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Will Elon succeed in making the Roman salute cool again? Reddit is predictably going apeshit over his gesture that can be construed as one. I mean, I doubt he's done that deliberately, it's a natural gesture in the same way a bendy cross is a natural ornament, but I doubt he's the kind of person that will mumble an apology and withdraw from the public eye for a while. If anything, I expect him to double down and insist it's been 80 years and people should be free to reappropriate the gesture.
If you search YouTube for “Nazi salute”, this is also almost every result.
The reason I’m searching is: I don’t actually know what a “Nazi salute” looks like. From what I can tell, it doesn’t really have any specific characteristics other than holding your arm out with your palm flat. But this is basically identical to the way that anybody would wave at a crowd.
The whole thing is so stupid. The bad part about the Nazis was the whole extermination of the Jews thing, not the Hugo Boss uniforms, or the hand gestures.
And there’s really no question that Elon Musk is not trying to exterminate all the Jews. It seems like he was waving in a weird spergy way.
I think that there are solid reasons why democracies have developed cultural antibodies against Nazi aesthetics.
Now, I get not leaving everything which has ever been used by Nazis barren. For example, there are only so many two-letter acronyms, not using SS for something useful seems a bit of a waste, so I am fine with you Americans abbreviating social security thus. Likewise, just because some Neonazis like 18 and 88, even the Germans will not go all tetraphobic (yes, I know) on these numbers.
On the other hand, if someone were to say that we should reclaim "Heil Hitler", because after all, what made the Nazis bad was not their greetings but their genocides, I would reply that this is a terrible idea. It would be like saying that glowing cigarette butts -- unlike wildfires -- are generally not dangerous to humans, and thus we can throw them away without a care.
Of course, Musk's salute is a lot more ambiguous than "Sieg Heil", but in general I think that the gesture should better stay in the cordon sanitaire for a few more centuries.
My theory is that Musk did this deliberately to troll people. I disapprove.
(Also, I re-read SSCs parable of talents from 2015 recently. Scott mentions Musk no less than nine times, as an example of someone who is clearly gifted and doing good on a scale most of us could never hope to do. With a decade of hindsight, this reads somewhat bizarre -- sure, Musk did some great stuff, like making electric cars cool and establishing reuseable first stages, but he also did quite a few things which do not seem worth emulating.)
Germany is not a democracy and not a free society.
I would rather the world avoids the norms from the German authoritarian far left hate speech police that persecutes its only genuine patriots. This is one of the several examples today of the extremes of anti nazi obsession and how that ends up looking as an occupation goverment. Which is because part of the reason this has happened in Germany has been the influence of some of the people who got influence after ww2. Especially the frankfurt school types. This kind of hysteria is what let to these types arguing in favor of giving German children to pedophiles because else it would lead to a new holocaust, and fascism. And they got away with it. But Germany was occupied and it is tragic to see even in other countries that even fought against Nazis, to see something similiar happen.
The general behavior of Germany isn't something to be proud off. The German establishment and those following its ideologies do not have any lesson to teach. Their current behavior is the opposite extreme of Germany under the Nazis.
Now, make no mistake I would rather countries and even more so other countries are lead neither by traitors who oppress their own patriots, the right wing and their own people in general, nor by extreme nationalists invading other countries. I don't think that your succeeds in only stopping the later.
I am not saying your approach is indicative of the worst of it, but to a small extend is part of a general more hysterical reaction than it is warranted. So there is a trend of antifa inquisition fanaticism throughout the world who have proven incapable of stopping only extreme elements of nationalism and not leading to an anti-native state that oppresses its own nation. Two tier justice system, totalitarianism and hate speech codes, having an agenda in favor of extintion of their own nation, and of guilt and self hatred and of course demonizing those who don't share their agenda. Supporting the extreme nationalism of foreign tribes at expense of their own nation. Ironically this behavior has some similarities to what the nazis wanted to do to some of the countries they conquered that they claimed their people like Polish were a threat to the German nation and should not be allowed ethnic consciousness. With the difference that Germans wanted to do it to other ethnic groups while some holders of this agenda want to do this against their own nation.
This has been part and parcel of their anti nazi crusade. It is comical now 80 years after world war 2 to be acting as if Musk's salute is serious business that we must have a strong reaction and talk about as a serious problem. So I would select in favor of not allowing them to play inquisitors any more. It is actually a good idea to loosen up with the hysterics 80 years after world war 2. Obviously the pro HBD nerd Elon Musk isn't out there to promote invading Poland.Musk's views on legal migration are actually a problem since large migration including legal migration, doesn't respect the rights of the indigenous American people to not be demographically displaced, especially white Americans who are especially targeted for demographic replacement.
If we need more authoritarianism, perhaps we need an inquisition towards the antifa inquisitors who went way over the top and while they think they are fighting the ghost of Hitler, they are actually oppressing their own people. And since there is actually a legitimate duty for a society not to oppress its own people, and to promote the interests of its own nation, first of all the preservation of the nation which is the people common ties of kinship, history, language, ethnic consciousness, it probably qualifies as restoration of rule of law and not necessarily authoritarianism to stop this faction which is itself authoritarian.
Ideally countries should have red lines in defense of their own people and preserving them and their interests that they wouldn't allow to be broken, but also respect some of the same red lines for other nations. There is also room for international collaboration beyond just that, but always with respect of red lines. Just like parents should put their children first, obviously define their children as their children and reject preposterous propaganda that just anyone can be allowed to become part of their children, protect their home, not give it to strangers, but not go around making money for their family by stealing from others, dealing drugs, murdering, etc. And of course they can develop some positive relationships with people outside just the family. Plenty of constitutions already say things along these lines of how it is the duty of the leaders of the goverment to protect the nation and how it is treason to harm the nation and have plenty to say about treason. So there is room to remember this and to start enforcing it.
Who would that be? Neo-Nazis aren’t patriots. At best, they’re lukewarm about the modern German state. It owes them no special deference.
I say this despite agreeing that Germany’s laws on the subject ought to be more like America’s.
Without even attempting to read @Belisarius' essays, because nobody's got time for that, here's my take:
The German state and its institutions hates and makes war upon the German nation, people, culture and language. You can love the state and hate Germany, or you can love Germany and hate the state, but not both. Maybe either can be patriotic, but you can probably guess where I stand on it. The German state so not only owes any patriots no deference, but rightfully considers them its enemies.
Now, are Neo-Nazis patriots? Probably more so than the compliant normie.
Some Hapsburgs once told me that Germany is basically still occupied and they renounced their claims to get more independence for Austria. Not doubting their story even if it's obviously self-serving.
Occupied by whom? I mean, I hear stories along those lines often enough, but so far they seem firmly in the tin-hat territory.
That Germany has been culture-formed into a suicidal self-hatred, that I will buy, but actively occupied and controlled by specific foreign powers?
The crux of the claim was that the German government exists to enforce the conditions of the allied occupation after the fact, I believe.
Bear in mind that this was related to me by reactionary Austrians.
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