PR can be a touchy issue for the alt-right. Some who’ve joined up with (or at least glommed onto) the euphemistically named movement have cried foul at the Nazi salutes at the recent National Policy Institute conference — on the grounds that they might cause some outsiders to think that their obsessively anti-Semitic, white supremacist movement had something to do with the Nazis.
Similarly, some worry that the alt-right’s embrace of the German term “lügenpresse” (lying press) might also draw Nazi comparisons, just because the term was really, really, really popular with, you know, the Literal Nazis.
As one self-described shitlord asked plaintively on Twitter yesterday:
https://twitter.com/Limsky420/status/803258552332611584
After several minutes of exhaustive research on the subject, which consisted of looking through a couple hundred of the most recent Tweets using the word, I have concluded that the sort of people who like to use the word “lugenpresse,” well, let’s just say that it wouldn’t be too hard to detect a certain Nazi-ness about them, even if they never ever uttered this particular word in public.
I mean, seriously:
https://twitter.com/tdltdltdltdltdl/status/803397446134923264
https://twitter.com/SwampDrainr/status/803378565312114688
https://twitter.com/sir_croak/status/803281958587482112
https://twitter.com/AltReich1488/status/803047442841096192
https://twitter.com/GreatArtiste45/status/802919793116352512
https://twitter.com/bat_shitlord/status/802828261206163456
https://twitter.com/MengerianKnight/status/802739175174737920
https://twitter.com/WallWatcher1983/status/802237437946855424
https://twitter.com/ShadowWar_1/status/802193707781025793
they're cucks You're a cuck We need to shift the Overton window. We won't by disavowing when the lugenpresse calls us nazis.
— Groping Groyper 🌲 (@HwyteMale) November 24, 2016
https://twitter.com/Mundilfury/status/801801289831223298
https://twitter.com/whiteamerican11/status/801524521358544896
https://twitter.com/attentionmustbe/status/801605161374203904
https://twitter.com/WallWatcher1983/status/801230704218664961
lugënpresse will always try to shekelate the narrative. Never surrender the narrative.
— Mitchell (@brabakr) November 25, 2016
Oh wait, I’m being told that “lügenpresse” has nothing whatsoever to do with the Nazis.
https://twitter.com/ChristiEquites/status/802459233589424128
Oops! My bad.
@Cynical Not according to the SPLC:
https://www.splcenter.org/20161129/ten-days-after-harassment-and-intimidation-aftermath-election
That’s not counting incidents in other countries.
@Fishy Goat
And thus, Trump is cemented in my mind as the only president who ever had to tell his supporters to stop committing hate crimes. Among other things.
@Axe
…
Haha, I had the exact same first thought! Couldn’t figure out how to make the joke before I had to go back to class, so I didn’t bother.
Of course the first tweet is an actual Becky with the good neonazi buzzwords.
Looks like AmeriKKKans can’t umlaut.
It’s not just AmeriKKKans, but most Americans generally, because English doesn’t have diacritics, and they’re a pain in the ass to get to in Windows.
They’re pretty easy if you know the alt-codes.
That said, if you want to write Löwe, for example, (without hitting alt+148) you type Loewe, with the extra ‘e’ signifying that the ‘o’ should have an umlaut.
According to that logic the actual Nazis weren’t Nazis.
I use Linux, so I have set up a seldom-used key on my keyboard (Right Control) to be the Compose key, and I can enter special characters that way.
[Compose] + m + u = µ
[Compose] + o + ” = ö
[Compose] + e + ‘ = é
[Compose] + A + ” = Ä
[Compose] + s + s = ß
Much easier than digging up a character map or memorizing Alt-codes.
I use a keyboard with diacritique (azerty layout). SInce they are on the keyboard, it mean I don’t need to memorize anything.
Wow, how does twitter not ban these assholes? Fuck their whining about frozen peaches, this stuff shouldn’t be given a platform.
@diacritics
That’s the one thing that’s always bugged me about Pokemon: You can’t use diacritics in your name (aside from the é, of course), which means I’ve never been able to spell mine properly. Bah. =P
Cynical Optimist:
Every leader of my adulthood (two Bushes, a Clinton, and an Obama) has gone out of their way to tell people we’re not at war with Islam, killing gays and black people is wrong, and so on. I’m certain some of the people they were addressing were supporters (particularly in Bush junior’s case).
Trump just isn’t very convincing at it.
@numerobis
And now I have changed that to “Americans are just that stupid as a whole”
I’m waiting for the explanation for the actual Nazis invading Europe and killing Jews for the lulz.
@Nerag
Sorry to burst your liberal fantasy bubble, but antisemitism, attempts to conquer Europe, military dictatorships and swastikas pre-date Nazi Germany. They’re not “Nazi things”.
@Pie
Antisemitism and Nazism. I’ll raise you Crystallnacht and the Holocaust.
Swastikas and Nazism. I’ll raise you the badging on the war planes the Nazis used to redesign my country’s cities.
The Nazis adopted these things through cultural appropriation to the point that now, yes they are ‘Nazi things.’
Uhh… This was sarcasm, right?
@Scented Fucking Hard Chairs
It was a deliberate reference to a tweet quoted in the OP. You may either read it at the end of David’s post, or visit the original here: https://twitter.com/ChristiEquites/status/802459233589424128
Clearly this was a mockery fail on my part, but seriously folks, we’re only on page 2 and the material I was referencing is just a short scroll upwards 🙁
Btw, you don’t have to use umlauts. When you can’t type »Lügenpresse«, it’s OK to replace the ü with an ue.
So luegenpresse is better than lugenpresse, or lugënpresse or L̈ug̈ën̈p̈r̈ës̈s̈ë. (Capitalazing nouns is a discussion for another day.)
Ì trÿ tõ úšë åç¢èñt márkš whéñ Ï çãñ.
Y̠̲o̸̲ͅu͏ ̳̖͎͓c̪ḁ̶̺̪̲n̪̭͚͠ͅ ̱̼̜̝̳g̱̫̞o͈͙̗͖͇̙ ͏̯̼̗̪̗̭̯ț̟ọó̜ ̩̯̪͍͖́ͅf̯̘̼͇̯͎ar̯̦͈͚̜͘,̸̟̲̩̠̗̩ ̧̟͍̹̬t͔͇̟͕̣̤̝h̬͕a̴̠̱̬͈̻̬t͔͇’̣͎̭ͅsͅ ̯̣̮̱́f͕̥̰̖͎ơ̮͓r͙̯ ̱͢s͏u̜͉r̟̰e҉̳̙̭͎.̱͉̖͍̣̗
Honestly if these people are so proud of their ethnicity, why are so many non-germans so insistent about using german terms.