Watch out! The Daily Stormer is coming for your children!
Or so they say. Earlier this week, Andrew Anglin of the Daily Stormer launched what he’s calling the “Pokémon GO Nazi Challenge,” urging his readers to descend upon their local Pokemon GO hot spots with crude flyers promoting race hatred in general and his site in particular.
Great news, everyone!
An enterprising Stormer has been handing out fliers at Pokémon GO gyms for the purpose of converting children and teens to HARDCORE NEO-NAZISM! …
HE’S HANDING THEM OUT TO CHILDREN!
THIS IS ALREADY HAPPENING!
HAVE YOU EVER HEARD OF ANYTHING SO GREAT AS THIS???
The Daily Stormer was designed to appeal to teenagers, but I have long thought that we needed to get pre-teens involved in the movement. At that age, you can really brainwash someone easily. Anyone who accepts Nazism at the age of 10 or 11 is going to be a Nazi for life.
The idea is so ridiculous, and the flyer in question so crude and over-the-top, that I assumed at first that it was a troll job — that either Anglin was trolling us, or that someone was trolling him.
The flyer (see the whole thing here) bristles with rabid denunciations of “n***er monkeys,” “burrito rats,” and “HOOK-NOSED JEWS.” It urges its readers to “vote for DONALD TRUMP” even while acknowledging that most of those reading the flyer are “probably too young to vote” for the “GOD EMPEROR.”
It promises its target audience of white not-yet-men that
Oh, and it compares catching Pokemons to … the Holocaust. Favorably
If Anglin is trolling, though, he’s trolling his readers as well as the rest of us.
In a followup post today, Anglin insisted that he was dead serious about the “Pokémon GO Nazi Challenge” — and defended it from alt-right critics saying the flyer was so over-the-top offensive that it could end up hurting the Nazi cause, and perhaps even Donald Trump as well.
“Trump has been called a racist six million times,” Anglin tells his readers.
If the media were to present these flyers and say “look, racist Alt-Right Neo-Nazi Pokemon conspiracy!!!!” it would simply be more noise.
It would also look ridiculous. There is so much news about so many different things related to the election, people just get these bits and bytes, and “TRUMP RACISM POKEMON NAZIS” is all their brain would absorb, which would simply cause the media to lose more credibility in their minds and cause them to draw closer to Trump.
As for all the racial slurs?
[Y]oung boys like rebellious things. It excites them. It makes them interested. The flyer, in my view, was perfectly designed to appeal to young boys, and I think we’re going to get a huge response once people start handing them out.
And what were the options, besides going hardcore?
Black IQ statistics? What kid is going to be drawn into that?
Saying “save your race” or some other generic, vague, low-energy statement? Most kids won’t even know what that means, let alone be interested in it.
Making it obscene and aggressive appeals to a primal drive in boys who are in or approaching puberty.
So there you have it.
I still think this campaign is more of a publicity stunt than an actual recruitment drive, but we’ll see, I guess.
This is a very strange year, no question about it.
@Chiomara
In 11 minutes we saw Pearl go from this
to this
to This
to THIS
It’s just too adorable!
Totally changing the subject but I wanted to share this
http://abcnews.go.com/US/tensions-mount-native-american-tribe-fights-block-oil/story?id=41891717
@Megalibrarygirl
I hate Illinois Nazis
@Fruitloopsie
My cousin is out there right now. He didn’t get savaged by the dogs, but the governor has called out the National Guard, and I’m frankly terrified. There’s a rally locally in support tomorrow that I’m going to; I encourage everyone else, especially Yankees, to look into local rallies or ways to support the water protectors if you can. Contact your representatives, send money or supplies, do what you can.
I would also like to bring to people’s attention that tomorrow is the date of the national (U.S.) prison strike, protesting the modern U.S. slave system. They could use your support and solidarity too.
WHY WASN’T I INFORMED THAT WE WERE TALKING ABOUT STEVEN UNIVERSE?
You guys already said a lot of stuff so let me mention Pearl in GODDAMN LEATHER JACKET AND A TALL PINK HAIR LADY WITH LIP PIERCINGS GETTING DIGITS AT A GARAGE BAND SHOW. It’s like they took my favorite tropes and mixed them in a blender!
And it was all just super goddamn gay I mean hole-lee shit. How much gayer can you get? And, like, WITH AN ACTUAL HUMAN TOO! You can’t sneak around and say, “Uh buh buh THEY’RE GENDERLESS SPACE ROCKS IT ISN’T GAY” anymore, can you?
No, it’s gay as fuck, fuck ya’ll.
And, hey, did you guys know that Mr. Smiley was confirmed gay by the Crewinverse?
http://66.media.tumblr.com/1d9dd8d3a0ae442a2ecfecce1760b652/tumblr_inline_ocuw32NVA01re8ugl_540.png
They gay too.
But, like, did you know Nickelodeon has the first ever interracial married gay couple?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ecp1dEyGscM
These are exciting times to live in. Gay, gay exciting times to live in. Super fucking gay. Like, sixty years ago, it was practically illegal, not only to be gay but to marry inter-racially and now we have TWO interracial gay couples.
My fucking gay ass fucking loves this gay ass world goddamn.
This is now my favorite sentence, ever.
You know, theory, this beauty
http://67.media.tumblr.com/5cf004de8af800f05b7502acc182eecd/tumblr_od7eseE1v21tandono1_540.gif
is named Sakura because
http://blacknerdproblems.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/08/Sakura.jpg
It just makes sense.
Also, she gives me a Ramona Flowers feel, and you know what sakura means? Cherry blossom. That’s a flower. It makes sense, right? Right?
It’s mine, too. I think it to myself whenever I see anything amazingly gay and beautiful, like my girlfriend. *a-wink* (+5 romance)
@Steampunked
I find this story absolutely fascinating! The idea of that moment, of someone being presented with absolute proof of such a gap in their perception… I’m sure I have more than my fair share of such gaps myself, but the whole idea is just so interesting.
Today is #doubleblessed because not only today was super gay but I found this
http://67.media.tumblr.com/cfcf0fd4dacf7867fd648049728c118c/tumblr_nyn9n7Hl4c1txepc1o1_1280.png
I like to think of this as a bit of a gay cherry on top of these good gay day.
@ serebriyani
You make an interesting point. There can be something both romantic and motivating in that idea of “noble losers” especially when combined with a belief that their loss was caused by outside factors. After all it was the myth that the gallant WW1 German soldier was betrayed by the ‘elite’ that fuelled Nazism. And you see something similar with Confederacy nostalgists.
Yeah, I can see how it would be easy to form a belief that the Nazis (and related ilk) were brave heroes unfairly stiched up by a cabal of traitors and fifth columnists. That’s what probably feeds into the alt-right world view.
@ megalibrary girl
Yeah, I’m still pondering whether there’s anything in my initial view that there’s a difference between UK and US perspectives on Nazism. People here have provided me with some good material to consider.
My initial (very random) thoughts are along the lines of Nazis as pantomime villains as opposed to cool bad guys. So we can contrast Indiana Jones and the Producers even. And Captain America punching out Hitler is like Batman punching the Joker. The fact that he’s seen as a worthy opponent for a superhero maybe elevates his status? (Look how many people think the Joker is cool) whereas getting punched by George Formby makes him look ridiculous.
There is a glamour around the Nazis and it’s not just down to the Hugo Boss uniforms. Red Skull looks cool. Nazi women in the media aren’t the docile housewives of Nazi propaganda films in dresses with puffy sleeves keeping their place and popping out babies for the Fatherland; they’re hot blond chicks with a penchant for S&M themed outfits (although the Nazi ideal for women does fit very well with the alt-right view of how they should behave).
Lots to ponder here. I’ll get my real work out of the way asap so I can have a nice think about all this.
Thankfully, there won’t ever be a movie with Heath Ledger as Hitler.
Something I’ve seen a lot in the fever swamps and particularly the Daily Stormer is that they treat Hitler as some kind of cool fictional villain. They make god(win)awful Hitler memes. They improvise “merch” items. They’ve even got Hitler-themed COFFEE MUGS for fuck’s sake.
And they project a lot of their shit onto him. At this point they’ve pretty much forgotten that he really existed, he’s a myth to them. A kind of Jesus whose Second Coming is in the form of Trump – incidentally, they also project a lot onto Trump.
Okay but what kind of kid – wait, make that ‘what kind of person’ – wouldn’t take one look at that horrifying Pikachu/Hitler fusion and run for the hills?
That is nightmare fuel.
Alan:
WWII action comics were most popular in Finland in postwar era, which was when the Korkeajännitys title became a Finnish pop culture icon.
The main reason we imported British comics was that during Cold War it was politically impossible to publish pulp style comics about Finland’s wars with the USSR. How convenient, then, that there were Nazis to bash around 🙂
@Jack
Oh, I am sorry I left, I was sleeping.
Gay morning, everyone!
YES OF COURSE I KNEW SMILEY AND FROWNY WERE CONFIRMED CANON GAY. The thing about SU is that I know everything there is to know, and talk about it screeching and non-stop.
She can’t be named Sakura, because it would make her TOO awesome, and I already have an unhealthy crush on her, so someone please STAHP before I have to go through the shameful measure of buying a body pillow. She’s like a fusion of jasper and Rose, with a Garnet like personality *sweats profusely*
I love that Pearl is using the same kind of clothes I do when I go out to bars. Except I never arrive at the “swave giggling” moment, I keep being fumbled and panicked. Ah, well.
Can I have a moment to personally thank both SU and Netflix recent shows?
You know I’m just 21, and only admitted to myself I also like girls when I was around 18. I am still pretty closeted to my family.
[TW bi/homophobia]
I grew up to think lesbians were taboo. Like “they are people and should be respected… But they are not normal, and you should be disgusted by it, unless you are also not normal.”. I also didn’t know you could like both guys and girls.
So, I never was too good fitting my assigned gender roles (I am certain I am cis), and therefore was called a lesbian every since I was 12. When I was around 14 and started having attraction to both genders I was SO confused and scared of myself. At 18, with the help of my also bi bf, I finally accepted bi was a thing(not only to please men), and that I was it. But still, something inside of me still said that it wasn’t normal, it was something to be hidden, it was shameful, and my partner only accepts cause he is bi too.
And then things like Orange is the new black, Sense 8, How to get away with murder and Steven Universe happened, and oh, it was like something changed inside of me. Seeing it on TV all the time in an organic way made me FINALLY comprehend LGBT people are every freaking where, and we are not taboo or abnormal, we are just people having all kinds of complex relationships with other people and ourselves. And there’s nothing wrong with the way I feel, the way I behave, the way my relationship is, and if you see me ANY differently after you know it, then, hey, YOU are the abnormal and YOU should be the one hiding.
I feel so much better and we’ll resolved. I hide it to most of my family, at least while I live with them, especially because they’d never understand the concept of a partially open relationship or bisexuality, but other than that, I just talk very openly about it, without need to any announcement or warning. Like, I don’t need to go out of my way to explain myself before we touch certain subjects, you should already expect everyone around you may be LGBT or not, any relationship can be open or not, screw that, I won’t tip toe or hand everyone explanation flyers upon meeting them or give everyone a “TW: ME”. If I make you uneasy or confuse, your problem, I won’t apologize.
And I feel so freaking free!
Representation matters. A lot.
So, again: THANK YOU, Rebecca!
Jesus, look at the SIZE of my comment. Sorry :p
I love you, guys.
Has no one else mentioned Hogan’s Heroes?
@Chio
No need to apologize. Thx for sharing. That was a lovely comment
🙂
@Vicki P
*slaps forehead, then runs away to hide shame*
It’s okay, Axe. I didn’t think of them until this morning.
(TLDR here. Ignore it if you like. I’m musing on why people on social media are being Nazis.)
I’mma channel Umberto Eco for a moment and suggest that western culture identifies four distinct tropes by the word “Nazi.”
1) Goose-stepping, disciplined Hugo Boss wearing badasses.
2) Genocidal lebensraum-loving killers.
3) Tyrants of the intolerant utopia.
4) A set of symbols, the use of which annoys your teachers and parents, letting you feel rebellious.
(katz identified the split between the first two. Thanks katz.)
When people say “Nazi”, they mean one of these, but it’s not always clear which one. Some people will deliberately play up the confusion between them in order to make or obfuscate a point. For example, when Orwell said “it couldn’t happen in Britain”, he was referring to Nazi Trope #1 – but as anyone who’s visited the Kenyan Highlands can confirm to you, British people are entirely capable of Nazi Trope #2 as long as it happens overseas.
Likewise, video games will usually make Nazis out to be Trope #1 because they look good and make a good power fantasy, but will hesitate to make any mention of Trope #2 or even #3. This is also true for fictional depictions: as katz pointed out, the Empire / First Order from Star Wars is a good example of what happens if you separate Trope #1 from the other three.
Likewise, we’ve all seen skinheads who adore the racism and violence of Nazidom (Trope #2) but who would totally fail at the discipline and dress sense of Trope #1 or the conformity and cooperation of Trope #3. You’ve also probably seen people who embody Trope #4 just as a fashion statement alongside other rebellious symbols drawn from anarchism and Satanism, despite the fact that those movements are entirely incompatible with any trope of Nazism other than #4.
There is also the irony of ultra-right-wing people simultaneously admiring Nazi Trope #2 while accusing their enemies of being Nazi Trope #3, and using extremely confusing and pedantic wording as a result.
Once we separate our culture’s use of Nazism out like this, a lot of things become clearer.
Captain America spends his time punching Nazi Trope #1. The people he punches are armed and on a battlefield, and their evil is only an informed evil. There’s no barbed wire and striped pajamas, and no ordinary German people trying to live under a harsh and intolerant regime. We can imagine that he is also against these things, but to my knowledge this not stated explicitly. There are no parallels drawn between Nazi Trope #2 and America’s historic treatment of her own native population, or Nazi Trope #3 and America’s historic treatment of her gay population. Was Captain America also against these things at the time? That’s a more difficult issue, hence why the comics stay on Nazi Trope #1.
On social media, Yiannopoulos’s whole schtick appears to be dancing between Trope #4 and the less socially palatable Trope #2 or #3. He’ll suggest something obscenely murderous or hideously intolerant, and then quickly take refuge in claims of trolling. This has evidently really annoyed people like Anglin and Auenheimer, who are openly fans of Nazi Trope #2.
Is it acceptable to be any sort of Nazi? In my opinion, no. Is it acceptable to use the more sanitised Tropes #1 and #4, knowing that some people would hide behind them to mean other forms of Nazi? I don’t know.
All of the horribleness aside, I’ve never really understood the function of these kind of flyers. If they’re advertising an event or some place to hang out or something like that, I get it. Whenever I’ve been given an ideological flyer (most typically they’ve been religious), I’ve just thrown them out. It’s like they’re directed at people who don’t know different ideologies exist. I don’t know how many kids there are who’re going to go, “What, nazism, you say? Never heard of that before, do share!”
re: Korkeajännitys
I’ve only read one story, and even that was because it was by Petri Hiltunen and I was purposefully going through everything from him in the local library.
I think my aversion to Korkeajännitys comes from my semi-leftist upbringing. I seem to have absorbed from somewhere that all those war comics were nationalistic at the core and thus were propaganda or something. Can anyone tell me if there’s any truth in that?
I can’t believe I forgot the wartime cartoons or Springtime! Posting while tired…. lol.
@ arctic ape
You may find it amusing that over here 2000AD ran a story in 1977 about an invasion of Britain (imaginatively called ‘Invasion’) but the bad guys were “Volgans”. Definitely not Russians, no way matey, pure coincidence that they wore Russian uniforms and spoke Russian (sorry, ‘Volgan’).
@ masse_mysteria
The Commando series (as it was called here) had a number of writers and the stories varied in tone. It was considered quite ‘progressive’ though in that, whilst there were some typical gung-ho tales, a lot of the stories were quite complex. Nazis were very much baddies but the stories could be quite sympathetic to the plight of the average foot soldier even if they were the enemy. They also doesn’t shirk from the realities of war (perhaps because many we’re based on actual accounts). They showed failure, and trauma and cynicism and fear, even of the ‘heroic’ protagonists.
@rogue angel (on the first page): I thought your anecdote – which was of perfectly reasonable length, no teal deers here – was a great addition to this post. Thanks for delurking!
@Steven Universe discussion: Aw, hell, I really wish I could watch that show. Nobody loves seeing women flirt with women on TV, especially in children’s media, more than this bi woman in a monogamous m/f relationship. BEAM The LADY LOVE DIRECTLY INTO MY SOUL, TELEVISION! Unfortunately, something about the colour pallete + the musical queues + the affects of some characters makes me lethargic and depressed. Who knows why.
Gay ladies I can watch on TV are the amazing Lena and Stef Adams-Foster of The Fosters. Anybody else watching that? Although I will say, SPOILER BUT IT’S A SPOILER I WISH I HAD READ MYSELF BEFORE WATCHING THIS PARTICULAR EPISODE, on a recent ep they did that thing that soap operas do where they teased a divorce at the beginning of the episode and ultimately revealed they weren’t breaking up at the end. I’ve always found that trope cheap and insulting to the viewer, but it was deeply upsetting when applied to what might be the only example of a healthy marriage of two lesbian parents that is on TV. It ruined the ep for me, because I spent the whole time worried they might actually follow through on their bait & switch.
I now have TWO favorite sentences ever.
@ Viscaria: *waves hello*
I don’t mean to interrupt the “Steven Universe” discussion going on now, though.
*goes back to lurker-dom*