"Who's a NAZI?" Topic

A Bavarian friend of mine told me Nazis would be displeased to be so referred to.

He claims that Hitler et al would only have referred to themselves as National Socialists & that the abbreviation of NAZI was given to them by their enemies & was considered deeply insulting.

Supposedly Nazi was the name (shortened version of Ignatius) of the doltish hero of many Bavarian stories.

He's a kidder but told me with a straight face.

True or not?

the abbreviation of NAZI was given to them by their enemies & was considered deeply insulting

And I would care that they felt insulted why, exactly ?

I was under the impression 'Nazi' was just another example of the mania for acronyms of the Third reich, and that a Nazi would in no way have been insulted to so be called.

Pat

@ Moomin. Yes, I believed the same. But is my Bavarian friend taking the proverbial or is it true?

@ 20th. ?

Ahhhh, I see – you want actual evidence? Well, this IS the internet, so here we go.

"My name is Martin Borman. My wife likes to call me a Nazi when we are in the sack together. Even when I don my rubber Bill Gates Costume so I can run Microsoft, I like my attractive assistants to whisper 'Nazi! Nazi!' in my ear while I tell everyone how good IE8 is."

"Heilo! I am Adolf Hitler's Clone Daughter, Margaret. I have never felt insulted at being called a Nazi, and nor has my husband/virgin blood provider Dennis."

There you go Ochoin, you can print that out as evidence.

Pat

Pat,
printed, laminated, gold-embossed, stuffed & mounted over my fireplace (to be a treasured heirloom, handed down to the wee'uns when my time comes*)

* half past two,

link

link

I think that you friend is right.

@ochoin deach

let us hypothesise that it is true that calling a National Socialist a Nazi is an insult that might hurt their feelings.

These are the same Nazis who thinks it's ok to invade other people's countries, murder the opposition, gas jews and romany gypises and homosexuals and socialists, who were ok with involuntary euthenasia and liked to experiment on humans. And more.

Why should I care if their poor tender Nazi feelings were hurt ?

i tell my 9 year old son, not all skinheads are nazi's…

it is one of the bizzarest of facts that the (UK) white skinhead culture came originally from a multi-racial appreciation of Jamaican Ska music.

How some of them ended up as racial bigots is a mystery.

OK, I usually am all about tolerance,but not here… Its that way because they made it that way.Winners write the history so don't pick a fight you cannot win. Was it Marshall the Supreme court justice that said (talking about pornography) " You will know it when you see it." I think the same thing applies to Nazi's.

20thmaine, Perhaps ochoin deach is trying to determine the veracity of a bizzare statement. I find your post about skinheads and his factoid to point out something I did not know about either group not an attempt to generate sympathy for them. We call em Nazi but they did not like the term, Hm?. Not all skinheads are racial bigots, Hm?.

BTW, do Skinheads call themselves Skinheads?

Illinois Nazis?

YouTube link

Let's not forget that self esteem is involved here.

YouTube link

With all due respect 20th, I don't think the OP was coming at the question with anything other than trying to get an answer about the origin of the term. I don't think he was 'worried about Nazi feelings'… not sure why you took it that direction.

There's plenty of examples of movements taking on a name that started out derisively. In art you have the Impressionists and Fauves.

I think he just wanted to know if the National Socialists got called "Nazi" and objected to it, or said "Hey, that's a good name for us!"

Allen57: An acquaintance of mine was a "non-racist skinhead", called himself a skinhead, and spent a lot of time explaining to everyone the difference between the hate-group skinheads and the non-hate-group skinheads… trouble was they looked identical, at least to me. I couldn't ever figure it out.

And just to clarify my position, I think anyone that investigates the Nazis- or whatever you want to call them- objectively, and without clouded vision, will come to the conclusion that they were very, very bad.

spent a lot of time explaining to everyone the difference between the hate-group skinheads and the non-hate-group skinheads… trouble was they looked identical, at least to me

The ones with swastikas are the hate-group

OK but so what?

The Soux don't call themselves the soux either, its a name given to them by others as are the Iroquois.

Isn't this a bit like the Bneemmeenemmeebemmeeneemee bring upset because that's what they call themselves but we all know them- as-- "Them." You know the giant ants that live in the LA Storm Sewers.

Isn't it rather like those bits of factoid you read in the underside of snapple iced tea bottles.

Now a far more interesting and useful topic is the straight definision as seemingly asked by the titla of the Post. Who actually IS a Nazi and what is defined by the name (regardless of if you like it or not.)

O Schmidt,

That was frak'n brilliant.Seriously.

My thanks,

Pat

So assuming this is true, some supremacist groups might willingly refer to themselves as "proud dolts?"

Perhaps they don't like the Capt Mainwaring pronuncuation, as in 'typical Narzi trick, Wilson', but prefer 'Natzi' – difficult to sound things out in text ain't it?

My nan used to sometimes say, when tempers were rising, 'there's no need to get nazi aboout it'. I'm presuming she meant those guys, not like we ever discussed where she got the saying from. Can't recall whether anyone else said it round our way. It must've worked, I rarely get nazi and have never invaded any European state.

Gary

By the by, on the latter thread direction, I think if we can have 'spelling Nazis' then the bar has been lowered to an intolerably low level. Actual Nazis are somewhat more dangerous than those who criticise incorrect use of the possesive apostrophe.

Gary-
If only your thoughts could be taken up by my fellow Americans. Sometimes seems that everybody one doesn't agree with over here is now a nazi!

So in a wargaming sense could yelling the term NAZI at the Germans be be used to goad the German soldiers into anger and making a mistake? Robert

I've been studying the far-right as part of my postgrad. Basically, it depends.

Most skinhead national socialists (note: not all skinheads are national socialists, some are virulently egalitarian etc) wear it like a badge of honour. Being a 'nazi' is a mark of identity and pride – minority groups often adopt insults or derogative names and symbols and incorporate them into their subculture, strengthening their sense of identity and differentiation.

As to its use as a contemporaneous term, dunno.

I guess that the term Untermensch and Untermenschen were considered an insult that the Germans used. Especially in regards to the Jews. Robert

One observation I have to make.

It is patentely obvious to the most uninformed observer that the Real Nazi's, would have despised the skin-heads and their adulators of today. The pierced, tatooed, crystal-methheads that make up the radical skinheads today would have been anathema to the "volkische" culture that was the ideal of the real Nazis, and the image of Aryan Man and womanhood advanced by the "Strength through Joy crowd." Todays skinhead would have been rounded up by the SS and the Gestapo and packed into the same cattlecars as the other Untermensch and not be allowed to pollute the "herrenvolk" of true German stock.

The Nazis completely repudiate that sort of imagery, as did Hitler himself, and if you want to see the image the Nazi's saw themselves, watch the movie "Cabaret" for the scene in the Country Beer garden.

"Still think you can control them Baron???"

"Tomorrow belongs.. Tomorrow belongs.. Tomorrow belongs to me.."

The pierced, tatooed, crystal-methheads that make up the radical skinheads today would have been anathema to the "volkische" culture that was the ideal of the real Nazis, and the image of Aryan Man and womanhood advanced by the "Strength through Joy crowd.

-----------------------
though one would have to say that people like Rohm, the Rossbach group, Julius Streicher might fit well in if they had a few tattoos! Not so sure about Aryan Womanhood – they certainly liked Aryan Man. And that before you even get on to drug abusers like Goering.

"Tomorrow belongs.. Tomorrow belongs.. Tomorrow belongs to me.."

------------------
actually what did belong to them was having their house knocked down by a 152mm Soviet Howitzer firing over open sites. Never start a fight you can't finish – I believe Hitler eventually concluded he picked the wrong people and should have chosen the Russians. All racist claptrap

20thmaine, Perhaps ochoin deach is trying to determine the veracity of a bizzare statement.

Thank you Allen57. I'd thought it was obvious but your re-statement might help.

wrt the OP, I would say 'false', your mate was pulling your leg.

wrt skinheads, nazism etc. It is very complicated. I was there, and no, they weren't all nazis, like all youth subcultures there are lots of different threads.

I have to say the idea that modern nazi skinheads would be anathema to Hitler and co is somewhat misinformed. Radical right wing working class cluture was the essence of national socialism, and the Nazi party and SA was packed with the same disenfranchised working classes who today flock to the banners of the far right. Fear leads to anger and anger leads to hate and all that.

Maybe, and this is just a punt, it was an insulting reference to that signature Indonesian dish 'Nazi Goering'?

Evil Nazi warlord:

Signature Indonesian rice based delicacy:

YouTube link

That's an obvious fake Sparker, there's no fried egg.

and single thawed prawn

ochoin deach
I have come across this three or four times, I originally heard it while working i Berlin in the 80's. Several of the old German civilians told me it was so and judging by the way it p!$$ed off the old "We were only obeying orders" type who worked in the office I would say it was true. Just my opinion mind.

20thmaine
Jeez dude as my kids say chillax. ochoin deach was just asking a question not objecting to the fact that the term mightbe offensive. When the old Nazi a/hole finally pushed me too far with one of his "Of course the Fuhrer didn't know about the killings in the camps, not that they were as bad as the allies said" statements I told him Hitler and the Nazis were a gang of scum sucking murderous f*%@&&ts" and was more than happy that he took offence. I got a written warning for not being sympathetic too local cultural attitudes. I also didn't have to buy a beer in the mess for about a week afterwards.

Fatman

Funnily enough some of the most ardent supporters of my drinking fund were old Germans of thne same age

Thanks Fatman. On both counts.

I think Churchill got it right in the way he drawled it out – that did (and quite rightly) sound insulting. I remember a teacher at school you used to do the same (mind you we had another one who basically implied that the photos of the Sharpeville Massacre were fakes as she said you can see that some of the people were not dead – given that wounded people might be looking in the direction of the camera I've never understood the fake argument – mind you 19,000 people v 150 police its perhaps not surprising that something happened)