# "Unite the Right" white nationalist march: Ugliness on full display. **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [August 12, 2017, 3:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unite-the-right-white-nationalist-march-ugliness-on-full-display/793444 "2017-08-12T15:06:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 16
**Author:** ![Ramira](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ramira/32/344_2.png) [@Ramira](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ramira)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2017, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unite-the-right-white-nationalist-march-ugliness-on-full-display/793444/301 "2017-08-13T16:51:06Z")
> [@Nava](#): > > Really? > > It translates to “kill anybody who isn’t one of Us and is found in Our Land”. The original idea was that only those considered ethnically-appropriate (Blood) could live in the Land and any who weren’t appropriate should be cleansed (translates to “killed”); “the Land” wasn’t merely what one might call “the motherland”, but “anywhere Our Power can reach”, and the “unclean” was also widened to include those considered “traitors to the Blood”. Indeed… the fact that the willful parsing of a narrow excuse making ends up having the resonances and the form that sounds almost exactly like the holocaust denial, is not a pure coincidence, it is made by willful blindess and retraet to the narrow parsing to avoid the uncomfortable truths. The american right, it never had to learn the lesson I think that the democratic republican right of the continent learned in the 1930s-1940s as in the France, as in the Spain (for longer period of course)… the extra precise parsing, the narrow excuses, for the exploitation of moment to gain the political push back against the left, blindness to the opening and the infection to a diseased political thought. ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2017, 4:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unite-the-right-white-nationalist-march-ugliness-on-full-display/793444/302 "2017-08-13T16:52:51Z")
> [@Spice\_Weasel](#): > > Do you have an adult answer to my adult questions? Because that’s the core of my beef with your commentary. All of your attempts to find out what actually happened are not what is offensive. What is offensive is that you seem to be denying that carrying a Nazi flag at a white supremacist rally is an expression of direct support for the Nazi regime and therefore ethically equivalent to screaming, ‘‘Murder the Jews!’’ Do you deny that is the case? On what grounds? I think carrying of flags is a bit fuzzier than explicitly stating “kill all the jews”. That’s one possible meaning, and a very reasonable interpretation, but the person doing so might merely be advocating for, to use an example from earlier, mass deportation instead of genocide. > [@iiandyiiii](#): > > Okay (that’s a “yes”). > > I don’t think that’s the point, though. Can you answer my questions now? I think this is the question you are referring to. > [@iiandyiiii](#): > > Do you think there’s a significant difference between marching with other white supremacists carrying swastika flags and repeating WWII era Nazi chants, vs saying “we approve of Hitler’s actions”? Is there any appreciable difference between expressing approval for Hitler’s actions and advocating for genocide? Possibly, although as others have pointed out, people wear Che t-shirts and presumably don’t support all of his bad acts, and people use Communist symbology or slogans and yet presumably don’t support all the bad acts of Stalin or Mao. I think marching with white supremacists and carrying swastika flags and repeating Nazi chants is a pretty good indication that they’re not nice people, and not someone who I think holds the key to better race relations in their philosophy. I find the acts abhorrent, without the need to claim that it’s an _explicit_ call for murder or genocide. I hope that’s clear. ---
**Author:** ![Ramira](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ramira/32/344_2.png) [@Ramira](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ramira)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2017, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unite-the-right-white-nationalist-march-ugliness-on-full-display/793444/303 "2017-08-13T16:53:30Z")
> [@WillFarnaby](#): > > Is there any appreciable difference between expressing approval for Stalin’s actions and advocating for genocide? If not, then you would be claiming a large number of respected American liberals advocated for genocide. Academia was in love with totalitarian regimes in the 20th century. > > Some murderous figures like Che Guevara are still idolized today. Should modern supporters of Mao and Che Guevara get the same treatment as modern supporters of Hitler? Che? That is silly and absurd. Stalin and Mao and you have the useful and the proper comparison. And yes. But Che?.. pure silliness. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2017, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unite-the-right-white-nationalist-march-ugliness-on-full-display/793444/304 "2017-08-13T16:57:22Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > Possibly, although as others have pointed out, people wear Che t-shirts and presumably don’t support all of his bad acts, and people use Communist symbology or slogans and yet presumably don’t support all the bad acts of Stalin or Mao. I think marching with white supremacists and carrying swastika flags and repeating Nazi chants is a pretty good indication that they’re not nice people, and not someone who I think holds the key to better race relations in their philosophy. I find the acts abhorrent, without the need to claim that it’s an _explicit_ call for murder or genocide. I hope that’s clear. Thanks for answering. I think this is terribly and even damagingly wrong (in that it allows you to mostly ignore white supremacists), though – swastikas and nazi imagery are nigh-infintely more intimately wrapped up with genocide and Hitler than Che is with Stalin and Mao. ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2017, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unite-the-right-white-nationalist-march-ugliness-on-full-display/793444/305 "2017-08-13T16:57:35Z")
Holy shit, wtf happened to you conservatives in the last 20 years so that you can defend KGB agents and Nazis in their efforts against America and our ideals of _truth_, liberty, and justice for all? ---
**Author:** ![Hector\_St\_Clare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5ac83/32.png) [@Hector\_St\_Clare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hector_St_Clare)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2017, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unite-the-right-white-nationalist-march-ugliness-on-full-display/793444/306 "2017-08-13T16:57:47Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > I do not like Nazis, or genocide, or chants for murder of people, or assholes who run people over who are exercising their First Amendment rights. That being said, Larry made a pretty specific claim, that people were ‘chanting for the murder of Jews and non-whites’. I hadn’t heard that anywhere else and wanted to know if it was true. As a point of fact, it appears that that did not happen yesterday. His claim, as near as I can tell, is false, or at the very least he meant it in a far more figurative and less literal way than I originally imagined. If you mistook that query for fact as being an “apologist”, I don’t know what to tell you except that it was not meant as such. If they invoke Nazi paraphernalia and imagery, or for that matter Confederate paraphernalia and imagery, their sympathy for mass murder and / or enslavement is implicit. Nobody asked them to choose those symbols with which to identify. In any case, even if they don’t support mass murder they do (by their own acknowledgement) support turning America into an exclusive homeland for particular racial groups, which I think would be extremely bad for the world as well, and needs to be condemned in the strongest terms as well. They were shouting at black women in the vicinity that they should go back to Africa. ---
**Author:** ![Hector\_St\_Clare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5ac83/32.png) [@Hector\_St\_Clare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hector_St_Clare)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2017, 4:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unite-the-right-white-nationalist-march-ugliness-on-full-display/793444/307 "2017-08-13T16:59:12Z")
> [@Ramira](#): > > Che? > > That is silly and absurd. > > Stalin and Mao and you have the useful and the proper comparison. > > And yes. > > But Che?.. pure silliness. I disagree with you on a lot, but this is absolutely correct. ---
**Author:** ![treis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bc79bd/32.png) [@treis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/treis)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2017, 4:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unite-the-right-white-nationalist-march-ugliness-on-full-display/793444/308 "2017-08-13T16:59:35Z")
> [@JohnT](#): > > Holy shit, wtf happened to you conservatives in the last 20 years so that you can defend KGB agents and Nazis in their efforts against America and our ideals of _truth_, liberty, and justice for all? It’s not a defense of Nazis. It’s a defense of free speech and the right to protest. ---
**Author:** ![Snowboarder\_Bo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snowboarder_bo/32/229_2.png) [@Snowboarder\_Bo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snowboarder_Bo)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2017, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unite-the-right-white-nationalist-march-ugliness-on-full-display/793444/309 "2017-08-13T17:04:18Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > Yes, it is. It was a bit of an extreme example to establish the baseline that displaying a Nazi flag does not always mean those individuals are calling for murder or genocide. Can we at least agree on that simple truth? Since the way you are using “display” is different than the way that others are using the word, it’s fair to say you are being incredibly disingenuous IMO and fair to say that you’re being so in multiple ways. ---
**Author:** ![Hector\_St\_Clare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5ac83/32.png) [@Hector\_St\_Clare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hector_St_Clare)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2017, 5:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unite-the-right-white-nationalist-march-ugliness-on-full-display/793444/310 "2017-08-13T17:05:41Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > I think carrying of flags is a bit fuzzier than explicitly stating “kill all the jews”. That’s one possible meaning, and a very reasonable interpretation, but the person doing so might merely be advocating for, to use an example from earlier, mass deportation instead of genocide. There are lots of regimes in history that have deported people. The Nazis aren’t memorable for deporting people, they’re remembered for killing millions of them for their ethnicity and religion. If you choose to invoke Nazi symbolism then I think the message is clear, and that even if you don’t intend to kill people you want Jews, Black people etc. to live in constant fear, which is sort of the definition of terrorism. In any case I think the idea of mass deportation of ethnic minorities from America would be a morally very bad idea as well. America is not an ethnic or religious homeland for a particular group, and it shouldn’t be. ---
**Author:** ![WillFarnaby](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/willfarnaby/32/514_2.png) [@WillFarnaby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WillFarnaby)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2017, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unite-the-right-white-nationalist-march-ugliness-on-full-display/793444/311 "2017-08-13T17:07:05Z")
> [@Ramira](#): > > Che? > > That is silly and absurd. > > Stalin and Mao and you have the useful and the proper comparison. > > And yes. > > But Che?.. pure silliness. Again, you are not remotely familiar with American culture, so let me fill you in. Che Guevara’s image is a popular one on T-shirts for leftists in the United States. They love the way he stuck it to the “man”(in this case the “man” is the capitalist pigs i guess). He killed thousands as the extermination arm of the Cuban communist movement. Do you object because his killings were not on the scale of Stalin, Mao, and Hitler? Ok, if so do you believe his modern idolaters are ok because he only killed thousands? Should idolaters of Osama Bin Laden or Timothy McVeigh be welcomed into polite society? ---
**Author:** ![Ramira](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ramira/32/344_2.png) [@Ramira](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ramira)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2017, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unite-the-right-white-nationalist-march-ugliness-on-full-display/793444/312 "2017-08-13T17:08:51Z")
Maybe they were only interested in reinactment of course… The poster, he would be very familiar to Zentrumspartie. ---
**Author:** ![WillFarnaby](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/willfarnaby/32/514_2.png) [@WillFarnaby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WillFarnaby)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2017, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unite-the-right-white-nationalist-march-ugliness-on-full-display/793444/313 "2017-08-13T17:09:02Z")
> [@Hector\_St\_Clare](#): > > I disagree with you on a lot, but this is absolutely correct. Didn’t kill enough to register for you? ---
**Author:** ![octopus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/octopus/32/3716_2.png) [@octopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/octopus)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2017, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unite-the-right-white-nationalist-march-ugliness-on-full-display/793444/314 "2017-08-13T17:10:17Z")
> [@JohnT](#): > > Holy shit, wtf happened to you conservatives in the last 20 years so that you can defend KGB agents and Nazis in their efforts against America and our ideals of _truth_, liberty, and justice for all? Ironic you post that. Why did the ACLU “defend” Nazis? Do they advocate Nazism? ---
**Author:** ![Ramira](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ramira/32/344_2.png) [@Ramira](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ramira)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2017, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unite-the-right-white-nationalist-march-ugliness-on-full-display/793444/315 "2017-08-13T17:11:44Z")
> [@WillFarnaby](#): > > Again, you are not remotely familiar with American culture Funny. without any utility or foundation It remains a silly, foolish, and very dumb comparison. I know the history of Che and also the popularity among the young fashionable ones on the left, which is hardly unique to the USA, indeed very much the contrary no matter your very silly posting. It remains the idea that Che t-shirt has a bearing here is absurd. A stalin or a mao t-shirt and you have some point. ---
**Author:** ![Hector\_St\_Clare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5ac83/32.png) [@Hector\_St\_Clare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hector_St_Clare)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2017, 5:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unite-the-right-white-nationalist-march-ugliness-on-full-display/793444/316 "2017-08-13T17:12:40Z")
> [@WillFarnaby](#): > > Didn’t kill enough to register for you? Uh, no. Thus says his biographer Jon Lee Anderson, who is not a hard left-winger: “I have yet to find a single credible source pointing to a case where Che executed “an innocent”. Those persons executed by Guevara or on his orders were condemned for the usual crimes punishable by death at times of war or in its aftermath: desertion, treason or crimes such as rape, torture or murder. I should add that my research spanned five years, and included anti-Castro Cubans among the Cuban-American exile community in Miami and elsewhere.” ---
**Author:** ![WillFarnaby](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/willfarnaby/32/514_2.png) [@WillFarnaby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WillFarnaby)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2017, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unite-the-right-white-nationalist-march-ugliness-on-full-display/793444/317 "2017-08-13T17:13:54Z")
> [@Ramira](#): > > Funny. without any utility or foundation > > It remains a silly, foolish, and very dumb comparison. > > I know the history of Che and also the popularity among the young fashionable ones on the left, which is hardly unique to the USA, indeed very much the contrary no matter your very silly posting. > > It remains the idea that Che t-shirt has a bearing here is absurd. > > A stalin or a mao t-shirt and you have some point. Right I understand your assertion. That you asserted it again is less than constructive. ---
**Author:** ![Hector\_St\_Clare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5ac83/32.png) [@Hector\_St\_Clare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hector_St_Clare)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2017, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unite-the-right-white-nationalist-march-ugliness-on-full-display/793444/318 "2017-08-13T17:14:07Z")
The right-wing equivalent of Che Guevara might be the fascist regimes in Greece or Austria, which were not genocidal and (unsuccessfully) opposed the Nazis. ---
**Author:** ![FloatyGimpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/floatygimpy/32/7750_2.png) [@FloatyGimpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FloatyGimpy)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2017, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unite-the-right-white-nationalist-march-ugliness-on-full-display/793444/319 "2017-08-13T17:14:53Z")
> [@JohnT](#): > > Holy shit, wtf happened to you conservatives in the last 20 years so that you can defend KGB agents and Nazis in their efforts against America and our ideals of _truth_, liberty, and justice for all? Heavily armed nazis killed and injured American citizens on American soil and, instead of condemning it, they make excuses. **Excuses for murderous nazis??** 😕 America, you have officially descended into bizzaro world. I don’t know how you can ever come back from this. Nations rise and fall. Maybe this is the end of America as the world has known and loved. I sincerely hope I’m wrong. ---
**Author:** ![Hector\_St\_Clare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5ac83/32.png) [@Hector\_St\_Clare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hector_St_Clare)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2017, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unite-the-right-white-nationalist-march-ugliness-on-full-display/793444/320 "2017-08-13T17:15:53Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > I think there are more than one possible interpretation of displaying a Nazi flag. For example, I have a close friend that participates in WWII re-enactment. He happens to participate with an American armor unit, but they re-enact battles with people who are participating as German military units, as Nazis. That sometimes includes the display of a Nazi flag. The people that are displaying those Nazi flags are certainly not, in my opinion, calling for genocide, and I see a vast ethical distinction between what they’re doing and “chanting for the murder of Jews”. YMMV. You can’t possible be serious in believing that this is a good analogy. Again this is a good example of why most European countries (even the ones where public opinion is very anti-liberal and ethnic-nationalist) have outlawed Nazi imagery. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unite-the-right-white-nationalist-march-ugliness-on-full-display/793444.md?page=15) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unite-the-right-white-nationalist-march-ugliness-on-full-display/793444.md?page=17)