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Culture War Roundup for the week of September 8, 2025

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Post-war Germany adopted this, at the Allies' command, and went full hog

Yes, but. Initially, the former Nazis were hard suppressed. Then, they were softly and quietly let back into the normal life. Of course, no openly proclaiming their views allowed ever, but you could be, e.g., ex-Nazi - especially if it's low level position - and hold a government job. Even be a lawyer or a judge. I assume most of them are dead by now, but how ironic would it be if an ex-Nazi judge would imprison a Jew under the censorship laws meant to prevent the recurrence of Nazi atrocities?

There was a former Nazi official serving as the Bundeskanzler at one point.

This is true, but it makes no difference. The suppression of their views was thorough enought hat whatever secret views they might have held in the back of their minds could not compete with the decidedly un-suppressed leftist tendencies of German society.

But they don't compete. They blend. Her grandpa hated the Jews and she hates the Jews. His grandpa knew the country can be only saved if certain troublesome groups are eliminated and the political debate is curtailed - and he knows the same. It's not a competition, it's an evolution.

Maybe in some hypothetical world, but not in the real one. The secret true-believing nazi who clandestinely influences procedural outcomes from a position he obtained by hiding his power level might have been an observable phenomenon in the early days of the Federal Republic, but not one that secretly handed on his antisemitism to the current generation of woke anti-zionists. I don't believe that this ideological lineage can actually be traced.

They are not direct ancestors maybe, but close relatives. Cousins or something like that. The totalitarian mindset is the same, the world model is the same - there's a group of people which is the reason of every evil and must be suppressed by all means necessary. It's true that for the modern Left the inclusion of the Jews into this group is consequential to them being so close to foundations of the Western civilization (which is the real target) that it's impossible to not include them, while for Nazis the Jews were pretty much the sole focus. But looking beyond those surface differences, the ideological skeleton behind it is surprisingly similar. And I don't think this is a coincidence.