhere else in 20th century Europe, IMO. Moral codes were certainly changing, but that was inevitable, now the German Empire was dead. And change is not necessarily decline. Sometimes, it is progress.
Unfortunately those who wished to build a New Empire denounced all of this as "pure filth." The purity of the German volk was in danger!! And so, they cleaned it all up, in their own inimitable fashion.
So perhaps you can see why your brief reference to "moral decline" puzzled me. Perhaps I misunderstood you.
jbe
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