This google cached (link) site is an example of typical accusations against VW regarding the second world war. Amoung the cited misdeads are: Hitler had much to do with the origins of the company and that thousands upon thousands of slave laborers were used to produce VW cars during WWII. If I understand correctly, the german government still has a 20 % stake in the company.
So would it be logical for Jewish people to avoid giving this company business?
Um, I see no branch of actual logic that would result in such a conclusion. Holding a group of people whose previous generations had wronged them (even in such a horrific way as the Nazis) accountable isn’t logical. None of the money spent would go to Nazis, or to Hitler, or (probably) to anyone related to that in any way whatsoever. That would be like Americans refusing to… um, OK, I can’t think of a single thing we import from Britain, but it would be like us refusing to do that.
In summary, grudges against dead people aren’t logical.
I have Jewish friends that refuse to buy German cars, and Jewish friends that drive VW’s. I am not sure I can say that either group of them is being illogical in its decision making process.
Well, you could avenge those who fell at Yorktown by not buying a Mini Cooper.
Personally, I reflexively roll my eyes whenever someone suggests I boycott something in order to avenge something-or-other.
I’m not too familiar with the Battle of Yorktown but the mini-cooper is german made too.
Anyhoo, I guess it could be argued that punishing the families of bad people tends to dissuade future people from being bad. For instance, I’ve heard of an Israeli policy of bulldozing the family homes of all suicide bombers within 24 hours of any attack.
The Germans make the best cars in the world. We should punish ourselves by not buying them?
Well you could not buy a Jaguar if this was the Pre-Ford ownership days, or you could boycott them due to their cultural association with Britain.
And you could boycott Aston Martin as I think maybe they’re made in the UK? Or headquartered??
Looks like Aston Martin is a Ford brand as well. The Rolls Royce auto company is now owned by Volkswagon, but the company is still centered in Crewe, England so we could theoretically boycott them.
And I believe Rolls-Royce PLC, the jet engine manufacturer is still British owned, so we could boycott flying in planes that use those engines.
My parents were both in WWII (and both Jewish) and would never set foot in a VW, “the car that Hitler drove.” But they both admitted it was a completely illogical, emotional reaction.
What, Porsches? Dr. Ing. Ferdinand Porsche was a prisoner of the Nazis from 1940.
The others are overpriced garbage. There’s nothing a BMW can do that a comparable Mazda can’t for 50% off. There’s nothing that a Mercedes provides that a Toyota can’t for 50% off. VW’s are no better to drive than Fords, and Audis are just VWs marked up 20%. Too much Bosch junk in any of them for their own good, anyway.
Similar to Eve’s story, one of my grandfathers also refused to buy German cars. I’m told he was one of the first soldiers to enter Auschwitz after it was liberated. If he were still around and driving, I doubt he’d end that boycott, but I can’t say it would be logical today.
I think there’s some logic in not patronizing a company because the company’s initial success was rooted in some evil. If a company used unfair/unethical tactics to get where it is today, doesn’t it make at least some sense to prefer a company which used fair/ethical practices? I guess its somewhat of a symbolic gesture, but it doesn’t strike me as an irrational one.
As for punishing dead people, in this case, mightn’t there still be shareholders who were invested in the company during the 30’s?
That said, I personally wouldn’t punish the present majority of shareholders/employees of a company because of something that happened before they worked for/invested in the company. Also, if one were to apply this standard universally, one might find themselves unable to purchase quite a few products (i.e. companies that got their start using profits from slave labor, etc.). But I can see where people are coming from.
I don’t think you’re encouraging other companies to follow their unethical example, if that’s what you mean, and I don’t know if you can say VW got where it is today because of that. That’s just how the company started. Though in point of fact I’m sure there are many other companies doing business with shady regimes.
More likely their descendants, who wouldn’t be culpable for anything. Even if anyone “guilty” is still around, if you punish them with a boycott you’re also punishing many more “innocent” people, especially lower-level workers. You may actually be hurting those people more, which is the problem with boycotts in general.
I’m sure VW owes it’s success to more factors than just their cozy relationship with Hitler, but I wonder if, without that relationship, they would have had the chance for those other factors to propel them to success. (This is, of course, assuming that the claims of VW’s complicity with the Nazi regime are true. I don’t really know anything about it.)
I take your point that the present owners/operators of the company have no responsibility for their forbearers’ actions. But they did choose to work for a company with such a history (keeping in mind that this was barely 60 years ago, we’re not talking slave trading here). It’s a bit like punishing the final runner in a relay race because the first runner started early. Or maybe that’s a bad analogy…do I have to have a strong position to make a post, or can I just play devil’s advocate? 
I agree with this reasoning, except in cases when the boycott, if effective, would help many more people than would be hurt by it (clearly not the case with this example).
No, the company was state-owned until 1959. Many people think Volkswagen was somehow a household name in the third reich, but it wasn’t. There was a factory, the “Volkswagenwerk” (“people’s car factory”) that produced several hundred so called “KdF-Wagen” before WWII. During the war the factory built military vehicles. In the war the factory was mostly destroyed. The first time you could actually buy cars under the Volkswagen brand was after the war after the production had been resumed by the British military administration.
Ah, thank you Kellner. And the “they got their start by cozying up to the Nazis” bit is pretty off-base then too, huh? Ok. Forget I was here. 
Well it strikes me as such. If a company no longer does evil, and no longer employs any of the people who did evil in the past, then what’s the point of boycotting it? Who’s being punished?
Maybe I’m missing something, but I didn’t think companies had control over who buys their shares. I could go onto E-Trade right now and buy shares of whatever company I felt like, couldn’t I? They can’t stop me, can they?
My point was that if some of the current shareholders were invested during the period of unethical practices, then it would make sense to punish those shareholders (though on balance probably wouldn’t be worth the cost of punishing everyone else). But, the point is moot, since there are no such shareholders.
It’s true that public companies have no control over who buys their shares, but so what? If I don’t like the shareholders of a company and wish to disadvantage them, for whatever reason, it is perfectly rational of me to do what I can to damage the commercial interests of the company.
So if, as in Zhao Daoli’s hypothesis, VW has shareholders who, through their shareholdings, profited from slave labour or other objectionable Nazi policiess, a boycott of VW is a rational way to disadvantage them. (Of course it also hits the innocent. And of course we now know the initial premise isn’t correct anyway. But the initial point remains. The purpose of a boycott of any company is to disadvantage the shareholders, and the fact that the company didn’t pick its own shareholders is irrelevant.)
B_R: * Amoung the cited misdeads are: Hitler had much to do with the origins of the company and that thousands upon thousands of slave laborers were used to produce VW cars during WWII. If I understand correctly, the german government still has a 20 % stake in the company.
So would it be logical for Jewish people to avoid giving this company business?*
If consumers, Jewish or otherwise, are concerned about supporting companies with ties to oppressive regimes, wouldn’t it be more logical for them to focus first on companies that are currently linked to oppressive regimes? How about boycotting the many firms that provide support for the abusive military dictatorship in Burma, one of the world’s worst human rights offenders? Or companies linked to repressive policies and human rights abuses in Nigeria? What about corporate beneficiaries of forced labor in cheap-goods factories in China and elsewhere? Aren’t these somewhat more important issues than a car company’s alleged involvement with a genocidal regime that was overthrown about sixty years ago?
IMO, this kind of debate just reinforces anti-Semitic stereotypes about Jews being hypersensitive about any unfairness or injury to Jews, but indifferent to injustices against other people (particularly non-white people). These stereotypes are unjust and untrue, so let’s not provide ammunition for them by talking as though the most urgent boycott issue we can think of is whether VW deserves to be punished for its association with Nazis a half-century back.