posted
Dagonee, ok, but that he also has the right to dismiss those comments by saying that what those people are saying was not his real intention. The fact that he said he was sorry looks more like he's trying to cover this up in order to escape all the bad publicity. As I've said before I doubt very strongly that the tabloid publishing this thought of how ethical an act it was (instead they were probably thinking how much this would increase their sales...) so he might have thought it's the Politicaly Correct thing to say. (or he was "instructed" to say it)
Edit:
quote: it indicates the lessons of the Holocaust have not entered into his understanding or consciousness.
Oh, sure... This is just the kind of talk I totally don't believe as truthful, but PC instead. I don't know, it might be just me not really trusting people to say what they really think these days...
quote: "Of course, the Holocaust is representative of man's greatest evil and collapse of morality in human civilization," Rozett told CNN, "so when Prince Harry wears it ... it indicates the lessons of the Holocaust have not entered into his understanding or consciousness.
Out of interest, which lessons of the Holocaust would you have to not have learned in order to think dressing as a Nazi might be amusing? While there are several lessons to be learned from the Holocaust, sensitivity isn't one of them.
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posted
I always thought that a cool idea for an inflammatory halloween costume was to dress up as the Unabomber sketch, with a curly brown wig peeking out of the hood of a navy blue sweatshirt, and those cheap sunglasses to finish the image.
As far as the Prince dressing in a Nazi costume, it was in very bad taste at the very least, and anyone offended by his actions (I believe anyway) has a right to be.
Am I offended? I dunno. I don't know him and the exact context as to why he chose that costume. But I must say that a person of his position cannot afford to pull stunts like this without raising the ire of the press and public.
quote:Out of interest, which lessons of the Holocaust would you have to not have learned in order to think dressing as a Nazi might be amusing? While there are several lessons to be learned from the Holocaust, sensitivity isn't one of them.
The lesson that it is a sensitive subject for a lot of people. Not just Jewish people may I add.
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quote:Of course, the Holocaust is representative of man's greatest evil and collapse of morality in human civilization," Rozett told CNN, "so when Prince Harry wears it ... it indicates the lessons of the Holocaust have not entered into his understanding or consciousness.
Uh-huh. So if I wear a Caligula outfit, the lessons of his evils haven't entered into my understanding or consciousness?
Hitler was a monstrous man, but he's not the boogeyman -- and it's an insult to my intelligence to say if I speak of him in anything but hushed tones, if I dare dress up as him for a costume party, I'm somehow insulting all those he killed. Giving him the respect and fear he worked so long to inspire is a tribute to him, not mocking him at a costume ball.
God, I can't believe there are actually some situations that I can accurately draw Harry Potter (ironically named as he is) analogies to.
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posted
I might want to remind some of you that in two weeks or so a memorial of the end of the holacuast will accur with the Queen and others, now what kind of example to the rest of the world, and victims of the nazis? I know i wouldn't wanna be hanging around Prince Harry if i was jewish.
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quote:I know i wouldn't wanna be hanging around Prince Harry if i was jewish.
Most Jewish people I know, if Harry apologizes and acts respectfully at the ceremony, would be gracious, forgiving, and glad if they believe he learned something.
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Not wearing the uniform of a mass-murdering facist organization is not showing respect to the organization. It is showing respect for its victims.
You are assuming Harry is wearing the costume to mock Hitler. I tend to agree with you, but for now, that cannot be proved. It is also possible that he thought a Nazi costume would be cool. Isn't there still a viable racist skinhead subculture in Europe? Are they considered cool the way Eminem's homophobia or certain rap artist's "cop killing" lyrics are considered cool? (Note: Not all skinheads are racist, I've met some really nice ones in fact. )
As a prince of England, Harry should never put himself in a position that would confuse people as to the royal's view of Nazis. (Let's not forget the Duke of Windsor.)
Edited to add:
It is ok to say the Dark Lord's name, but not so funny to dress up as Death Eaters and conjure up the Dark Mark.
quote: Hitler was a monstrous man, but he's not the boogeyman -- and it's an insult to my intelligence to say if I speak of him in anything but hushed tones, if I dare dress up as him for a costume party, I'm somehow insulting all those he killed. Giving him the respect and fear he worked so long to inspire is a tribute to him, not mocking him at a costume ball.
"Boogeyman" actually isn't the most innaccurate term to describe the feelings Jews still have about him. While I personally know of no family members even in Europe during the Holocaust, even seeing a swatstika can make my blood boil. The Holocaust is something that will never leave the collective consciousness of Jews, so while we don't expect you to refer to Hitler as "he who must not be named," we do expect people to treat the Holocaust as a serious subject, not as a subject to mock by pretending to be a participant or making jokes about ovens and gas chambers.
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posted
I haven't personally seen any Jews who do that, but I would still think it would be incredibly innappropriate. To an extent a group has the right to make jokes about itself that non-members don't, but the Holocaust should not, does not fall within that extent.
posted
Even when you ridicule Hitler you still shouldn't do it. Its not offensive on nearly the same scale, but at least from my perspective when you belittle him, you undermine the seriousness of the entire event. If the gravity of the Holocaust passes us by, we are all the more likely to let history repeat itself.
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quote: It is ok to say the Dark Lord's name, but not so funny to dress up as Death Eaters and conjure up the Dark Mark.
Yes. We can clearly see it in Fiction; no one would question this logic. Impersonating the evil, whether for fun or for serious, is not funny.
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posted
Impersonating the evil, whether for fun or for serious, is not funny.
I disagree. Sometimes mocking the evil can show it for the ridiculous lapse of humanity that it is.
I would not make jokes about those killed, but I have no problem with anyone who wants to poke fun at Hitler. For one thing, it makes it more difficult for people with similar views to gain power when everyone is laughing at them.
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But. I find Springtime For Hitler, although amusing, squirmyfying. There is a sort of comedy mixed with tragedy that makes it almost impossible for me to listen to that song. It's on my computer but I never play it.
I believe it's good, and in many ways necessary, to be able to laugh at the evil things that happen. Laughing destroys the boggart, to continue in a thread of Harry Potter metaphor.
But to laugh at the Boggart, at Hitler in Springtime for Hitler, at Hitler in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, we turn him into something rediculous.
Although it was bad taste for Harry (not Harry Potter this time) to dress up as Nazi, it was even more bad taste to do it in such a way that did not outwardly display his contempt. He's not acting to make us laugh (although he may have done to his friends) and he's not doing it for artistic purposes, he's wearing a swastika on his arm as if it belongs there. No silly moustache, no nothing, just plain Nazi.
(I understand that he may have been just caught at an inopportune moment. There's most definately a backstory I don't know.)
But doing it straight- That's not comedy to any one. There's no one laughing, because no one's sure if they're supposed to be laughing.
Harry Potter would never go to a party dressed as a Death Eater, Prince Harry should never go to a party dressed as a Nazi.
The discussion was why black people can use the n-word on each other but white people can't, even when they mean it the same way. One of the answers was that when other black people use it they know it's meant affectionately or casually or even in anger, but when white people use it there's no way to tell offhand whether the white person in question might be using it the same way or might really think black people are subhuman.
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posted
Because white people can't do anything race related without being criticized, and black people can. Here's where I would normally launch into my "white men are the most picked on people in America" rant, but I'll let it go for the moment.
As for the Prince Harry thing. Just let it go. Maybe he meant it as a joke, maybe he was trying to make a point. Perhaps he was just trying to prove a point about the Media and how worked up people get about silly things such as costumes. I think he made that point whether he intended to or not. Just let it go.
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posted
Because white people can't do anything race related without being criticized, and black people can.
Wow, is that not what I meant. Didn't mean to start that particular argument, only that people in a class have liberties regarding that class that those outside do not.
If I went through a horrible life-threatening disaster and barely survived with a few others after terrible deprivation, I could see myself making sick jokes to those others for support and to take our minds off it, and afterwards because I know they'd take it in the spirit meant and because we were now a group with shared experiences. But if someone else made a joke that trivialized the disaster or the people lost in it, I'd consider them to be insensitive.
You can affectionately call your own kid an idiot and still get mad if someone else does.
A woman can call herself a bitch and mean it proudly, yet still get offended if someone else calls her that in anger or resentment.
Someone dying of a painful disease can joke about it all they want, but strangers making the same jokes would be insensitive.
I can make a wiseass comment about my wife acting slutty and she'll laugh and say something wiseass back because she knows I don't mean it. If a stranger in a grocery store made the same comment to her, I'd probably drag 'em outside.
When someone who has experienced pain jokes about it, those jokes can lessen the impact that the pain makes. When someone who has not experienced that pain makes the same jokes, those jokes can lessen the pain's validity and trivialize the people who have suffered it.
Maybe he meant it as a joke, maybe he was trying to make a point. Perhaps he was just trying to prove a point about the Media and how worked up people get about silly things such as costumes.
I doubt he put any thought into it at all, besides "hey, this'd be funny." I wasn't personally offended -- it takes a great deal to offend me -- I just thought he was a jerk. What I'm responding to in this thread are the people who seem to think no one should be offended by his actions and are explaining to the offended people why they're wrong. As I said above, he's free to do what he likes, they're free to get peeved and complain.
[ January 14, 2005, 06:02 PM: Message edited by: Chris Bridges ]
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posted
Ok.. some of you are going to jump my ship and slit my throat for this, but....
The world would be better off if we stop using our heritage/race/ethnic background as an excuse for being offended. Yes the Holocaust was a terrible thing that put a significant dent in the jewish population, but that isn't a reason to go condemning a kid who goes to a party as a nazi. I mean that is the same as me saying, "I'm a christian, and I'm insulted by your roman gladiator costume." I mean Harry should have known better, but if wearing a nazi outfit to a party is so bad, then why could he get one at a rental shop?
Posts: 1094 | Registered: Mar 2004
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quote: The world would be better off if we stop using our heritage/race/ethnic background as an excuse for being offended. Yes the Holocaust was a terrible thing that put a significant dent in the jewish population, but that isn't a reason to go condemning a kid who goes to a party as a nazi. I mean that is the same as me saying, "I'm a christian, and I'm insulted by your roman gladiator costume."
There are significant differences between the two examples. For example, very few Christians are actually in any way related to the Christians who were persecuted. Jews on the other hand largely belong to both the same ethnicity and religion. Furthermore, there definitely isn't anyone who is either a survivor of the Roman persecution or a recent relative of one. There are other differences as well and until you evaluate those and then determine from the perspective of those offended whether the reasons for being are valid, you cannot fairly say that what the prince did was not a big deal.
You also shouldn't use the word excuse. You make it sound like Jews desire for a reason to be offended and are looking for new ways to be. The Holocaust is a subject that is genuinely upsetting to a lot of people and should be dealt with complete seriousness.
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posted
The world would be better off if we stop using our heritage/race/ethnic background as an excuse for being offended.
A slight amendment, if I may.
The world would be better off if enough people stopped treating other heritages/races/ethnic backgrounds as inferior or ridiculous. When that happens, and probably not before, we can make any joke we like and be assured it will be taken in the spirit meant because no one really thinks that way.
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posted
I the only difference between my examples is about 2000 years. I apologize that no one has attacked Christians and given me a more recent (and relevant) example. I'm not saying that those who were directly effected shouldn't be offended, I'm just saying that Jewish people (and none jewish people) who weren't directly effected (I know, it's a shock, a whole jewish family or farm boy survived untouched) shouldn't go throwing a fit over a tasteless joke.
Ok, I'm sorry, he's not a kid, he's a college age young adult, I mean college students have so much better better judgment than a five year old.
Would you prefer I use the word "reason"?
Edit: Yes Chris, your amendment is agreeable. My point however was that some people try to use they heritage for pity when they are in no way effected by the thing that gets their race pity.
[ January 14, 2005, 07:18 PM: Message edited by: J T Stryker ]
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posted
Two millenia is an enormous difference. The wounds of the Holocaust are still fresh. If the Romans were recent and primarly concerned with eliminating undesirable races than dressing up as one would be rightfully seen as offensive by those who suffered at Roman hands.
quote: I'm not saying that those who were directly effected shouldn't be offended, I'm just saying that Jewish people (and none jewish people) who weren't directly effected (I know, it's a shock, a whole jewish family or farm boy survived untouched) shouldn't go throwing a fit over a tasteless joke.
All of Europe suffered at the hands of the Nazis. Thousands of Americans lost their lives fighting in Europe. Somewhere between 2 and 8 million Gypsies, Homosexuals, and other groups languished in concentration camps. Just because I personally wasn't in a concentration camp, nor was I alive at the time of the Holocaust doesn't mean that today I am unaffected by it. It means something when a man in charge of a powerful and "civilized" nation wants to eliminate you personally from the face of the earth.
quote: Yes Chris, your amendment is agreeable. My point however was that some people try to use they heritage for pity when they are in no way effected by the thing that gets their race pity.
If, let's say, 9/11 had involved nuclear bombs killed one third of the American population, would you feel as though you didn't deserved pity because you were one the two thirds who survived the attacks?
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posted
I wouldn't except pity... and I have a rather low opinion of those who actively hunt for it. In my opinion it is a sign of weakness to go looking for pity and I'd only except it if i had no other options. Hell I felt guilty about considering letting Stray take me up north to meet the madison clan, and to see my girlfriend.
But, I'm not trying to say that people should ignore or forget about the holocaust, I'm saying that wearing a nazi uniform to a costume party is in no way inappropriate.
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posted
I'm still of mixed opinion about this. I don't think Harry is callous, but I also don't think he is stupid. I don't know what he was thinking when he put that swastika on, but I don't really think it was wrong.
Both my grandfathers fought in World War Two, and thankfully they both survived, though I only got to meet one of them. Both my uncles were in the airforce during Vietnam, and my brother was in the Marines for the first year of the Iraq war. I'm trying to imagine how I would feel if one of the Bush daughters dressed up as say, Osama Bin Laden or the Viet Cong, but they are both established idiots anyway, so I don't know if that works. I think I would be offended, but not to the point of demanding some huge toll from the person who did it.
So I think Harry is guilty of a bad judgement call. I think he needs to learn from it, but he should also be forgiven. It's true that at 20 he is no longer a child, but he is also not a man. He lives in a strange world of press and royalty, his every move under scrutiny, I'm sure I don't understand what it's like, and doubt most here do either. Again, that doesn't excuse his actions, but he's not a bad person. Give him a break.
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posted
I'll tell him when I tell my three uncles who are buried in similar graves, one right nest to your uncle's. And I may be a jerk, but unlike a lot of people, I've made my peace with the past. It's a lesson we shouldn't forget, but It's not a lesson so sacred that we can't laugh about it to ease the pain.
I'm willing to bet your uncomfortable around germans. You know, the vast number of nazi's didn't know what the camps were.
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quote:I'm saying that wearing a Nazi uniform to a costume party is in no way inappropriate.
In no way?
You presume a lot, thinking you know me so well.
I AM German, as was my uncle.
And if you wore that costume to their graves, what do you think your uncles would think of it if they were alive?
I doubt they would even want to acknowledge you.
Not even close.
There is a difference between making peace with the past and forgetting what the past has to teach us.
I have served in the Army....have you?
So I am entitled to my own opinion on this matter, and I think it was crass, crude, and idiotic. He lives off the public, and is no more than a parasite of the British taxpayers, so they have every right to critique his public behavior...and he wore the costume in public, even if it was a private party.
If you wore that costume I would think you were an idiot, and I would be glad that I don't really know you.....but if a Presidential candidate wore it, he would not even be elected to the local PTA. And rightly so.
He is a figurehead, and is payed more than well for it...and even with the best education money can buy he is still a boor. I expect better from world leaders, and that is what he is being groomed for, make no doubt.
It turns out that he shouldn't even be in charge of his own costuming.
And he deserves all the crap he is getting, and more. He is callow, ignorant, selfish, and unrepentant....and those are his good traits.
quote:You know, the vast number of nazi's didn't know what the camps were.
Revisionist history strikes again!
If that is true, it was only because they didn't want to know. And I doubt that, I really do, despite claims to that made after the war. There is just too much evidence that that wasn't the case.
But Harry knew, didn't he? He just thought that his "prank" was so clever that it was worth it.
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posted
I'm not sure how much I like you calling him a parasite. But you certainly make a good point. As a member of the royal family he should be up to a level of public scrutiny, and should act as a representative of the British royal family should act.
I doubt he will ever be king though, his brother is far too popular, not to mention next in line after Charles. He'll be pushed to the side as some Duke or Lord, never really to be heard from again. I don't think he's as bad as you make him out to be. He has done a lot of charitable things if you look at his history. For a while there I thought he would be a good person to carry on his mother's legacy, and he could still be that person. Don't ignore some of the good things he has done.
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Polar, harry is trying to be, because he knows he cannot top his brother. At the end of the Day, Nazis killed jews and humans of many color, Harry wore a Nazi symbol.
An insecure dumbass who needed global attention? maybe. A guy who killed people? no.
He will never live this down, and that shall be his lesson.
posted
Harry made a very foolish desicion, and I think that he simply did it for drawing attention to himself, after being shadowed by William all the time. He apologized in public, and there's no reason to get upset.
Other Hatrackers, however, are very upsetting:
quote:You know, the vast number of nazi's didn't know what the camps were.
Nonsense. The barbarians sent off to fight in the name of Hitler (not only SS, all soldiers) were given strict orders to treat the Jews like dirt's saliva, and concentrate them(the ones who the Nazis didn't decide to kill because they didn't take their hat off when they saw an SS soldier) in places near railways so they'll be ready to be transferred.
By 42-43, even the Jews in the most remote and secluded ghettos knew what's going on, and any Nazi with a brain larger than the size of a pea (well, clearly there weren't many of them) understood and knew, despite the existence of the concentration camps being "classified".
Besides, even without the camps, if the Nazis would've held for a couple years longer, six million Jews would be dead anyway. Look at Bergen Belzen: foreign Jews were concentrated there. The Germans didn't want any trouble with foreign countries, so they didn't start up gas chambers. However, thousands of Jews died there from hunger and diseases.
My gradfather's grandad was as rich as is gets, ran power plants, had relatives all around Poland, from Warsaw to Krakow, through Poltusk and Raddom and any town in the country. He liked to have his family near him, so he bought a whole street and they lived together, side by side. My gradfather moved to Israel with his brother and parents in 1933.
Twelve years later, Grandpa, then a soldier in the British army, searched in vain for any surviving relatives.
All of them were wiped out. No one survived.
So don't you barge in here and babble about things you don't know.
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posted
I'm coming in on this conversation pretty late, and it might be my only contribution. But I wanted to elaborate on a point Chris made that I agree with:
quote: The discussion was why black people can use the n-word on each other but white people can't, even when they mean it the same way. One of the answers was that when other black people use it they know it's meant affectionately or casually or even in anger, but when white people use it there's no way to tell offhand whether the white person in question might be using it the same way or might really think black people are subhuman.
What Chris describes is not a new dynamic, and it's not limited to blacks and Jews.
My ex-wife's family was Sicilian. Her dad and his family sometimes called each other "wops" and "dagos." It wasn't hard to figure out that it was nonoffensive and maybe even affectionate when they used it with each other.
I never needed anyone to tell me it wouldn't be appropriate for me - English/Irish/Dutch hybrid that I am - to start using the same language. It seemed pretty obvious.
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posted
If you get to use a word in my presence, I get to use it in yours. If it offends you, stop using it yourself.
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but what exactly is the motivation for "I get to use it in yours"?
Using the example of the not-so-hypothetical Italian family (note, though: many, if not most, Italian-American families don't use this language at all, even in fun. It may be an urban thing.)
OK, using the Italian American family,
you would want to use these words - and I'm assuming your background teaches you they are offensive - because:
a. you always wanted to pretend you were an Italian-American.
b. you always wanted to use these words you were taught were offensive and now someone has given you a good excuse to do so.
Really, I don't get it. What's the motivation here?
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posted
Right, I'm missing a few pages of this thread, but anyways:
I myself would not dress up as a Nazi. I do not find them to be objects of humor, and no one I know would be entertained to see me in that costume. So it's not a matter of being in the public eye. It would be atrocious for anyone, really. And because royal families are still incredibly influential groups, what one seems to endorse carries a lot of weight and responsibility.
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posted
For the same reason it is fine for me to drink in front of my father if he is drinking too. Not that I necessarily would say the slur if a member of applicable group did, but I would have the right to. I get offended when people try to tell me it is fine for them to do something, but not for me. It does not make it okay to use the slur in front of members of your ethnic group, or drink in front of a non-drinker who asks me not to do it in front of them, but it makes it okay to use it or drink in front of someone who did the exact same thing.
Also, at least in the case of n-----, more than a few blacks object to its use even by other blacks, saying it still has a negative effect. I tend to agree, and perhaps a white guy pissing off blacks who use it because they are hypocrites might be able to teach them something.
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quote: For the same reason it is fine for me to drink in front of my father if he is drinking too.
Not if you're under 21. Certain groups have privileges that other groups don't. This concept may seem unfair, but it is how we maintain a civil society.
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quote:I tend to agree, and perhaps a white guy pissing off blacks who use it because they are hypocrites might be able to teach them something.
Doubtful. White guys have pissed blacks off for years. I'm sure something has been taught in the process, but probably not what the white guys intended.
(And before you jump on me, I grew up watching black kids being spat on, fire hoses being turned on peaceful demonstrators - all by white guys. Seriously - this, along with various assassinations and the Vietnam war took up most of the evening news in the 1960s.)
What you're laying out sounds to me an awful lot like a "I'm going to shove it in their face" kinda thing.
posted
I understand what he is saying, although I would go the other way with it...I don;t approve of it, and while I can't stop othrs from saying things like that I'll be dammed if I stoop to that level of discourse.
I never understood that whole thing myself anyway.
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