21 Comments
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Sherri Priestman's avatar

The Nazi salute and the “I am become meme.” They pretend they’re just trolling, but it’s disgusting, and what’s worse is all the young men who think they’re part of something daring and subversive. I agree with you, John. It’s disgusting and fills me with a sickening rage.

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Preston Crawford's avatar

John, I agree with you. It makes me furious, because it IS saying that they believe they have the right to conduct a murderous pogrom. The right and the willingness. It’s insane that anyone tolerates it in a free society.

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ben chambers's avatar

every ironic gesture contains a particle of earnestness

i havent found the right words to fully explain it yet but i believe the act of trolling is intrinsically fascistic and inexorably murderous

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Katie's avatar

And if not earnestness then an unacceptable, disqualifying lack of seriousness. We must spurn clowns who seek to rule us just as we reject fascists who seek to do so.

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Ethan Stein's avatar

The Democrats should block the budget until Elon and others are removed from the regime, based on their Nazi party allegiances. First things first. Get the Nazis out of government.

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Katie's avatar

We're basically in a government shutdown already, so actually having the gov't shuttered may be a good thing. We've had shutdowns before - the longest, of course, under Heil Trump; we survived, so not deadly. My major concern is the debt limit - that's a line we've never breached before, and I fear that doing so might be cataclysmic in these uncertain times.

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Bartholomee's avatar

Though I don't think there's a sizable number of government or banking bodies in the world that are under any illusions as to our current stability irrespective of our credit rating.

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Katie's avatar

Good point.

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Sophie Clayton's avatar

100%. Seeing people do that salute here is sickening and enraging. And seeing how people respond, down to what they call it, or how they interpet it, is a litmus test.

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Minou's avatar

A mere 80 years after the liberation of Auschwitz and thought-leaders are compelled to insist yeah Nazis are bad. Interesting times.

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Ethan Stein's avatar

Why is the Nazi party even legal in the US? Nazism by it's own self description is a physical threat to innocent people. Why is it that a conspiracy to rob a bank is criminal, but conspiracy to commit genocide is freedom of speech?

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Michael's avatar

Germany passed laws like this, and actually enforces them, but they unfortunately do not seem to work very well, and have not prevented the success of the AfD (and you see similar stories in many other European countries especially France and Italy).

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Minou's avatar

Ideological expression protected by the 1st Amendment.

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Ethan Stein's avatar

Naziism is more than that

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Greg Pickle's avatar

John, it was refreshing to see your comments about Elon channeling his inner fascist along with the others. There's something evil and twisted in these people. If they ever regain their soul maybe they'll then be able to feel shame over what they see inside.

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Jack Leveler's avatar

I'm old so when I hear this argument that the Nazi salute is trolling, provocation, I always think of '70s punks wearing swastikas. That was trolling and provocation. And when some punk fans took it wrong, as license, or as a symbolic rallying cry for white power, what came roaring back at them was Rock Against Racism. What 2025 needs, amongst other things, of course, is its "Nazi Punks Fuck Off."

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Thomas's avatar

There was also David Bowie's Thin White Duke persona in that period. Allegedly in 1976 he gave the Nazi salute at a Frankfurt concert and also at Victoria Station.

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Jack Leveler's avatar

I guess my point, or not very thought out flippant observation, was that those gestures to my adolescent brain, and in retrospect, did feel like trolling or provocation; just trying to tweak the squares. This stuff, Musk, Miller, Hanania, like the early Nazis, try to pass it off as provocation but it's obviously a political movement based on hatred and persecution of otherized groups; immigrants, Muslims, etc. Also, Bowie's Thin White Duke was a glam-erization of Black funk. There was a lot of at times problematic flirting with Nazi imagery in '77 punk and around that time, though, to be sure.

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Ro's avatar
Feb 26Edited

How the ever loving hell does it not provoke disgust in everyone that sees it? It’s overwhelming, literally physical.

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damn_tam's avatar

I’m excited for another episode of the podcast! I checked out the other works that you suggested, but something odd happened. I typically play the audio as I follow along reading it and did this for the Bloomberg book review. This is the first time it didn’t read the words exactly as written. None of the additional words, omissions, or reorganization of a sentence changed the meaning of what was being said, but what if it had? And, why is it doing that?

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Stregoni's avatar

These saluters are not my friends or my brothers. We could agree to be enemies.

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