There are thousands of anagrams for such a name. I know, I used an online angram generator. However, when creating both thread titles, and anagrams, people usually choose attention getting words. In this case, it is appropriate to use the word nazi, not because he is one, but because it is natural to link him with the word. Hell, all you have to do is cut off the end of his name, and you get, “Ratzi”
Every single thread here points out that he was a member of the hitler youth involentarily. I do not think that anyone means it as more then a cheap shot. Besides, he has much more recent thing to critcize about him. (The Pope, not Hooleehootoo, that is.)
So why take cheap shots on the guy (or on anybody)? Like you said, there are more recent things to criticize him about, and he’s certainly taken some controversial stances on issues. Criticize him for that, if you want, but taking a cheap shot is just mean.
That’s a reasonable question. Several points:
(1) There’s a huge huge HUGE difference between people making random message board jokes, even ones in very poor taste, and people calling the pope a nazi to his face, telling catholics the pope is a nazi, sieg-heiling him or any of a number of other things they could do.
(2) This is a particularly sensitive topic for a pope due to the long standing, and arguably justified belief that the catholic church acted poorly during WW2. It would have been a noble gesture for Ratzi to say something like “In my youth, I was a member of the hitler youth and the german army. Since then, I have done my best in my life to fight against the evil that those organizations represented, and truly regret the fact that I was a part of them. However, I think it is important for our church to emphasize its loathing for those organizations, and to make clear our lack of connection to them, so I’m withdrawing myself from contention to be the new pope”.
To sum up: He made bad choices under what was almost certainly incredible pressure many years ago, and has lived a life that refutes those choices since then (as far as I know). So should we spit in his face and refuse to listen to him? no. Does that mean we can’t joke about it, or pretend it’s not the case at all? no
I’d guess more or less the same way I’d feel if I were accused of “intrinsic moral evil” based on an immutable characteristic I was born with.
Is it accurate to call Ratzinger a Nazi? No, not by any stretch. Do I particularly care if he’s being unfairly maligned? Not in the least. Fuck the pope.
This is an illogical post. Pope Benedict was a member of the Hitler Youth. That is a fact that the opposing exculpatory and condemnatory factions are attempting to twist by adding meaningless emotional content.
That the young Ratzinger was a compulsory member of a paramilitary youth organization does not tell us anything about his political beliefs. Neither does his ducking out on his military service obligation later on; maybe he was opposed to Hitler, maybe he wanted to save his own skin and didn’t care about the politics, or imagine any number of other scenarios.
Morever, his membership in the Hitler Youth at the age of 14 does not really tell us anything about the 78-year-old man who is now Pope. Even if he had been an ardent Jewhater as an adolescent (and we have no evidence for either side–I exclude his autobigraphy because memories are unreliable), views change, people mature, and it would be foolish to expect an old man to defend the beliefs of the child he long ago ceased to be.\
My grandfather was a Nazi. He joined the party in 1932 and was an officer in the Waffen SS. He was shot by his comrades while on the Eastern Front for disobeying an order. That doesn’t make me a Nazi, and I also hate when someone jokes about it.
The response I usually use, is to become very serious and with a hurt tone of voice point out that I don’t think Nazi jokes are very funny because my grandfather died in a concentration camp. Now that everyone is thoroughly embarrased, I mention that he got drunk and fell off the watchtower. That usually shuts everyone up really quickly.
Don’t know if anyone mentioned it, but His Holiness was required to join the Nazi Youth, and deserted from the Wermacht (which wasn’t a Nazi institution, just German.)
You’re just saying that because I look good in jackboots.
You have to admit that the Waffen SS had really spiffy uniforms. My grandfather looked like a really handsome devil in his uniform.
[hijack]Speaking of pictures of my grandfather, there are very few left over, and only one of him in uniform. This is because after the war, my grandmother lived with her in-laws in what was then the Russian occupation zone. If the Russians had ever found any pictures of her husband in an SS uniform she and her family would have been shot on the spot. She had to burn and bury a lot of stuff.
She also ended up smuggling her three small children and herself into the American occupation zone over the course of about three months shortly after the war. One night she was even shot at, while smuggling her oldest daughter through the woods of Thüringen. She always had some fascinating stories to tell before she died three years ago.[/hijack]
