# "Zombie Day Cancelled Over Nazi Signs" **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [November 24, 2011, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/zombie-day-cancelled-over-nazi-signs/604003 "2011-11-24T21:41:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 18\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2011, 2:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/zombie-day-cancelled-over-nazi-signs/604003/21 "2011-11-26T02:46:11Z")
I guess the elephant in the room for me is; when did “zombie day” become something that occurs as a faculty-sanctioned event in public schools, and in mid-November of all things? Anyone ever heard of this before? ---
**Author:** ![Suil\_Dubh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/85f322/32.png) [@Suil\_Dubh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Suil_Dubh)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2011, 2:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/zombie-day-cancelled-over-nazi-signs/604003/22 "2011-11-26T02:52:58Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > The thing is, I can understand why it would show up when one of your main characters is an interwar Germany. I don’t understand why this would come up with Zombies. **Swords to Plowshares** upthread has already mentioned the videogame “Call of Duty”. Recently there have also been a lot of tabletop wargames and roleplaying games set in a “Weird World War II” with both Allies and Axis powers using occult magic and monsters in order to win the war. Zombies, vampires, werewolves and mutants abound in this setting, especially on the Axis side. All this is probably predicated on the occult and mystical beliefs supposedly held by the higher-ups in the Nazi party. > **[Religious aspects of Nazism](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religious_aspects_of_Nazism)** > > Final solution > Pre-Machtergreifung > Post-Machtergreifung ---
**Author:** ![Zebra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/c0e974/32.png) [@Zebra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zebra)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2011, 3:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/zombie-day-cancelled-over-nazi-signs/604003/23 "2011-11-26T03:25:46Z")
Isn’t that the basis for Hellboy? ---
**Author:** ![dangermom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e274bd/32.png) [@dangermom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dangermom)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2011, 4:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/zombie-day-cancelled-over-nazi-signs/604003/24 "2011-11-26T04:38:18Z")
> [@Smapti](#): > > I guess the elephant in the room for me is; when did “zombie day” become something that occurs as a faculty-sanctioned event in public schools, and in mid-November of all things? > > Anyone ever heard of this before? Oh, schools like to come up with that sort of thing. Pajamas Day, Crazy Hair Day, Spirit Day (wear the school colors), Movie Star Day. They seem to think it’s necessary nowadays. Zombie Day is just the middle-school version for young teens who are too cool for the elementary crowd. ---
**Author:** ![jz78817](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jz78817/32/1028_2.png) [@jz78817](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jz78817)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2011, 6:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/zombie-day-cancelled-over-nazi-signs/604003/25 "2011-11-26T06:12:17Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > I think this makes sense… > …but this doesn’t because Nazis aren’t inherently linked to zombies. And the gestures weren’t forbidden ahead of time. It sounds like it didn’t occur to the school administrators that the kids might see a connection between the two things based on the video games (it wouldn’t have occurred to me either). > > By the way, I’m a little disappointed that this didn’t happen in Illinois. That’s a line you never cross. _Everyone_ hates Illinois Nazis. ---
**Author:** ![Attack\_from\_the\_3rd\_dimension](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b38774/32.png) [@Attack\_from\_the\_3rd\_dimension](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Attack_from_the_3rd_dimension)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2011, 1:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/zombie-day-cancelled-over-nazi-signs/604003/26 "2011-11-26T13:07:34Z")
> [@Malthus](#): > > Now, of course Nazis really existed (unlike Werewolves) Unlike zombies, there were plans to make [real Nazi werewolves](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Werwolf).:eek: ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2011, 4:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/zombie-day-cancelled-over-nazi-signs/604003/27 "2011-11-27T04:21:26Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > My daughter MilliCal and her friends are heavily into the manga and anime _Hetalia_… My daughter plays Austria. I’ve asked she never wear her Iron Cross. It has too much negative meaning for older folks. ---
**Author:** ![Katriona](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/katriona/32/113_2.png) [@Katriona](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Katriona)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2011, 12:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/zombie-day-cancelled-over-nazi-signs/604003/28 "2011-11-28T00:17:27Z")
> [@dangermom](#): > > Oh, schools like to come up with that sort of thing. Pajamas Day, Crazy Hair Day, Spirit Day (wear the school colors), Movie Star Day. They seem to think it’s necessary nowadays. Zombie Day is just the middle-school version for young teens who are too cool for the elementary crowd. We had dress-up days during Homecoming Week in high school (mid-80s), all leading up to School Spirit Day on the Friday of the game, where we’d wear the school colors. I mostly remember Neon Day and an attempt at a Toga Day. ---
**Author:** ![BellRungBookShut-CandleSnuffed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bcef8e/32.png) [@BellRungBookShut-CandleSnuffed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BellRungBookShut-CandleSnuffed)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2011, 5:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/zombie-day-cancelled-over-nazi-signs/604003/29 "2011-11-28T05:58:17Z")
Damn kids with their Call of Duty Nazi zombies. Back in my day we had Nazi zombies in Doom, and we liked it that way! ---
**Author:** ![Scuba\_Ben](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/278dde/32.png) [@Scuba\_Ben](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scuba_Ben)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2011, 2:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/zombie-day-cancelled-over-nazi-signs/604003/30 "2011-11-28T14:08:13Z")
> [@BellRungBookShut-CandleSnuffed](#): > > Damn kids with their Call of Duty Nazi zombies. Back in my day we had Nazi zombies in Doom, and we liked it that way! Back in _my_ day we had Nazis in Castle Wolfenstein, in top-down maps with profile characters _and we kicked their asses!_ ---
**Author:** ![BellRungBookShut-CandleSnuffed](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bcef8e/32.png) [@BellRungBookShut-CandleSnuffed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BellRungBookShut-CandleSnuffed)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2011, 2:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/zombie-day-cancelled-over-nazi-signs/604003/31 "2011-11-28T14:30:08Z")
> [@Scuba\_Ben](#): > > Back in _my_ day we had Nazis in Castle Wolfenstein, in top-down maps with profile characters _and we kicked their asses!_ Yeah, but it wasn’t until Doom that the Nazis actually turned undead! Unless you count episode 2, but technically they were mutants from medical experiments, rather than zombies. ---
**Author:** ![limegreen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/82dd89/32.png) [@limegreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/limegreen)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2011, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/zombie-day-cancelled-over-nazi-signs/604003/32 "2011-11-28T17:44:56Z")
> [@Zebra](#): > > Wait, are they Nazi Zombies or Zombie Nazis? My teenage son asked me to leave the room where his friends and he were playing because I asked this question. At length. Grammar and perhaps sentence diagramming were mentioned. The upshot? They’re zombie Nazis, because they were Nazis first, and then zombies…not that anyone else probably cares. ---
**Author:** ![Inigo\_Montoya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inigo_montoya/32/124_2.png) [@Inigo\_Montoya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inigo_Montoya)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2011, 3:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/zombie-day-cancelled-over-nazi-signs/604003/33 "2011-11-29T15:03:19Z")
> [@Zebra](#): > > It’s all fun and games until somebody burns a Jew. And then it’s only…No. I won’t do it. Darn you to heck **Zebra** , you and your sick sense of humor. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Attack\_from\_the\_3rd\_dimension](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b38774/32.png) [@Attack\_from\_the\_3rd\_dimension](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Attack_from_the_3rd_dimension)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2011, 4:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/zombie-day-cancelled-over-nazi-signs/604003/34 "2011-11-29T16:26:23Z")
> [@limegreen](#): > > My teenage son asked me to leave the room where his friends and he were playing because I asked this question. At length. Grammar and perhaps sentence diagramming were mentioned. The upshot? They’re zombie Nazis, because they were Nazis first, and then zombies…not that anyone else probably cares. So if you signed up the zombies for the National Socialist Party they’d be Nazi zombies, but the dead usually aren’t politically active, except in Chicago. I hate Illinois Nazi zombies. ---
**Author:** ![Irishman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b487fb/32.png) [@Irishman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Irishman)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2011, 11:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/zombie-day-cancelled-over-nazi-signs/604003/35 "2011-11-29T23:14:58Z")
> [@Malthus](#): > > The point here is that for kids these days, Nazis have no more inherent reality to them than zombies - their source for both is movies and video games; in both, they are basically monsters that the heroes have to fight. Hence having a “zombie day” but forbidding “Nazi gestures” makes, for them, little sense. Making such gestures does not indicate support for Nazi ideology, any more than lurching about moaning for braiiiinsss means you actually want to be the undead. This. To children today, Nazis are practically cartoon bad guys - in this case, literally so from the video game. Nazis are a stereotypical bad guy, and Hitler is just a “historical bad guy” like Napoleon or Ghengis Khan. Nazis and Pirates and Ninjas are all just pop culture referents. The problem is there is some small subpopulation that uses Nazi symbolism and Hitler admiration as a real world political symbol for a message of violence and hate. Thus this imagery can’t quite get fully desensitized, because there’s still a racist connection to the swastika. So someone dressing up for Halloween and deciding instead of being Dracula or Frankenstein or a zombie decides instead to dress up as that other funny bad guy, Hitler, and gets sent home from school to change clothes for being insensitive. Kid didn’t mean to be an icon for bigotry and anti-semitism. He just thought Hitler would be an iconic “bad guy” costume. So there is some tiny fragment of population that would dress up like Hitler out of admiration or as a form of intimidation, and a subset of the population oversensitized to the appearance of catering to that imagery and mentality, and a lot of kids who look on Hitler and Nazis and ancient history stereotypical bad guys who get caught in the middle. These kids said “Zombies, fun! Hey, let’s dress like the zombies in CoD - we’ll be zombie Nazis! Yea!” Nobody was thinking “Hey, we can dress up like zombies _and_ be mean to Jews! Woohoo!” ---
**Author:** ![Inner\_Stickler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inner_stickler/32/318_2.png) [@Inner\_Stickler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inner_Stickler)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2011, 11:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/zombie-day-cancelled-over-nazi-signs/604003/36 "2011-11-29T23:33:36Z")
Except for Cartman. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2011, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/zombie-day-cancelled-over-nazi-signs/604003/37 "2011-11-30T00:00:53Z")
> [@Irishman](#): > > This. To children today, Nazis are practically cartoon bad guys - in this case, literally so from the video game. Nazis are a stereotypical bad guy, and Hitler is just a “historical bad guy” like Napoleon or Ghengis Khan. Nazis and Pirates and Ninjas are all just pop culture referents. > > The problem is there is some small subpopulation that uses Nazi symbolism and Hitler admiration as a real world political symbol for a message of violence and hate. Thus this imagery can’t quite get fully desensitized, because there’s still a racist connection to the swastika. So someone dressing up for Halloween and deciding instead of being Dracula or Frankenstein or a zombie decides instead to dress up as that other funny bad guy, Hitler, and gets sent home from school to change clothes for being insensitive. Kid didn’t mean to be an icon for bigotry and anti-semitism. He just thought Hitler would be an iconic “bad guy” costume. > > So there is some tiny fragment of population that would dress up like Hitler out of admiration or as a form of intimidation, and a subset of the population oversensitized to the appearance of catering to that imagery and mentality, and a lot of kids who look on Hitler and Nazis and ancient history stereotypical bad guys who get caught in the middle. > > These kids said “Zombies, fun! Hey, let’s dress like the zombies in CoD - we’ll be zombie Nazis! Yea!” > > Nobody was thinking “Hey, we can dress up like zombies _and_ be mean to Jews! Woohoo!” In a way, I gotta imagine this situation must piss the _real_ neo-Nazis off no end. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![FriarTed](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/friarted/32/1052_2.png) [@FriarTed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FriarTed)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2011, 1:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/zombie-day-cancelled-over-nazi-signs/604003/38 "2011-11-30T13:54:42Z")
> [@Suil\_Dubh](#): > > **Swords to Plowshares** upthread has already mentioned the videogame “Call of Duty”. > > Recently there have also been a lot of tabletop wargames and roleplaying games set in a “Weird World War II” with both Allies and Axis powers using occult magic and monsters in order to win the war. Zombies, vampires, werewolves and mutants abound in this setting, especially on the Axis side. > > All this is probably predicated on the occult and mystical beliefs supposedly held by the higher-ups in the Nazi party. > > [Religious aspects of Nazism - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religious_aspects_of_Nazism#Cultic_activities_within_the_SS) Any of these games involve Britain’s various Wiccan covens & Magickal Orders being commissioned to co-ordinate rituals against the Axis? Because that is alleged also to have happened. The most elaborate version of the story is that Ian Fleming was the Gov’t man who contacted Aleister Crowley to in turn recruit said covens & orders for the effort. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/zombie-day-cancelled-over-nazi-signs/604003.md?page=1)