I’ve heard rumors they’re monarchists, too.
13 Likes
Of all the things to get bent out of shape about, this is not one of them. Historical context aside, she was a six year old girl at the time which was 8 decades ago. It isn’t like you can’t find stuff the royal family has said and done as adults to criticize.
20 Likes
It even appeared (multiple times) in a very early girl scout recruiting film strip from 1917. Not usually as part of a mass thing, but used where say, military people would do the regular hand-to-the-forehead salute. Still, it was disconcerting viewing!
3 Likes
There are a couple of photos purporting to show the last pope in his Hitler Youth uniform.
2 Likes
Quite. So, in view of that …
Fuuuuuuck you and your passive aggressive anonymous spokespersonal snobbicondescension.
The possessed now raise their arms towards the symbol of the land they will conquer, preparatory to shooting their laser beams.
Which was the only legal youth organization in 1933, and grew where it became mandatory in 1939. You or I or anyone else (unless you were Jewish) would most likely been involved with the program if you were of a certain age at that time.
9 Likes
Are you serious? His grandfather was a Danish prince who was recruited as King of Greece. He does not have a single recent ethnic Greek ancestor.
1 Like
And his seminary even got into trouble for refusing to let their boys actually serve in the Hitler Youth until 1941. (Nominally the whole German youth was already part of the Hitler Youth.) So he entered the Hitler Youth even later than legally possible. And of course even then nobody ever asked him.
6 Likes
I thought it wasn’t actually mandatory, but rather heavily encouraged and you got some extra benefits if you signed up as a loyal nazi. Given that man’s subsequent history in failing to recognise anti nazi (I.e. Leftist) Catholics during his church career I think it is pretty fair to drag that up about him. He was a hitlerjugend because he hated the commies.
That’s important because hating Union power and workers power is what made Churchill for example a big supporter of Mussolini and Hitler early on.
It’s why Austrian school economists and supposed libertarians can find themselves comfortably supporting autocratic States. As long as they crush the unions and worker power all the rest is just window dressing.
[quote=“Mister44, post:28, topic:62016, full:true”]
Which was the only legal youth organization in 1933, and grew where it became mandatory in 1939. You or I or anyone else (unless you were Jewish) would most likely been involved with the program if you were of a certain age at that time.
[/quote]c
2 Likes
I think it’s more about the strange fetish the British have with WW2. Is it some sort of inferiority complex? Last time the UK was super power and fighting the good fight?
3 Likes
Well, then you were wrong.
3 Likes
A 13/14 year old child was joining a popular youth organization because it allowed him to express his socio-economic and political ideology? Yeah, right.
2 Likes
You could be right about the WW2 obsession. Those were the last days of Empire.
I can’t say that we fetishise it; it was a war that actually came to our country and levelled many of our cities in, for some, living memory. In my experience of fellow Briton’s remembrance of the Second World War isn’t one of triumphalism but a recent reminder of atrocities and violence committed to our neighbours. It’s more of a memory of the time we almost lost than of a time where we won.
WWII is also a reminder how a modern, “enlightened” country can fall into the trap of being led by fear and scapegoating of the outsider. Britain and the US can both do well to remember that what happened in Germany in the 30s could very easily happen now if the current trend for hate and fear based political rhetoric continues.
19 Likes
It’s also very much a gateway between the old and new worlds.
From my perspective, the world wars did so much to bolster the divisive concept of patriotism whilst also stifling - or perhaps smothering in its infancy - the emerging British socialism that would have put this country on a much better footing to thrive in the modern world. I lament that Britain didn’t get the chance of a peaceful transition into modernity.
2 Likes
I could excuse this attitude more if there were a more balanced and critical perspective of the UK’s involvement in the war. Recently I visited the Imperial War Museum in Manchester - it’s better than some presentations in that it doesn’t glorify war, but I was disappointed that the Blitz was a major and emotive part of the presentation, while bombings of German cities were hardly mentioned. There seems to be a fairly unchallenged ‘us and them’ attitude - ordinary British people standing against an inhuman enemy. Showing how ordinary British civilians and military personnel experienced events like the Blitz is good, but there should really be some parallel stories from some of the 2/3rds of Hamburg’s citizens who lost their homes within 8 days, and suffered losses greater than the whole Blitz in a city a fifth of its size.
As for why it’s still such a popular topic, I think part of it ties in to the British myth of being the underdog that somehow manages to face off extreme odds, possibly with the help of God. If you brush many of the facts under the carpet, it can really be used to support national pride. The story is nothing like that in Germany, so it’s not surprising to see the memory of the war being very different there. Having spent time in both countries as someone not originally from either, it seems pretty clear that the Germans learned a lot more from that time.
4 Likes
He was born in Greece, as was his father. If he was an ordinary bloke, anyone who said he wasn’t “really” Greek would likely get called a racist.
1 Like
Perhaps, but that’s not exactly what I would call “pure Greek ancestry”.
3 Likes
