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I think that there are solid reasons why democracies have developed cultural antibodies against Nazi aesthetics.
Now, I get not leaving everything which has ever been used by Nazis barren. For example, there are only so many two-letter acronyms, not using SS for something useful seems a bit of a waste, so I am fine with you Americans abbreviating social security thus. Likewise, just because some Neonazis like 18 and 88, even the Germans will not go all tetraphobic (yes, I know) on these numbers.
On the other hand, if someone were to say that we should reclaim "Heil Hitler", because after all, what made the Nazis bad was not their greetings but their genocides, I would reply that this is a terrible idea. It would be like saying that glowing cigarette butts -- unlike wildfires -- are generally not dangerous to humans, and thus we can throw them away without a care.
Of course, Musk's salute is a lot more ambiguous than "Sieg Heil", but in general I think that the gesture should better stay in the cordon sanitaire for a few more centuries.
My theory is that Musk did this deliberately to troll people. I disapprove.
(Also, I re-read SSCs parable of talents from 2015 recently. Scott mentions Musk no less than nine times, as an example of someone who is clearly gifted and doing good on a scale most of us could never hope to do. With a decade of hindsight, this reads somewhat bizarre -- sure, Musk did some great stuff, like making electric cars cool and establishing reuseable first stages, but he also did quite a few things which do not seem worth emulating.)
To better generate political accusations against political opponents while deflecting accusations of behavioral comparisons on aesthetic dis-similarity are certainly solid reasons, but they are not good reasons.
It certainly doesn't have much to do with protecting the rights and liberties of the individual, hence why the antibodies are about aesthetics and not practices such as government attitudes towards political-opposition speech (including use of organized political violence and ostracism to intimidate bystanders into non-resistance), political structure dynamics (incredibly strong governmental influence on private commercial actors to leverage nominally independent entities as tools of the state), social engineering at the race-composition level.
Moreover, it is and was particularly important that the cultural antibodies be against Nazi aesthetics, as opposed to the aesthetics of anyone who shared in Nazi-behavior, because during the Cold War when those antibodies were developed antibodies against behavior-aesthetics instead of Nazi-aesthetics would have implicated a not-inconsiderable portion of the Soviet-sympathizing socialist-leaning classes, who were significant influences in the cultural-antibody process and many of which whom still keep their Communist-derived aesthetics.
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Germany is not a democracy and not a free society.
I would rather the world avoids the norms from the German authoritarian far left hate speech police that persecutes its only genuine patriots. This is one of the several examples today of the extremes of anti nazi obsession and how that ends up looking as an occupation goverment. Which is because part of the reason this has happened in Germany has been the influence of some of the people who got influence after ww2. Especially the frankfurt school types. This kind of hysteria is what let to these types arguing in favor of giving German children to pedophiles because else it would lead to a new holocaust, and fascism. And they got away with it. But Germany was occupied and it is tragic to see even in other countries that even fought against Nazis, to see something similiar happen.
The general behavior of Germany isn't something to be proud off. The German establishment and those following its ideologies do not have any lesson to teach. Their current behavior is the opposite extreme of Germany under the Nazis.
Now, make no mistake I would rather countries and even more so other countries are lead neither by traitors who oppress their own patriots, the right wing and their own people in general, nor by extreme nationalists invading other countries. I don't think that your succeeds in only stopping the later.
I am not saying your approach is indicative of the worst of it, but to a small extend is part of a general more hysterical reaction than it is warranted. So there is a trend of antifa inquisition fanaticism throughout the world who have proven incapable of stopping only extreme elements of nationalism and not leading to an anti-native state that oppresses its own nation. Two tier justice system, totalitarianism and hate speech codes, having an agenda in favor of extintion of their own nation, and of guilt and self hatred and of course demonizing those who don't share their agenda. Supporting the extreme nationalism of foreign tribes at expense of their own nation. Ironically this behavior has some similarities to what the nazis wanted to do to some of the countries they conquered that they claimed their people like Polish were a threat to the German nation and should not be allowed ethnic consciousness. With the difference that Germans wanted to do it to other ethnic groups while some holders of this agenda want to do this against their own nation.
This has been part and parcel of their anti nazi crusade. It is comical now 80 years after world war 2 to be acting as if Musk's salute is serious business that we must have a strong reaction and talk about as a serious problem. So I would select in favor of not allowing them to play inquisitors any more. It is actually a good idea to loosen up with the hysterics 80 years after world war 2. Obviously the pro HBD nerd Elon Musk isn't out there to promote invading Poland.Musk's views on legal migration are actually a problem since large migration including legal migration, doesn't respect the rights of the indigenous American people to not be demographically displaced, especially white Americans who are especially targeted for demographic replacement.
If we need more authoritarianism, perhaps we need an inquisition towards the antifa inquisitors who went way over the top and while they think they are fighting the ghost of Hitler, they are actually oppressing their own people. And since there is actually a legitimate duty for a society not to oppress its own people, and to promote the interests of its own nation, first of all the preservation of the nation which is the people common ties of kinship, history, language, ethnic consciousness, it probably qualifies as restoration of rule of law and not necessarily authoritarianism to stop this faction which is itself authoritarian.
Ideally countries should have red lines in defense of their own people and preserving them and their interests that they wouldn't allow to be broken, but also respect some of the same red lines for other nations. There is also room for international collaboration beyond just that, but always with respect of red lines. Just like parents should put their children first, obviously define their children as their children and reject preposterous propaganda that just anyone can be allowed to become part of their children, protect their home, not give it to strangers, but not go around making money for their family by stealing from others, dealing drugs, murdering, etc. And of course they can develop some positive relationships with people outside just the family. Plenty of constitutions already say things along these lines of how it is the duty of the leaders of the goverment to protect the nation and how it is treason to harm the nation and have plenty to say about treason. So there is room to remember this and to start enforcing it.
Who would that be? Neo-Nazis aren’t patriots. At best, they’re lukewarm about the modern German state. It owes them no special deference.
I say this despite agreeing that Germany’s laws on the subject ought to be more like America’s.
If patriotism meant loyalty to the state as it currently exists, that would mean all Eastern anti-commie dissidents were traitors.
Um, yeah. You wouldn’t exactly expect Stalin to reward them.
It’s reasonable to wish the Germans were more merciful to their dissidents. But there is no reason to call neo-Nazis patriots, because the state they belong to explicitly opposes the one they’re patriotic about.
I wish we picked a more sympathetic example than neo-Nazis, because it makes the argument somewhat harder, but it's exactly this logic I'm disputing. This might not compute under a "
$nationis just an idea" or "citizenship is just aa passport" framework, but historically the idea you'd want to abolish the state you're under I'm the name of patriotism, is not really that strange.More options
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Don't people refer to the Secret Service as the SS, at least in contexts where the referent is clear?
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Then good thing ϟecureϟignals is bringing it back and putting it to use.
I doubt SecureSignals with his "the Nazis didn't do it and the Jews deserved it anyway" rhetoric minds at all when people call him SS.
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