What's in a name?

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Arkady

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Rob
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No
Serious question...

I get away with using the image of a homicidal maniac responsible for carrying out Stalin's pogroms, purges and general nastiness mostly because no-one reads books any more and schools only teach kids text-speak... I've even been asked a few times who he is and have answered honestly and extensively as to who he was and what he did...not a murmur...
I choose to do this because it amuses me that 90% of the general population don't know anything about him and those that do wouldn't recognise him if he smacked them in the mouth...and because despite his appalling behaviour he would have dismantled the CPSU and ended the Cold War thirty years sooner, had he not in turn been murdered by some of those he'd previously exiled...

But say: "Adolf Hitler" *swoon, shock, horror*...the bogeyman's about again...
Nazis - such an easy target - no-one will ever complain about being nasty about the Nazis - they're perfect! Black uniforms, evil insignia, unspeakable acts of murder and depravity on an industrial scale...The perfect villains, in fact.
Hitler was a Very Bad Person...yes...but just a person. So were Goebbles, Himmler, Eichmann, Bormann et al and they're all dead - well mostly, if you believe the National Enquirer...

You know why we really hate the Nazis so much...really?
They're us.

They're not ancient Romans...
Not illiterate drug-addled Rwandans...
Time, distance, race and religion can't be used as a lens to look at those atrocities and say - we could never do such things...

The Nazis were just like you and me.

Us...
...and that's why we hate them so much - we look in the mirror and it could have been us doing that stuff...

If a certain person had chosen Ghengis, would that have been as bad...or Nero, Caesar, Agamemnon? All murdering thugs...though History may paint them in artificially heroic tones...
Or how about Custer? Massacred thousands of women and children, forced the remainder into areas where they starved to death...No-one would mind Custer as a screen-name, would they?

Is it acceptable to choose another mass-murderer's name simply because they murdered a longer time ago?

Obviously our poor friend has had second thoughts and hopefully re-registered by now, but should he have? And if so why?
I cannot believe anyone is so unaware of what Hitler stood for, so by choosing that name was he being funny? A lot of Israelis probably wouldn't get the joke...well some of the ones I know might laugh...
Was he trying to identify with the man's politics? If so at least he'd be being honest about it unlike a certain someone on Question Time last week...

Your thoughts please ladies and gentlemen...
When are words unacceptable...when is a name unacceptable...and why?
 
Not seen anything about someone using a name that required changing so cannot comment on that.

I did know a bit about Arkady partly because I do enjoy reading and partly because I used to know someone with a horse who had that name and the reasons behind it!! A lot of the more recent names you mentioned are responsible for atrocities commited in some peoples lifetimes which have been well documented in both printed words and in films, whereas a lot of the "older" names (Ghengis, Nero, Caesar, Agamemnon) were well before our lifetimes, and their deeds were not witnessed by films or our relatives. Custer was a handsome oficer who was a hero - according to the films - so until someone produces a film saying that an American hero was really a baddie and that the indigenous indians were badly treated, had their land taken away and were pushed onto reservations........

I imagine that anyone chosing that name would be doing it to get a reaction, and would know it was likely to cause trouble, in which case removing them would be the sensible option, if they want to rejoin with a name less likely to cause offence or kick up a storm then they no doubt will.
 
Well, I suppose you could have included Mao Zedong, Idi Amin, Pol Pot, Radovan Karadzic and a few others too. They're even closer to us in time than the Nazis, but I think you're right.

The Nazis were Germans, a civilised Western European race that has produced some remarkable people, and we are very closely related to them in many ways. The idea that people, very similar to ourselves, could have behaved like that is just a bit too close for comfort.

We can disassociate ourselves from the rest of the "monsters" in history through time and space, or by stereotyping them as "foreigners" or "aliens" who really didn't know any better.
 
susie said:
Custer was a handsome oficer who was a hero - according to the films - so until someone produces a film saying that an American hero was really a baddie and that the indigenous indians were badly treated, had their land taken away and were pushed onto reservations...
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I refer you to the 1964 film directed by John Ford 'Cheyenne Autumn' starring Richard Widmark...
or the 2007 Yves Simoneau TVM 'Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee' with Anna Paquin...

It's all out there - people just choose to believe what they want to...

Grandson of a Hessian Mercenary named Küster, Custer was only just a Lt Colonel...having been been promoted Brevet Major-General during the Civil War where he commanded the Michigan Brigade (volunteers), he was a Captain for much of his Regular Army career.

250px-G_a_custer.jpg


Handsome? Vain more like...thoroughly detested by many of his junior officers, he advocated total extermination as the only viable solution to the 'Indian problem'...

Back to my real point - does the passing of time make mass murder (or a mass-murderer) more palatable - does the lens of Hollywood make that much of a difference?

Ceasar - a hero? Or how about Scipio Aemilianus? Who? Ask the citizens of Carthage...

If I chose the screen name Scipio it would mean nothing to most, but to Tunisians it might appear a little offensive...
Or how about Jack T Ripper...most would find that at worst, mildly amusing nowadays...
 
I really don't think much can be said on the subject that will help anyone, but thats not going to stop me.

It's already been identified that most people are like this because of "actually they're like us and we don't like that" and also i think to compound that, they/he directly threatened us as a nation and in many case (at least until recently for most) threatened members of our living family.

Does this mean we shouldn't be appalled by all the others? no.
Does this mean we should be less appalled by Hitler or Nazis? no.
Does this mean that everyone should know about every mass murdering or evil person that has made an impact on the world as we know it? for me no.

... at this point i have written a lot of different things, reworded them and rewritten again

As for the real question, which seems to be slightly obscured by the drama of the subject...

In theory, words are harmless.
In practice even though most of how we see the world today is in words, either spoken or written. Once a word has a good or bad conitation attached to it generally it doesn’t matter how you wrap the word or the point you are trying to convey. In our wonderful modern world of speed, political correctness, human rights and political correctness people assume a lot and don’t bother to find out the real meaning behind what anyone really has to say.
On the other hand will we ever really know what people mean when they use certain words, often words like Nazi are used just for impact, sometimes it’s ment as in ill conceived joke, or maybe it could be used as a real insult or even a belief. When approaching someone using such a word how often will you really get to know exactly what they mean by it? So going back to my earlier point, a lot of the time we have to use our own judgement and assume.


Short answer... This is an infinitely arguable point with no clear answer.
And if an answer is ever conceived it will be out of date with the modern way of thinking, or thats what "they" will tell you.
 
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The Custer comment was a bit tongue in cheek, the point that films that I remember getting the most showings did have him as the hero, and I do think a lot of people are influenced by films more than you would like to think.

The passing of time does make a difference to the perception of names. The ones we find most offensive (for want of a better word) are those who have had a direct effect on people who we speak to or could see in the street. MartynK summed it up well, and in less words than me!!
 
Just one short comment on words. With no facial expressions or body language to help us threads and comments on here are often misinterpreted which shows that words are often inadequate.Susie's comment about Custer was , as she says, tongue in cheek, but that was not obvious until she told us.

A lot of the time I think threads on this and other forums, become nasty because we cant see each other.

On the subject of Nazi's and why we hate them, I think it is because we and our families were their target and many people remember what they did to this country.We tend not to notice atrocities so much if they are committed in far away countries because we feel less involved.I am not so emotionally affected by the deaths of Afghans or Pakistanis or Iraqi's as I am by the deaths of our soldiers.

On the acceptability of words- I think freedom of speech is important and find the political correctness in this country quite pathetic.I dont like to see or hear a lot of swearing and find some peoples speech and manner offensive. However I wouldnt want any more tightening of our laws to prevent it.As for your name Rob, you can call yourself what you like on here I think.I dont think you are upsetting anyone.
 
Simple answer to be honest.
Why do we act appalled at the very mention of Hitler and the Nazis?
Because we feel we have to. Society and the media instils in us this notion that if we don't stand up and actively denounce something, then we are often said to be supporting it.

It's why we see millions of facebook groups 'Join my cause if you agree the baby p killers are evil murdering schum'. Well of course we agree, no one in their right mind would not...but why do we need to join a facebook group? Why do we need to tell the world of our hatred?
Because if we don't, then we're seen as tolerating it.
How many have jumped on the anti-BNP bandwagon and have actually read anything about the BNP other than what's printed in the tabloids?

It's social pressure to join in the condemnation of the bad so we are not seen as to be endorsing it.

Besides, I'm sure there wasn't only one Adolf Hitler in the world. It's a name, a word. Yes he was an awful man, but it's still only a name.
I'm siure Arkady isn't a homicidal maniac any more than I'm a young Japanese cartoon boy.
 
Marcel said:
Simple answer to be honest.
Why do we act appalled at the very mention of Hitler and the Nazis?
Because we feel we have to. Society and the media instils in us this notion that if we don't stand up and actively denounce something, then we are often said to be supporting it.

It's why we see millions of facebook groups 'Join my cause if you agree the baby p killers are evil murdering schum'. Well of course we agree, no one in their right mind would not...but why do we need to join a facebook group? Why do we need to tell the world of our hatred?
Because if we don't, then we're seen as tolerating it.
How many have jumped on the anti-BNP bandwagon and have actually read anything about the BNP other than what's printed in the tabloids?

It's social pressure to join in the condemnation of the bad so we are not seen as to be endorsing it.

Besides, I'm sure there wasn't only one Adolf Hitler in the world. It's a name, a word. Yes he was an awful man, but it's still only a name.
I'm siure Arkady isn't a homicidal maniac any more than I'm a young Japanese cartoon boy.
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Something very strange just happened to me reading this post! Marcel we have have disagreed in the past! and will probably disagree in the future but I can only say you have expressed my feelings far better than I could have :thumbs:
Oh bleddy hell! just agreed with a mod / admin :eek: Note to self: must work harder :cool:
 
well i just watched a program on channel 4 that concluded all white people are racists.
now i'm reading on TPF that we are all Nazis

i honestly wish people would just get on with their own business and stop trying to tell people what they are. I know exactly what I am, and I'm quite happy with it.

but getting back to the subject.
Britain fought Hitler. Britain didnt fight Arkady.
History in the UK is taught with a UK bias. WW2 was a big part of UK history. Hence we dont get taught about Arkady and therefore dont know anything about him.

Arkady said:
You know why we really hate the Nazis so much...really?
They're us.
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Utter nonsense. We hate them because we fought them in the last world war! We didnt fight Arkady!
 
Gary said:
well i just watched a program on channel 4 that concluded all white people are racists.
now i'm reading on TPF that we are all Nazis

i honestly wish people would just get on with their own business and stop trying to tell people what they are. I know exactly what I am, and I'm quite happy with it.

but getting back to the subject.
Britain fought Hitler. Britain didnt fight Arkady.
History in the UK is taught with a UK bias. WW2 was a big part of UK history. Hence we dont get taught about Arkady and therefore dont know anything about him.



Utter nonsense. We hate them because we fought them in the last world war! We didnt fight Arkady!
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Jeez :bang: .... :thumbs: Agreeing with two mods in one night ...... I must be losing the plot ... :thinking:
 
Gary said:
Utter nonsense. We hate them because we fought them in the last world war! We didnt fight Arkady!
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It's not that simple mate...

Do we hate the Italians? Do we hate the Japanese? We fought them and Japanese treatment of Allied POWs was horrific - and my Grandfather was in Changi Prison after the fall of Singapore, so I have a link to this personally, not just from group memories of the Blitz on London...

We tend to 'excuse' Japanese atrocities becuase they're 'different' to us - they look different and they have a different cultural background...so we can say: "they did appalling things but that's because they were brought up that way for centuries - we're not like them, we would never do such things"...
Whereas in reality nothing excuses what the Japanes armed forces did in China or what they did to Allied POWs - thier medical experiments on US Airmen rival anything Dr Mengele did in Auschwitz-Birkenau...and they still have not issued an apology BTW...

The Nazis are different - simply because they force us to look uncomfortably at ourselves.
When I was in Bosnia we had the same feeling - these were Europeans, not Africans - we have come to expect atrocities to occur in African conflicts - a sublimed racism if you like...but when we see people who look and dress just like us doing the same appalling things it makes us realise that but for a few circumstances it could be us pushing those people into the killing-houses...and laughing while we do it...
 
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Let's look at this from a different perspective for a moment. More than 25,000 women and children (this was probably around 35% of the total number of people interned), and an unknown number of Africans, died in the British concentration camps during the Second Anglo Boer War from 1900 - 1901. It wasn't genocide in the sense of a deliberate attempt to exterminate the Boers, most of the victims died of neglect, malnutrition and disease, but Boer propagandists maintained that it was murder. The British were certainly responsible, and thousands of families were also made homeless by the scorched earth policy that went with it.

This left a legacy of contempt and bitterness towards the "English" that lasted for generations. I know quite a few people who are still struggling to forgive us, but how many people in this country are even aware of what happened now?
 
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MartynK said:
Let's look at this from a different perspective for a moment. More than 25,000 women and children (this was probably around 35% of the total number of people interned), and an unknown number of Africans, died in the British concentration camps during the Second Anglo Boer War from 1900 - 1901. It wasn't genocide in the sense of a deliberate attempt to exterminate the Boers, most of the victims died of neglect, malnutrition and disease, but Boer propagandists maintained that it was murder. The British were certainly responsible, and thousands of families were also made homeless by the scorched earth policy that went with it.

This left a legacy of contempt and bitterness towards the "English" that lasted for generations. I know quite a few people who are still struggling to forgive us, but how many people in this country are even aware of what happened now?
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Or the machine-gunning of unarmed civilians during India's struggle for independence in the late 1940's - the Lieutenant Colonel in charge of the (English, not colonial) troops was 'censured' - in other words he got a telling-off for murdering 36 civilians...

We all have the capacity for evil - this isn't the point I'm trying to make - why is someone who chooses a screen-name belonging to a Nazi, worse than someone who chooses an older, more geographically distant or obscure mass-murderer?

I doubt whether (as previously pointed out) 'Radovan', 'Ghengis', 'Mao', 'Pol-Pot' or 'Amin' would rouse as much ire and condemnation...
 
This is an interesting question, although I think Arkady answered it quite well himself already. I think there is a strong correlation between how "outraged" we are by a name and how closely we can relate to the acts that person committed.

I'd say that major influencing factors are :

notoriety
place in history
culture / society

Nazi Germany is still within living memory, well documented and is not so distant from our current culture / society that we're unable to relate to it.

Stalinist Russia, while not much earlier in history than WW2, was a society that is harder to relate to our own, geographically further away and not so much in the spotlight of popular media and UK history lessons.

To go to the other extreme, I suspect that somebody signing up as "Myra" with an avatar photo of Myra Hindley would be deemed hugely more offensive than Hitler, even though she was responsible for fewer deaths.
 
Arkady said:
It's not that simple mate...

Do we hate the Italians? Do we hate the Japanese? We fought them and Japanese treatment of Allied POWs was horrific - and my Grandfather was in Changi Prison after the fall of Singapore, so I have a link to this personally, not just from group memories of the Blitz on London...

We tend to 'excuse' Japanese atrocities becuase they're 'different' to us - they look different and they have a different cultural background...so we can say: "they did appalling things but that's because they were brought up that way for centuries - we're not like them, we would never do such things"...
Whereas in reality nothing excuses what the Japanes armed forces did in China or what they did to Allied POWs - thier medical experiments on US Airmen rival anything Dr Mengele did in Auschwitz-Birkenau...and they still have not issued an apology BTW...

The Nazis are different - simply because they force us to look uncomfortably at ourselves.
When I was in Bosnia we had the same feeling - these were Europeans, not Africans - we have come to expect atrocities to occur in African conflicts - a sublimed racism if you like...but when we see people who look and dress just like us doing the same appalling things it makes us realise that but for a few circumstances it could be us pushing those people into the killing-houses...and laughing while we do it...
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I sort of see where you are going with this, but I think you are wrong. The reason the Nazi's were different is the mechanisation of slaughter on such a grand scale and the development of those methods over a number of years with for want of a better word, rational, approach. Not because they force us to look uncomfortably at ourselves. The political goings on before WW2 also paid a large part in allowing the culture for this to develop, but that in itself is common with many attrocities


On a slightly ligther note I thought Arkady was a dodgy soviet comic http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arkady_Raikin. Maybe you should change your icon :D:D


Hugh
 
Arkady said:
Serious question...

I get away with using the image of a homicidal maniac responsible for carrying out Stalin's pogroms, purges and general nastiness mostly because no-one reads books any more and schools only teach kids text-speak... I've even been asked a few times who he is and have answered honestly and extensively as to who he was and what he did...not a murmur...
I choose to do this because it amuses me that 90% of the general population don't know anything about him and those that do wouldn't recognise him if he smacked them in the mouth...and because despite his appalling behaviour he would have dismantled the CPSU and ended the Cold War thirty years sooner, had he not in turn been murdered by some of those he'd previously exiled...

But say: "Adolf Hitler" *swoon, shock, horror*...the bogeyman's about again...
Nazis - such an easy target - no-one will ever complain about being nasty about the Nazis - they're perfect! Black uniforms, evil insignia, unspeakable acts of murder and depravity on an industrial scale...The perfect villains, in fact.
Hitler was a Very Bad Person...yes...but just a person. So were Goebbles, Himmler, Eichmann, Bormann et al and they're all dead - well mostly, if you believe the National Enquirer...

You know why we really hate the Nazis so much...really?
They're us.

They're not ancient Romans...
Not illiterate drug-addled Rwandans...
Time, distance, race and religion can't be used as a lens to look at those atrocities and say - we could never do such things...

The Nazis were just like you and me.

Us...
...and that's why we hate them so much - we look in the mirror and it could have been us doing that stuff...

If a certain person had chosen Ghengis, would that have been as bad...or Nero, Caesar, Agamemnon? All murdering thugs...though History may paint them in artificially heroic tones...
Or how about Custer? Massacred thousands of women and children, forced the remainder into areas where they starved to death...No-one would mind Custer as a screen-name, would they?

Is it acceptable to choose another mass-murderer's name simply because they murdered a longer time ago?

Obviously our poor friend has had second thoughts and hopefully re-registered by now, but should he have? And if so why?
I cannot believe anyone is so unaware of what Hitler stood for, so by choosing that name was he being funny? A lot of Israelis probably wouldn't get the joke...well some of the ones I know might laugh...
Was he trying to identify with the man's politics? If so at least he'd be being honest about it unlike a certain someone on Question Time last week...

Your thoughts please ladies and gentlemen...
When are words unacceptable...when is a name unacceptable...and why?
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My thoughts for what its worth, this is a bit heavy for a photography forum
 
Arkady said:
Or the machine-gunning of unarmed civilians during India's struggle for independence in the late 1940's - the Lieutenant Colonel in charge of the (English, not colonial) troops was 'censured' - in other words he got a telling-off for murdering 36 civilians...
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Or Dyer, at Armritsar?
 
boyfalldown said:
I sort of see where you are going with this, but I think you are wrong. The reason the Nazi's were different is the mechanisation of slaughter on such a grand scale and the development of those methods over a number of years with for want of a better word, rational, approach. Not because they force us to look uncomfortably at ourselves. The political goings on before WW2 also paid a large part in allowing the culture for this to develop, but that in itself is common with many attrocities

Hugh
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Maybe. That's certainly one of the arguments, but anti-semitism and violent pogroms had a long and inglorious history in Europe, with the Church either complicit or turning a blind eye. The parallel thesis is that this was the first time a modern state had set out to deliberately exterminate an entire people, because of their racial/religious identity, which seemed simply incomprehensible. (I know that approximately the same number of Gentiles were also murdered, but the "Holocaust" is often reserved for the Jewish victims, and that is another debate).

I do agree that a lot of the loathing and repugnance for the Nazis is based on their visibility and the imagery, some of it bestial, associated with them. The events are still within living memory, just, and many families lost grandparents, parents and relatives. There is also a vast archive of original film, photographs, records and eye witness accounts, supplemented by post war films, photographs, books, articles, interviews and studies that continue to have a macabre and sinister fascination for many people. The remains of some of the camps can still be visited, and there are holocaust museums worldwide.

The events of the more remote past are largely lost to us by distance and time, preserved in fragmentary sources, modern books offering interpretations and films made for entertainment. Many actions that we consider repugnant may not have been viewed in the same light when they took place, but rather as normal or, at least, acceptable in the circumstances. Henry V ordered his men, probably the archers, to kill the French prisoners - apart from the most valuable men of rank - during the Battle of Agincourt because he feared that they might free themselves, rearm and strike his rear if the French launched another attack. He is considered an English hero now, but this would be considered a war crime today. Significantly, none of the contemporary sources, including the French ones, criticise him.
 
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boyfalldown said:
I sort of see where you are going with this, but I think you are wrong. The reason the Nazi's were different is the mechanisation of slaughter on such a grand scale and the development of those methods over a number of years with for want of a better word, rational, approach. Not because they force us to look uncomfortably at ourselves. The political goings on before WW2 also paid a large part in allowing the culture for this to develop, but that in itself is common with many attrocities


On a slightly ligther note I thought Arkady was a dodgy soviet comic http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arkady_Raikin. Maybe you should change your icon :D:D


Hugh
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My point isn't what they did or how they approached the Jewish Question - with atypical infficiency surprisingly - but that as a race, Germans (most Nazis were after all, German) are broadly similar to us - we can envisage us as them if the situations arose...
I can't envisage myself as a dagga-smoking SWAPO guerilla...

BTW 'Arkady' is a combination moniker: - Martin Cruz Smith's Moscow Militia Investigator was Arkady Renko and I trade as RKD Photographic - Rob Knight Digital - a small leap, but it fits...
Beria is just the avatar and the two are unrelated.
 
I mean this with the up most respect and as a valid answer to the original post... I genuinely couldn't give a rat's arse.
 
clicktor said:
I mean this with the up most respect and as a valid answer to the original post... I genuinely couldn't give a rat's arse.
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At last...

me neither TBH...I just wondered if i was the only one...lol
 
Whilst I am finding the sociological/pshchological discussion about why the name Hitler is so offensive to some absolutely fascinating, I want to bring it back to forum level for a minute. I can understand why some people took offence to such a name, the association of the name Hitler is still very taboo for many people, regardless of their reasons of history, culture, or whatever. Now whilst I personally couldn't care less what someone wants to call themselves, anyone joining and using a name that might be offensive to some people can not really be surprised when people do indeed take that offence. Whether its Adolf Hitler, Myra Hindley, Ghenghis Khan or Osama Bin Laden - there will be a kick back against it, no matter how many less touchy souls say its 'only a name'.

I think you would have to be either very naive or very stupid not to expect some kind of reaction, but I also suspect that 99.9% of people that sign up to communities such as ours using such emotive names, do so fully aware of what they are doing ;)
 
raythefab said:
Bit arrogant that are we all fools then
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No I dont think we are fools. However it just goes to show that people can write stuff on here and we dont know if they are taking the Mickey or winding people up because we cant see their expressions or body language.

Strange thing to do on here Rob, especially as you started your post with "serious question". In future I, for one, will take what you say with a pinch of salt.
 
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raythefab said:
Bit arrogant that are we all fools then
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No you miss the point - so easy when we rely on printed words as has been mentioned MORE than a few times - it matters not a bit on the face of it - our perceptions are coloured by experience either first-hand or by group pressure...
Hence - to me it doesn't matter, ergo I don't really care one way or the other...
I still want to hear your reactions and that's the reason for the post.

To me, it shouldn't matter that someone chooses to use the screen name Adolf Hitler (yesterday - the thread has now been removed)...but it does...why it does is of interest, simply beacuse other names don't generate the same level of knee-jerk reaction...why? Other historical figures were just as bad if not worse...

The industrial scale of the slaughter has been cited as a reason as to why the Nazis hold such fascination for us, but that's evading the real issue as I see it - if the Romans had the technological means they'd have used them too...

The Nazis simply took an existing problem and advanced it to the logical conclusion - logical to them...and remember, because of the Nurnburg Race Laws, what they did was for the most part legal under German Law as it stood - which is why the later post-war Nurnburg War Trials were on such shaky ground...what the Nazis did was legal - the was no International Rule of Law as we now understand it - a sovereign state's laws held precedence.
If you read the book that the BBC TVM 'Conspiracy' was based on (starring Kenneth Branagh and Stanley Tucci), it documents the minutes of the wannsee conference at which the SS heirachy decided to progress the extermination of European Jewry - against the advice of the lawyers present as it might appear illegal to other nations...the current practice of segregation and compulsory sterilisation would achieve the end result humanely: the race would simply die out - that was the argument, whereas simply killing Jews would appear barbaric...
 
ladysue said:
No I dont think we are fools. However it just goes to show that people can write stuff on here and we dont know if they are taking the Mickey or winding people up because we cant see their expressions or body language.

Strange thing to do on here Rob, especially as you started your post with "serious question". In future I, for one, will take what you say with a pinch of salt.
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:clap::clap:
 
Whats in a name , well in the 60s we had a guy at work who liked to bet on horses, one day he shouted over to me hey Ray theres a gee gee running today called raythefab followed by you got to back it its an omen, so over the next 12 months or so i had 5 shillings each way on it, it ran about 12 times and its form was 000000000000 needless to say i never backed another horse again hence my username:lol::D
 
Arkady said:
No you miss the point - so easy when we rely on printed words as has been mentioned MORE than a few times - it matters not a bit on the face of it - our perceptions are coloured by experience either first-hand or by group pressure...
Hence - to me it doesn't matter, ergo I don't really care one way or the other...
I still want to hear your reactions and that's the reason for the post.

To me, it shouldn't matter that someone chooses to use the screen name Adolf Hitler (yesterday - the thread has now been removed)...but it does...why it does is of interest, simply beacuse other names don't generate the same level of knee-jerk reaction...why? Other historical figures were just as bad if not worse...

The industrial scale of the slaughter has been cited as a reason as to why the Nazis hold such fascination for us, but that's evading the real issue as I see it - if the Romans had the technological means they'd have used them too...

The Nazis simply took an existing problem and advanced it to the logical conclusion - logical to them...and remember, because of the Nurnburg Race Laws, what they did was for the most part legal under German Law as it stood - which is why the later post-war Nurnburg War Trials were on such shaky ground...what the Nazis did was legal - the was no International Rule of Law as we now understand it - a sovereign state's laws held precedence.
If you read the book that the BBC TVM 'Conspiracy' was based on (starring Kenneth Branagh and Stanley Tucci), it documents the minutes of the wannsee conference at which the SS heirachy decided to progress the extermination of European Jewry - against the advice of the lawyers present as it might appear illegal to other nations...the current practice of segregation and compulsory sterilisation would achieve the end result humanely: the race would simply die out - that was the argument, whereas simply killing Jews would appear barbaric...
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Names are evocative for many cultures, and that alone is a big part without getting into the history of why.Adolf Hitler does is a more evocative name is Western culture now - look at the case in the US earlier this year were a couple were ordered to rename their child to something else. For less disturbing reasons you won't find a Susy Wong in Hong Kong now.

Discussions about history aside, posting as AH on any internet forum is making a statement and one bound to provoke reaction.

Hugh
 
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I knew that the avatar was Beria. I don't know any Arkady.

I've always felt that most people who get into positions of power are likely to be unpleasant (to my way of thinking) because getting to the top almost always involves pushing other people to the bottom.

There is a serious proposition that being successful is mild psychopathic behaviour. (I cant be arsed to find the references, but a couple of studies on personality types in finance/trading environments). I am consequently not surprised by the actions of all sorts of people.

The nazi actions against the people that they saw as deviants (and please note it wasn't only the jews), are not that different to other campaigns in the recent past.

Pol Pot, Stalin have been mentioned. You could also mention the Armenian holocaust in the recent past. Such events have always happened, modern technology may have made them more efficient (I'm not sure).



There is also the well known fact that inventing or emphasising an external enemy is an established method for developing 'team spirit' (I never liked team games). Give people a big external enemy and you suppress a lot of internal dissent and get people to 'pull together'.

Hence the well established demonisation of outsiders.

Oh and winners write the history; from the princes in the tower to iraq some things don't change.
 
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ladysue said:
No I dont think we are fools. However it just goes to show that people can write stuff on here and we dont know if they are taking the Mickey or winding people up because we cant see their expressions or body language.

Strange thing to do on here Rob, especially as you started your post with "serious question". In future I, for one, will take what you say with a pinch of salt.
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Not with you there...elaborate please?
 
who? said:
Does that help?
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Not really...I meant I don't really care that someone might choose to use a contentious Forum-Name - that's thier look-out - but I am still interested in what other members think - is that putting my position better?

Serious Post and asking for a Serious Discussion, which is what we're having hopefully.
 
Arkady said:
Not really...I meant I don't really care that someone might choose to use a contentious Forum-Name - that's thier look-out - but I am still interested in what other members think - is that putting my position better?

Serious Post and asking for a Serious Discussion, which is what we're having hopefully.
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For what it's worth I understood your point completely (wrt ladysue and raythefab's post).
You don't give a rats arse about the name a person chooses, but you are genuinely interested in why others do.
 
Arkady said:
Not really...I meant I don't really care that someone might choose to use a contentious Forum-Name - that's thier look-out - but I am still interested in what other members think - is that putting my position better?
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A bit. You don't care what people use as a forum name, but you'd like to know why some people might find certain names, and not others, insensitive or offensive?

I think you did cloud the issue a bit by mentioning some of the "monsters" and introducing the time/space factor, but no matter. The thread was probably going to go this way in any case, and its interesting.
 
Marcel said:
For what it's worth I understood your point completely (wrt ladysue and raythefab's post).
You don't give a rats arse about the name a person chooses, but you are genuinely interested in why others do.
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Correct-a-mundo...:D
 
The Nazis bombed us, in our homes - not in some remote country

not against another people

against us

why would you wish to use names connected with such people? The only reason is to cause reaction - and if you have intended to cause reaction you cannot be unhappy when you recieve one.

Contrary to popular belief, we all fought the nazis, the old ladies melting down their pots and pans, the children growing up in a wartorn country not knowing if their parents were dead or alive -

I suppose the real difference is that the Nazis = fascism, something the whole country joined together to banish from our shores.

Personally i think using the names of those people who attacked this country in any way other than derogatory is an insult to those people who fought to give us the right speak our minds.
 
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