Godwin’s Law Nazis

Gerard Henderson typically annoys me. He’s from the Right Wing think tank the “Sydney Institute”. I don’t like him because despite agreeing with a lot of what he says, I think he sounds smug when he’s saying it.

His ivory tower takedown of Kyle Sandilands and his Megan Fox-esque grip on history and the significance of Hitler’s total evilness was right on the money.

He points the finger of blame at needless comparisons to the Nazi overlord made by politicians. It really does lower the level of political conversation.

If some opinion leaders use ”Nazi” or ”fascist” or ”communist” to denigrate political opponents, is it any wonder some demonstrators in the US and shock jocks in Australia will follow their lead?

Hyperbole has become a way of getting noticed in the never-ending news cycle. Exaggerated comments about the applicability of totalitarianism to contemporary democracies get a run because so little is known about the suffering of the victims of Hitler and Stalin.

Sadly it appears on the SMH website alongside a story featuring insidious current affairs style journalism snooping at its worst.

Hitler’s 39 remaining relatives have been tracked down. Somehow being related to the guy responsible for significant atrocities is reason enough to be named and shamed. Some of his family had been living under fake names – and these guttersnipe reporters have named them for the world to see. No doubt the people involved are incredibly thankful that these private eyes took the time to pick up discarded cigarette butts and McDonalds wrappers.

“Analysing forgotten cigarette butts in a small village in lower Austria, a used paper serviette in a New York fast food restaurant and the seals of letters sent over 30 years ago from northern France, Marc Vermeeren and Jean-Paul Mulders said they had traced all known living relatives of the Fuehrer for the first time.”

“…”The American relatives have agreed not to have children to extinguish the saga of Hitler and stop living in fear, but have promised to publish a book before they die,” said Mulders.”

Not having children seems a high price to pay for having an infamous great-great-uncle.

It occurs to me that I write about Hitler quite frequently. Or more specifically, I paradoxically write a lot about how writing or talking about Hitler is bad.