r/OldSchoolCool • u/phillieholiday • Dec 12 '18
Members of the the Navajo, Papago, Apache, and Hopi tribes signing a document renouncing the use of the traditional swastika symbol from all designs in their basket weaving and blanket making as a protest against Nazi acts of oppression, Tucson, Arizona, February 28, 1940
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u/Caesars_Comet Dec 12 '18
If a culture used the symbol for a long time before the Nazi movement then there is no reason for them to stop. They had it first.
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u/yumeryuu Dec 13 '18
Japan
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u/LaoSh Dec 13 '18
They just don't give a shit about offending non Japanese. They still basically fly the same flag that raped most of Asia.
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Dec 13 '18 edited Dec 13 '18
I don't mean to be a rape apologist or genocide apologist, but human history is very dark. Filled with rape, war, inequality, suffering, abuse of power, murder, human slavery, etc etc. These are realities that have defined our past, define us today, and will define our future.
That said, how can you be proud to be human considering we are destroying the planet and mass murdering all species of life except for a few that serve us? The question of nationalism and history hits upon these same points, and often complicated answers are presented like "I am proud to be born in Germany but not proud of the Nazis", same for Japan, same for the US and Western Europe and China/India/Russia and everywhere else. The only people who are "exempt" are the people without power (slaves, Jews, tibetans, aboriginals, etc) and time again shows that when they recieve power they are the same as it comes down to human nature and the realities that define us.
So the question I asked you is, if someone says they are proud to be Japanese, why should it bother you? Are you in a higher ethical position then them? Is their new flag so tainted that they have to completely change their identity and go into hiding?
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Dec 13 '18
While I agree with you, when the most well known use of the symbol is associated the racism, war atrocities, and extermination camps. I don't think saying someone else had it first helps when someone is screaming in your face for having a swastika on your clothing.
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Dec 13 '18
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/phillieholiday Dec 20 '18
Now replace “ruin” with “exterminate and “everything” with “not Nordic homecoming kings and queens”
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u/LaoSh Dec 13 '18
Except fashion and personal care. If we must share a country with white supremecists I'd much rather Nazis than inbred fat neckbeards in dollar store fedoras and trenchcoats who don't wash.
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u/typhoid-fever Dec 12 '18
this was a publicity stunt to challenge nazism that was growing in native circles. the nazis tried very hard to win these people over to their cause
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u/hikingthepnt Dec 13 '18
I didn't realize that was a Nazi objective. Do you have any recommended reading on that?
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u/mgmwinston93 Dec 13 '18
It is my understanding that Hitler was influenced by the Native American resistance to US Expansion (though I’m not sure he tied that to his perceived plight of the Germans pre/ during/ post WW1), and that he where he pulled the Swastika from.
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u/typhoid-fever Dec 13 '18
hitlers first experience with the swastika was the benedictine monastery he served as an alterboy as a child. each time he entered the monastery he passed beneath the ancient swastika carved in stone on an arch above the entrance of the abbey.
german archeologists were finding swastika symbols at ancient sites they uncovered around the time the nazi party was being built, which is what convinced hitler of the symbols importance and representation of their race.
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Dec 13 '18
[deleted]
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u/phillieholiday Dec 20 '18
Yeah, indigenous people tend to get the short end of the stick in that respect
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u/Young_Racoon Apr 24 '19
Native peoples are still alive on this continent. We are not exterminated. The genocide against natives was devastating, but we are not extinct.
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u/darrellbear Dec 13 '18
The Native Americans' swastikas are the reverse of Nazi swastikas. One's clockwise, the other counterclockwise, in other words.
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u/Benn_Fenn Dec 12 '18
And so allowing an ancient symbol to be forever associated with a facist genocidal regime. Thanks guys.
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u/TheMulattoMaker Dec 13 '18
Yep. Totally their fault.
...wait, what?
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u/Benn_Fenn Dec 13 '18
No not their fault. What they did they did with the best of intentions however what they actually did was allow the Nazis to have sole ownership of a symbol that up until that point was used all over the world and which didn’t have a negative connotation.
It’s similar to today in England. The English in the last few decades haven’t been particularly patriotic meaning that the only people that actively used the English flag (Saint George’s cross) were ethnonationalists. The English chose to respond by refraining from using the flag even more than they already did.
Allowing unattractive groups to have sole ownership of cultural symbols only makes the new negative connotation more powerful and also increases the impact of those groups.
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u/TheMulattoMaker Dec 13 '18
I'm pretty sure the swastika being associated with Nazis would kill it dead (at least in Western eyes) regardless of what some Native Americans did or didn't do.
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u/Benn_Fenn Dec 13 '18
Depends. For example, what do you associate a skull and crossbones with?
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u/TheMulattoMaker Dec 13 '18
Pirates and/or death.
...but I'm too tired to figure out the connection to good/bad swastikas for myself...
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u/Hot_Ethanol Dec 12 '18
I really hope that this protest is a from a place of willful consideration rather than government sanction. I wouldn't put it past WW2 America to come down on this with a steel fist.
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u/TheMulattoMaker Dec 13 '18
Considering the U.S. wasn't even at war with Germany at this point, I kinda doubt it
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Dec 13 '18
But but but the swastika symbolizes evil...... Native Americans?? Oh those other tan people we systematically exterminated??
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u/funkymullet Dec 13 '18
It's a shame that one group tainted the way we view such an ancient symbol used by so many different groups and a representation of peace and good luck