The Nazi Gold Train

[Tiki Tom]

Holy smokes, I've never heard of that before. Nazi themed weddings in Asia? I'm afraid to even Google it at work. See my location. I can only imagine that the good folks at the German, Austrian, and Israeli embassies must be besides themselves. Just when you think you've seen it all and that nothing can surprise you anymore, something like this pops up to remind you that it's impossible to stay ahead of the craziness. Sigh. "Nazis. I hate these guys."

 

[Big J]

Time Warp Wife, yep, it's absolutely crazy and offensive, and I've loved to have slapped that guy seven ways from Sunday, but in Japan that'd just get me arrested (since there's no laws against simple racial discrimination here, never mind war-crimes denial and such).

Anyway, just to prove I wasn't making it up, here's a snap of Himmler.



To understand why this happens, you should read this excellent BBC story about just how poorly the Japanese are educated about WWII;

http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-21226068

And as a result of this 70 year failing of the education system, people dress up like this to honor war-criminals;



Because, after all, Tojo was just 'misunderstood', right?
An attitude that leads to our friend Himmler In The Park above, and the general idea across large parts of Asia that Nazis are 'fun cutsey play time!' (why are those sensitive white people getting their knickers in a twist?) with no sense of irony at all.

To demonstrate that last point, I'll leave you with this (Tiki Tom, yes, this is like living in a nut house of childish ignorance. I had to explain the Nanking Massacre to my kids, and then make them promise not to tell anyone else, or they'd be social outcasts).



View attachment ©Uchujin-AdrianStorey_2012_03_22_3968.jpg



Hell, in Japan, Nazis are so harmless, they can even be used to sell skin cream;

 

[TimeWarpWife]

Big J, you have my utmost admiration for your self-control. Being one of those big mouth Yankees, even though most of the time I'm the typically polite southern belle, I just could not have passed by this ignorant yahoo and not given him a quick history lesson on what really happened during WWII. As Judge Judy so aptly puts it, you can't fix stupid - and I include the Holocaust deniers in this group also.

 

[Big J]

Big J, you have my utmost admiration for your self-control. Being one of those big mouth Yankees, even though most of the time I'm the typically polite southern belle, I just could not have passed by this ignorant yahoo and not given him a quick history lesson on what really happened during WWII. As Judge Judy so aptly puts it, you can't fix stupid - and I include the Holocaust deniers in this group also.

I appreciate the compliment; self-control isn't my strong suit.
For what it's worth, I think southern accents are charming in a lady.

 

[LizzieMaine]

I thought I'd seen everything, but a Nazi schoolgirl with furry animal ears had never crossed my path before.

 

[Big J]

I thought I'd seen everything, but a Nazi schoolgirl with furry animal ears had never crossed my path before.

Lizzie, I think that when Eddington said, “Not only is the universe stranger than we imagine - it is stranger than we can imagine.” it just about covered such eventualities.

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

Though I tend to think that many Asians have only an abstract knowledge of Hitler, Nazism and the Holocaust considering it part of what is to them a very distant "European history."

 

[p51]

Funny. The "Himmler" guy is wearing a SS hat but an Army tunic...

You have way more control than I, if you didn't say anything to him. I have no patience with anyone who is stupid - and I do mean stupid - enough to be dressed in any kind of Nazi uniform, but much less emulating that godless butchering lunatic Himmler! :mad2:

Heck, at the big Battle of the Bulge re-enactment at Indiantown Gap, PA (I think in 1994), there was one of each: Hitler, Himmler, Rommel and Goering. I don't know who those guys were, But lots of people took photos of them (mostly German re-enactors, but a few allied types took photos with them like they were capturing them). I was there with a 'GI' unit, and we just rolled our eyes and went the other way the one time we saw them. I have been to re-enactments all over the place and that's the only time I ever saw anything like that.

 

[Edward]

Bizarre seeing those Japanese and Korean kids dressed like that. Not least as the Ss would have been keen to shovel nonAryans like them into ovens.

 

[LizzieMaine]

I won't post a link because -- shudder -- but Google "Barbarossa anime card game" if you really want to see how twisted some of this stuff can get. And note the articles about the 100-percent-funded Kickstarter campaign to import it to the US, because the image of Hitler as a Japanese schoolgirl in a very short skirt is apparently quite the thing with some of the well-educated middle-class American youths of the moment.

 

[Big J]

Lizzie, I know this type of thing- there are many anime of girls free from the challenges of gravity in nazi uniforms (Girls und Panzer springs to mind). I think that a certain type of well-educated middle-class American youths of the moment like it because they perceive the 'edginess' of playing with nazi imagery as a rebellion against their family values (in much the same way as white kids back in my day were listening to rap and imagining that they too were 'Straight out of Compton').
It's kind of the same way that the Sex Pistols (who I'm going to assume you aren't familiar with ) played with Nazi symbolism to annoy people parents. These are examples of nazi symbolism as conscious/subconcious rebellion maybe.

V.C. Brunswick, I think you're right, many Asian people may indeed not see the Nazis as having anything to do with them, and 'up for grabs' as it were, for cultural appropriation. I have no doubt that Korean nazi costume enthusiasts would scream blue murder if I dressed up as member of the Imperial Japanese Army and strutted through Seoul. The Japanese have got less of an excuse having been allies of the Nazis- they should be on their best behavior if we are to believe that they have learnt their historical lessons, and are now model 'global citizens'.

But this again brings up an interesting point- why is it ok for people in the west to enjoy 'living history' or 're-enactment' as nazis, but we find it creepy and repulsive when asians do it? I personally thinks it's about context (easy to prove- not many re-enactors go out for a night on the town dressed as nazis) and intent (more difficult to prove- who knows how many nazi re-enactors are getting their jollies at events way more than some kid in Tokyo?).

So, yeah, I think it's a potential minefield of potential 'racism' accusations and counter accusations. All I can say is that it feels damn strange to me.
The thing I keep coming back to in my head is that it's 'acceptable' for Americans to dress up as nazis for re-enactment/living history ('My grandfather died for my freedom to dress up as a nazi!'), but NO ONE makes concentration camp inmate uniforms, and no one wants to 'living history' that, and if they did, I'm pretty sure they would be pilloried for being disrespectful, so I think somewhere we got our values all mixed up.

P51, If I looked like any of the nazi bigwigs, I'd get a uniform and go to events and set up a photo booth to make photos in the style of the old War Bonds posters, or the wartime superheroes comics.

 

[LizzieMaine]

I've always been creeped out by "reenactor" Nazis, to be honest. I realize somebody has to be the Bad Guys at reenactments, but I just can't get the YOU'RE PRETENDING TO BE SOMEONE WHO FOUGHT FOR HITLER thing out of my mind. I think it trivializes what those uniforms stood for, and I don't support it by attending such events.

I remember being a kid and seeing other kids playing Army around the neighborhood with cut-out paper swastika armbands because the Nazis they'd seen on TV had "the best uniforms." I've always kind of felt that modern collectors of Nazi memorabilia must be stuck in a bit of that mindset.

 

[Bamaboots]

As one who has dealt first hand with the Klan, Aryan brotherhood, skinheads and other groups who wear Nazi symbolism, fly the Nazi flag and espouse Nazi beliefs, I would never feel comfortable around anyone wearing the uniform or similar clothing as in the pics Big J posted. Fortunately, most that I've been around make stupid look pretty smart.

 

[Otter]

Big J, I agree with you 're the antigravity. At least we now know what happened to Die Glocke at the end of the war !

Lizzie, you were right, I really didn't want to look at that kickstarter.

 

[Big J]

Big J, I agree with you 're the antigravity. At least we now know what happened to Die Glocke at the end of the war !

Lizzie, you were right, I really didn't want to look at that kickstarter.

Die Glocke? Went to America under Operation Paperclip, surely?

After googling that card game, you should probably refrain from mental exercise until your brain cells grow back again. I did.

 

[Big J]

As one who has dealt first hand with the Klan, Aryan brotherhood, skinheads and other groups who wear Nazi symbolism, fly the Nazi flag and espouse Nazi beliefs, I would never feel comfortable around anyone wearing the uniform or similar clothing as in the pics Big J posted. Fortunately, most that I've been around make stupid look pretty smart.

+1
Me too. I've never met any of the type who were real smart.

 

[Big J]

I've always been creeped out by "reenactor" Nazis, to be honest. I realize somebody has to be the Bad Guys at reenactments, but I just can't get the YOU'RE PRETENDING TO BE SOMEONE WHO FOUGHT FOR HITLER thing out of my mind. I think it trivializes what those uniforms stood for, and I don't support it by attending such events.

I remember being a kid and seeing other kids playing Army around the neighborhood with cut-out paper swastika armbands because the Nazis they'd seen on TV had "the best uniforms." I've always kind of felt that modern collectors of Nazi memorabilia must be stuck in a bit of that mindset.

You know Lizzie, I'm sure there's a PhD. in this for anyone who can stomach the research (not me for sure). Hugo Boss had a brief, and he designed a winning uniform for the nazis that pressed all thier buttons about supremacy and inspiring fear. It's no wonder that it still appeals to some people today, even if they aren't self-aware about it. And then there are those who are aware that they love the powerful imagery, but are so dissasociated in time and space from the nazis that it doesn't really feel 'real' to them- it's something that happened to 'other people' 'a long time ago'. And maybe they don't have a very good understanding of the nazis or their beliefs, they just know that nazis were 'bad'?

 

[Otter]

Definitely suffering from brain cell suicide this morning. Perhaps we should start spreading the rumours that Die Glocke was on that train ?

 

[Big J]

Definitely suffering from brain cell suicide this morning. Perhaps we should start spreading the rumours that Die Glocke was on that train ?

Only if you guarantee me a 10% cut!

 

[Otter]

Deal ! I will even cut you in for 50% of the intellectual property rights on Vril !

On a more serious note the reenactors that go out as Wermacht and even SS don't hugely bother me as I used to do a bit of WWII reenactment. It's a bit freaky the first time or two you see them though. I have no idea however why anyone would want to dress as a KZ guard which I have seen.