This is the Torre Littoria in Turin, Italy. It was built as a Fascist symbol on request by Mussolini. It’s an eyesore compared to the 1700s buildings nearby, in person is worse than in photo.
Still here with offices and shops inside because nobody wasn’t using it as a far right meeting or the like.
There’s even a city Latina that was built in 1932 where before was a swamp. Nobody is thinking to bulldoze it.
No, I disagree strongly with your position regardless of whether we’re sticking with the original context of your comment, or switching to some kind of dichotomy between “blame” and “responsibility.” (not to mention the shift from personal responsibility to “shared”)
Here is the context of your statement:
Q: Was every single member of the German people personally responsible for killing Jews?
A: unless they were actively involved in the rescue of the jews and other persecuted classes, the answer to your question is yes, yes they were.
That is, in my opinion, a morally unacceptable label to apply to children, regardless of any arbitrary lines you want to draw between 13 and 14(!) year old kids. The 12 year old girl in the air raid shelter was not “responsible” for the crimes of the Nazis, the 14 year old boy who had a uniform and a panzerfaust slapped on him to fight tanks in the battle of Berlin was not “responsible” for the crimes of the Nazis, and the 17 year old Blitzmädel was not "responsible for the crimes of the Nazis. Because they were children.
I have no doubt that a great number of German children from that era felt profound shame for their actions during that time, but that shame belongs to the adults who put them in those positions, not the children.
If you hold either of these children “responsible” for the actions of the groups who put weapons in their hands, then you and I will simply not agree on this matter and should probably leave it at that.
my original interrogation of your denunciation of my point carried the flavor of what i was getting at from the very beginning. i asked you at what age complicity begins. i pointed to two possible points with possible counterexamples and gave a third point i was willing to excuse completely but i was willing to talk about and be persuaded about the ages from 14 to 18. if you hadn’t been so busy denouncing me as some kind of moral cretin we could have had a conversation about it. apparently, you would rather find a reason to feel morally superior to me than you would to talk to me.
my initial reply was to another user who, with similar certainty to yours, was willing to freely grant the remission of sins for the entire german people. my initial reply was hyperbole but only just, and it included the standard exceptions for people who are not considered autonomous actors by law and it shouldn’t have had to specify that to avoid your moral censure. i asked my questions in response to at least focus on the possibility that youth does not always forbid either complicity or resistance. i’d greatly appreciate it if you’d get off your high horse and save you opprobrium for someone who actually deserves it.
So, at the end of all this shifting, do you believe children to be responsible for the crimes of the Third Reich, or not? Because aside from taking offense at having your argument questioned, it remains to be seen whether or not you actually believe the position you were taking.
ETA: I’m not trying to hide the ball here, and in case it wasn’t clear from any earlier post, I don’t believe there is a clean line above which “responsibility” attaches. But I do know that if that line is there, it most certainly isn’t between 13 and 14. My examples of kids I don’t find “responsible” for the actions of the Nazis should make clear my view.
There is collective blame. That doesn’t mean anyone is saying Hitler was twelve at the time, and it doesn’t mean the Nazi dentist who cleaned Nazi teeth has no blame, because they weren’t directly involved.
Everyone who failed to stop the Holocaust, who had any ability to stop it, has some share of the responsibility for it, in proportion to their ability to stop it.
You should stop arguing as if anyone thinks children were the cause of WWII, because no one thinks that.
Fair point, of course. Wisdom from our mothers.
But does this mean every repurposed project is fucked up? The two examples I posted above from the video include and aquarium and an energy storage center.
I haven’t seen any evidence of this night club is glorifying Nazism. But if you think a club that caters to dark music and metal is too on the nose, then wouldn’t a repurposing of it into a hotel with some lush greenery and trying to “lighten up” the aesthetic be an improvement?
And again, if this flak tower is irredeemable, then is every other building formerly adorned with swastikas also irredeemable? There are dozens of former government buildings a kilometer or so away. When does the transitive property end? We can find many, many building where bad things happened, even in the US. Do we tear them all down?
As it’s been said above, these structures are massive and it was a bitch to do it in 1945 with explosives when you didn’t have to worry about the surrounding area. It would take millions to tear it down (hundreds of millions?) and a lot of time. The two other options are abandonment and let it be an eyesore, or repurposed it. I think repurposing is a viable option.
TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN
on the issue of the complicity of the german people alive during the period from 1933-1945 with the nazis and with their works, i regard the entire german nation complicit in those crimes. i excuse only those who resisted the nazis or resisted their works of genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity, or those individuals the law generally regards as incompetent to be held accountable. although a case could be made that a minor or other normally legally protected individual could be held complicit if they were to deliberately act as an informer to turn in targeted ethnic groups or their protectors to the nazi authorities or if they deliberately volunteered to become part of the armed services of the nazi german state.
this represents, at most, a clarification of my views from the first time i commented in this thread and in no way represents a shift or a change. all the intervening comments have been intended for the purpose of having my unexpected interlocutor clarify the point at which they will stop excusing.
So have you been to this venue or know more about it? You speak like you are more familiar with the space. I did try to read up on it a bit, and did find their web page (3 semesters of German and I’ve forgotten most of it 
) But its clear they have a ton of bands that go through there, and it looks like they have a lot of music shops etc.
There is an argument above that the type of music and name is too on the nose - that a dark industrial vibe glorifies the past. I’m curious if you agree or can relate more “on the ground” experiences.
Honestly, this all sounds like something Liabach and their NSK State would do. Taking fascism imagery and turning it on it’s head. Hold on… googles - they played their in 2014. They wouldn’t play there if it actually glorified Nazis.
I do not think it would stay abandoned for long before squatters/vandals moved in and any cultural event/art space would find it hard going to pay for any upkeep, so allowing a company turn it into a semi-attractive (even the artist’s rendition struggles to make it anything but a big old chunk of concrete with some trees on it) hotel is a viable option, given its hop, skip and jump proximity to the Reeperbahn and the city. There seem (on Google maps) to be several museums not too far from it so it probably would struggle to fill an unfilled niche in that market.
There is something in one of the stories about a memorial to the forced labourers who built it, doubtless tucked away somewhere but at least the sentiment will have been corporately met.
If Goldhagen is going to be brought up, you know we have to talk about Browning, too:
Things are never so simple in history, of course, especially when dealing with blame for a state-sanctioned genocide.
True dat.
Those are the fucking worst.
All this!
Probably when it’s not something found in every write-up of the place, and where people have to make any kind of argument that people are being “too sensitive” when they mention the history.
Every time people make “It’s time to move on and forget” arguments, people listening hear an argument that “Maybe the Nazis weren’t that abhorrent.”
It’s an argument that it’s a better thing not to bother people. It’s not the argument that the humanity of today should, if they’re making a mistake, err on the side of respect for Nazi victims.
The argument is that it would cost too much, and that life is better, smoother, more profitable for a couple people, if people who care about glorifying Nazis are ignored.
I agree with the first part, and even agree with the 2nd part - but acknowledge that “disrespect” is subjective. If this is reputation rehabilitation - then so would any building previously used by the Nazis.
The reason I repeated “all” “every” etc and you called out in your quotes is: I like consistency.
I don’t see anything special about this flak tower. If this is nonredeemable, then wouldn’t many more buildings - buildings with stronger ties to the actual Nazi government, where decisions were made, Nazi officers lived, etc - be even less redeemable?
I’d even argue that it is possible for some areas to be non redeemable - Auschwitz being an obvious example. The actual Gestapo headquarters in Hamburg might be bridge to far as well (see my articles I linked above.).
I don’t really care if it is a Hotel or not. Some people have posted suggesting the current use of it is an art space and more people can get use out of it that way. That’s fine. My point is I think we should be using the space for something productive. The fact it was an instrument of war and currently used for music and dance I think is awesome.
No one here is arguing to forget, nor that the Nazis weren’t abhorrent. But I don’t get the point of poisoning a hotel deal because it has ties to Nazi pasts. Is it bad for the area? OK. Is the developer wanting too much tax money? OK. I am sure there are a lot of valid criticisms to the idea. But the reality is: lots of buildings, companies, and people (families) had ties to the Nazis. Just like almost everyone in America had ties to people who fought the Nazis. The Nazis were the government and permeated everything. It’s a black stain on their history they have to live with.
Again, your hinging your argument that it’s glorifying Nazis and thus bad. I don’t think repurposing it glorifies it in the least.
The cost and difficulty in dismantling it is a real thing. They tried to blow up another one and it only cracked the top. They decided to reinforce it so it didn’t fall and just leave it alone.
“Yes to all Nazi structures or No to all Nazi structures” isn’t “consistency” it’s a complete erasure of context, and making any attempt to deal with the Nazi past completely unworkable.
I am sincerely glad you’ll ease up on your preference for consistency in recognizing that a luxury hotel at Auschwitz would be “too much”.
You’re answering your own question here. The stronger the association with the Nazis in people’s minds and in daily or conversational reference, the more care should be taken in not even accidentally giving people the chance to rehabilitate the reputation of the Nazis with any unearned association with achievement. It’s better to err on not giving Nazis a stage or a positive shout-out, than to err on providing one.
Centering the comfort of the descendants of Nazis is not the point. This smacks of, “Have you considered the feelings of German people who have all these things that Nazis built that they can’t use or profit from. And it’s all basically free and it must really bum them out that the only reason they can’t use it is because people say it was stolen or built with the blood of others or other historical stuff. If we could just get people to forget that stuff, we could have a pool and a mall! For FREE!”
I don’t have to go very far to find comments extolling the work ethic of Nazis as evidenced by these kind of buildings, or to find people who like to point at them with pride. No, it wouldn’t be everyone, but re-using an historical building isn’t value-neutral. If it was, this thread wouldn’t exist. You see how this thread exists? And how people tell the story of this building’s Nazi origin? Those conversations will also be a part of any future use proposed or not yet.
Nah, these are different. They were armed, but the military usefulness of that was rather symbolic - but they were important to propaganda.
Oh, but that’s quite an issue. Painting the Allied war as “terrorism from the air” is a trope that was started during the war by the original Nazis - and it is interesting in being one of the few, or maybe even the only Nazi trope that has never been completely dropped, or “cryptified” (i.e., only alluded to). Not only do contemporary neo-Nazi directly re-use this language, but this point of view shares varying grades of support well into conservative, and centrist circles. It is just too convenient for some people to say something along the lines of “yes or country did terrible things, but so did the Allies, well that’s just war for you, isn’t war always terrible?”
When I was in Hamburg back in 2010 my hotel was right across the street from that bunker. It’s an absolutely massive and imposing structure. I can only imagine that it would be such a pain in the ass to tear down that they are trying to repurpose it instead.
Here’s a picture I took while watching the World Cup at the neighboring field:
(Note the patio umbrellas on the roof and how small they look.)
The St. Pauli neighborhood while not as boujee as the Neustadt area, it’s pretty vibrant and right by the infamous Reeperbahn so the location is actually pretty choice.
(Note: not trying to offer any justification or defense of this plan.)
Those nazis were good at using concrete to build strong.
The allies had so much trouble bombing submarine pens, and dams, because bombing from the top didn’t make much impact.
So they had to do very low bombing to get torpedoes into the sub pens, to do damage inside.
Maybe that’s the issue here. If they dynamite it from the outside, it may not do much. If they dynamite from inside, it may spread tge debris too.much, especially in a busy area.
The articles I have read includes at least some words on who built the tower. And it wasn’t Nazis.
You’re quoting the part of the discussion that’s talking about all Nazi buildings, not the tower.
Of course the Nazis used forced labor. The kind of people who would praise what the Nazis “built” would be praising their evil methods of achieving that work, not their direct participation in mixing the concrete. The way people talk of Trump building a new building, despite never using a backhoe.
The Nazis are who are responsible for the work happening, it wasn’t a worker commune that independently decided to create a flak tower there.
“Enjoying” those buildings without thought of use just affords more risk of giving assholes who idolise Nazis an opportunity to point and praise.
I just want to point out that this is an interesting discussion to have whilst another monument built by fascists for themselves is also now in the spotlight.
That situation is further complicated by the fact that the tomb of that fascist creep was right in the middle of a large necropolis where both nationalists and loyalists are buried (due in large part to him).
If a place can become a shrine for fascists, either raze it or turn into something that somehow explicitly repudiates fascism.
