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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   35462 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of October 3, 2022

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Why is it called A. hitleri?

According to Wikipedia:

The scientific name of the beetle comes from an Austrian collector, Oskar Scheibel, who was sold a specimen of a then undocumented species in 1933. Its species name was made a dedication to Adolf Hitler, who had recently become Chancellor of Germany.

So it was named back when Hitler was "The guy who is pulling Germany out of the post-war morass and decline, the strong capable leader" and not afterwards, when he was "Ah. Yeah. Oops!"

I can see arguments on both sides: on one side, that this is the historic name and the opposite, that it was deliberately intended to honour someone who should not be honoured. I think changing the name in this case has a lot more in favour than pulling down statues, but it all depends how stridently the demands are made. If it's a reasonable "not the best idea, all things considered" request, fine. If it's part of a rant about cishetnormative privilege and the patriarchy and all the rest of it, no wonder people aren't convinced.

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