Nazi memorabilia

[Marymaymay]

Went to local car boot this weekend, man had a stall bedecked with a huge Nazi swastika/SS flag, selling mainly Nazi memorabilia. As a 3rd generation Jewish immigrant family, most of whom perished in the war, I was shocked and saddened by this. Someone wrote words to this effect on a local gossip site and over 60 people have replied - the majority basically calling the OP a dickhead, that the war is over, people fought for freedom of expression so get over it. Was really surprised by this response. I can understand that I might be more sensitive than most on this topic but can't believe that most people think selling this stuff is ok...if there was an ISIS flag for sale the same people would be going beserk! So AIBU?

Gah, typos.

Why does being interested in history (or 'the' history)...

We didn't fight for flags, we fought for an ideal and that ideal needs to be upheld

Yes, freedom I think it was.

We have laws in this country about hate speech and inciting violence, about racism and homophobia, both of which are Nazi ideals. it's good that we have those laws.

But we don't have laws, or nor should we, on buying or selling flags. If we did, the hammer and sickle would also have to be banned (Stalin's death camps). Also the Chinese (cultural revolution, millions starved) & Japanese pow atrocities) flags. Which would be awkward as they are both currently flying above their embassies!

Also, we don't have thought crime in this country. People are allowed to be sympathetic to the Nazis or even support them. They are also allowed to hate blacks/Jews/gays. So long as they don't spout their idiocy and don't inflict harm on them, or encourage others to, then idiots are entitled to think what they like and buy and sell flags.

HellKitty, I find your posts incredibly distasteful, particularly your "pension" comment.

It is repugnant that you plan to make money out of peoples' suffering.

It's vile.

I'm actually too angry to say anything more articulate than this.

Oh for fucks sake.

I'm going to hide this thread now.

TTWK

What about glorification of terrorism, which is a crime and includes "any form of praise and celebration" that might make people think they should emulate the conduct - even if nobody actually acts upon that?

Would you be comfortable with someone selling terrorism-related paraphernalia?

HellKitty - what do you feel about having nazi paraphernalia in your house? Or even handling it? Is there an emotional connection?

I think I would feel such hatred and sadness that I would be uncomfortable in myself, which is why I would never have anything nor wish to see them except in a museum.

Hmmm, educating about Islamophobia you say? Do you have any idea of the antisemitism (often state sponsored) that exists in the Muslim world?

HellKitty, your posts are repulsive.

What about glorification of terrorism, which is a crime and includes "any form of praise and celebration" that might make people think they should emulate the conduct - even if nobody actually acts upon that? Would you be comfortable with someone selling terrorism-related paraphernalia?

I'm not convinced buying or selling terrorist related stuff (not weapons obviously) is glorification. Coming back to Nazi flags, there must be a legitimate market, for film sets, museums etc.

I think we have to be very careful about not throwing the baby out with the bath water on issues like this. You don't get to defeat Nazism by effective imposing Nazi style restrictions on the population.

There's a guy near me who has bought an ex N.Ireland army Landrover, with all the mesh grills over the glass and the side panels down to the ground to stop petrol bombs being throw underneath. Now the sight of this thing may trigger upsetting memories for anyone who lost someone in the troubles, but should we really be banning his right to own it?

Quite why he wants it I don't really get, but it's a free country, still.

The big flag is a bit over the top, but Nazi war time stuff is just as collectable as british wartime stuff, it is a point in history which is studied a lot.
I have a book on wartime propaganda, with cartoons and posters from Germany, Russia, the UK and america in, somebody collected these posters as a source for example.

I would be suspicious of anyone who collected Nazi memorabilia and I agree that to airily describe it as "our pension" shows an incredible lack of understanding. I wouldn't assume they had Nazi sensibilities though, more likely they've got a fascination with horrible things. There's a big market for items connected with serial killers which I think taps into the same part of people's brain. It's a bit immature in my view.

Hellkitty

Why stop at making money from Nazi memorabilia? There's money to be made from the hair,spectacles and gold teeth of their slaughtered victims too you know......

Your pension pot. FFS.

Communist memorabilia is openly for sale everywhere and people wear it very casually. Just because they won the war, its sort of forgiven that they murdered way more people.
But when it comes to Nazi stuff, its a very double standard.

i was going to hide but I am slightly heartened that it isn't just me who is disgusted by that post, and I wanted to share one of the reasons I find it so disgusting.

I have DC who have a disability relating to a recessive genetic condition. DH and I had to go for genetic counselling and testing and part of that was asking our families if they had ever had family members with the same condition. My grandmother said she didn't know of anyone.

Years later, before she died, she told me that she did in fact have a disabled relative with this condition, who was her best friend growing up although she attended a different, special, school. One afternoon the cousins mother went to collect her child from school, only to find her child and all her classmates had been taken, presumably to camps and then killed. None of the children survived. Her cousin was eight and she was killed as she had the same disability my DC had.

My grandmother felt so guilty she hadn't told me, but she couldn't bring herself to talk about it, even decades later. In a way I wish she hadn't told me as it is so horrific to think of, but I think the victims and their families' stories deserve to be acknowledged and remembered. To me it illustrates so clearly why someone using nazi memorabilia (which they are "fascinated" by) as a source of income is beyond contempt.

That's a tragic story No. Perhaps I could share one of my own.

I only recently discovered - a few years ago - of the existence of a relative in the United States. The relative was the son of my mother's cousin 'W' and his wife 'H'. I'd always been told that the cousin and his wife had not had any children.

In fact Cousin W and H had a son, but this son has been brought up and looked after in an institution because of the severity of his disabilities. He had been written out of the family tree and nobody talked about him.

I was really shocked about this.

However, the oddest - to me - thing is that all my mother's family are Jewish and came from Nazi Germany. But the idea that disabilty is shameful is very much there in that generation, whether you're right wing or left wing, Jewish or Aryan. I think W - who lost his brother in Auschwitz - was very keen to be able to bring new life into the world and felt sad that after repeated miscarriages, his only child was someone who probably wasn't going to get married and father children.

Incidentally my own father (not Jewish) rung me up specially when I was pregnant - in my late 30s - to tell me that he thought it was absolutely okay to have a termination if tests had showed that the baby would have Down's syndrome. This was not a topic I had discussed with him. He brought it up himself.

All I'm really saying is that some attitudes held by the National Socialists were linked to quite ordinary widely held prejudices.

FishCanFly Sorry but there is no comparison with the Communist regime and the Holocaust. Dreadful things happened under Stalin, but I certainly don't think they were more abhorrent than the "Final Solution". And I've never seen a stall selling Communist artefacts, either, or seen a party where people dressed in Russian Army uniform, unlike the fascination with the Nazis.

Marianne, that's very sad too.

i am just reading the thread where posters are advocating that DC with SN should be seated at the back of school concerts, so as not to be a disturbance, funnily enough, so I do agree with your last sentence. Obviously didn't want to provoke Godwins Law on that thread, but it's sad that people still don't see people with disabilities as part of society with just as much right to be present as others.

I also think society is edging towards the use of eugenics to prevent DC like mine, being born, which makes me feel depressed, to be honest. It's obviously a much bigger and wider debate than this thread though.

My grandmother told me her story at the time my youngest was the same age. I used to pick him up from his (special) school every day and think about the mother turning up all those years to find her child gone and never seeing them again.

Awful. No it's not illegal, and probably shouldn't be, but someone who sells or buys genocide paraphernalia deserves to be robustly criticised. I think people feel that nazism is now part of history and forget that there are still families touched by it and by modern variants. I doubt anyone would sell items from the Serbian or Rwandan genocides but for some reason nazi stuff is ok. Yanbu op.

I wouldn't assume they had Nazi sensibilities though, more likely they've got a fascination with horrible things. There's a big market for items connected with serial killers which I think taps into the same part of people's brain.

I think this is true. I wonder if perhaps people who collect this stuff are less sensitive to, less connected to, or less easily haunted by what actually happened.

There are things I know about what was done to pregnant women and babies in those camps that I wish I didn't know and cannot unknow. They still occasionally haunt me when I look at DD, an infant, and I find it incredibly upsetting to think about them and all the other horrors that went on. It happened to ordinary people just like me. I find it hard not to imagine what it would be like if it was me, or my child, or my family.

Because of this I have never visited a concentration camp. I couldn't cope with it.

Similarly, if I had Nazi artefacts on display in my house I would think of awful things every time I looked at them. I don't really understand how you can divorce those objects from one part of their context and enjoy them because of another part.

Clawdy i think its pretty much pointless to argue who hurt who more. As for ww2 memorabilia, a lot of people have them as collectibles, does not mean they are nazi sympathisers.
As for communists, i had a catfight with a woman who was openly waving a bolshevik flag at Free Gaza demonstration. I first explained nicely that this is very very wrong and offensive just like waving a swastika. She said "oh, but the communists saved you eastern europeans from the nazis. You should be grateful." I was so livid and nearly stuffed that shite flag up her arse. But have to realize - some people are just idiots.

Sorry, I just cannot equate the Bolshevik flag with the swastika. No way.

A lot of people can. Here i will stop, because it like arguing its better that a shark bites off your head than a crocodile.

Nazis are dying of old age and their families are having to get rid of their junk. Hopefully most will destroy it rather than sell it.

I used to live in Preston and there was a regular Nazi stall in the town centre. A friend of DP collects knives and daggers and bought one apparently. They make me very uncomfortable but the friend doesn't keep them out on display, but is very into authentic weaponry. I don't think the stall should be allowed in the market though, it's just next to regular stuff like candles, clothes, used books and the like - you can imagine how disconcerting it is to suddenly clock all the swastikas.

I do think specifically hoarding Nazi memorabilia for personal profit later on as they become more rare is more distasteful than private collections, even though inevitably some private collectors will believe Nazi ideology as well as history/weapons researchers or enthusiasts.