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Q: Attitudes toward Nazi Germany
Anyone else notice really weird attitudes towards Nazi Germany here? Like it was just some kind of big joke that can laughed about now? I think because the atrocities weren't directed at them...they have a much harder time understanding that they were "real" and still are very serious business for many many people. (lack of abstract thinking)
I swear to god I see people wearing Nazi shirts and memorabilia like it's just some big joke...and before you ask, no it's not the Buddhist swastika symbol...it's 100% clearly Nazi stuff.
They all seem to know about the holocaust museum in Berlin, and feel that Germany has adequately expressed sorrow for what happened, so therefore Nazism was OK and now just a big joke. "Why can't the Japanese be more like the Nazis?" they ask.
I think they hate Japan because Japan hurt China...but they really don't seem to hate japan on the principle of the inhumanity of what took place during the Pacific war. Maybe it's bad translation...but it really seems like the issue is more "It is wrong to conquer and oppress and kill China/Chinese people!" than "It is wrong to conquer and oppress"
The same morality of a criminal boss who kills a man for stealing from him. He has no problem with stealing, he is a thief too, but the disrespect of the lesser thief (little japan anyone?) who dared steal from him cannot be tolerated.
I don't accept that kind of Mob Boss morality. Either fascist genocidal regimes are wrong, or they aren't. They can't just be wrong if they affect you.
Like I said I would thrilled to hear counter-examples. This is just what i've seen in my experience and I'd love to be proven wrong.
I'm not jewish, but I still can condemn the holocaust
I'm not chinese and i can still condemn the excesses of imperial japan
I'm not native american but I can still accept the evil of the behavior of european settlers.
I can't accept somebody who likes the nazis hating the japanese. it's being a huge hypocrite!
A similar discussion was already here: http://answers.echinacities.com/question/wtf-what-s-all-nazi-stuff-you-c...
Here are my observations based on teaching U.S history and social studies in China:
The Chinese admire the Germans for their efficiency (although the Third Reich was not as efficient as popular opinion dictates).
They see the Germans as correct in the protection of their own people (annexing territory under the auspices of "protecting" the large number of ethnic Germans living there).
Everyone in uniform, check. Everyone is contributing to a stronger homeland, check. Identifiable enemy to rally against, check. Lots of rallies, parades and show of strength, check, check, check.
The students are only taught about the Imperial Japanese aggression and not about the political reasons for Nazi Germany's racial policies. They do know that Germany was always a "friend" of China whilst Japan was always an enemy.
A contentious issue is that they (they Chinese) fought back against the Imperial Japanese yet they weren't taught about resistance to occupying Nazi German in occupied countries.
I really like the book 'American Shogun' by Robert Harvey (ISBN 0 7195 6638 x) wherein several explanations are given for the Imperial Japanese aggression and acts against humanity. You can never "hit your students over the head" with these ideas, but introduced slowly (and by reversing the situation, "What would you do if you..."), you can get some of the more open-minded students to understand more of the causes and impetus that lead to the Imperial Japanese trying to take China.
Finally, Mao was buddy-buddy with Stalinist Russia then that relationship fell apart because Mao didn't want to be subordinate to Russia. Mao wanted Vietnam to follow Chinese communism but Ho Chi Minh wanted Vietnamese communism and not Chinese, so that relationship bit the dust.
China wants closer ties to Russia again while (again) threatening Vietnam. History repeats itself.
expatlife26:
I'm not sure they're making that leap of respecting German nationalism. Again that takes very abstract thinking.
Sinobear:
They don't have to respect German nationalism (after all, they're not German). Today's grandparents get all misty-eyed about how, in the past, the state took care of them (and totally forget about the negatives).
So, little Jo Ni and Ji Li see a system whereby the state covered everything and no one had to "think too hard" about anything...utopia!
RobertZimmerman:
Agreed. Also several Chinese students have mentioned to me that Hitler was a great man. When I bring up words like genocide and the suffering of a world war to combat that idea they get a puzzled look on their face. Then I realized that they don't make the connection of how awful he was because Mao oversaw the killings of at least 60 million of his people.
I had a friend from Henan province. Repeat after me, Henan Province.
She loved what the jews did for China (drip irrigation technology, etc), but she had a clit-on for Hitler and the Nazis.
Come to think of it, it doesn't matter where they come from... everyone seems to think the Nazis were awesome, and they masturbate to stories of Hitler.
They hate the Japanese for raping the hell out of Nanjing, etc., but Hitler's far-worse atrocities are okay? Weird bunch, them.
expatlife26:
I don't know if you can really say one was worse...they were both pretty horrible and very different, though both thought of themselves as a master race.
The Nazis were quite literally trying to exterminate a race of people. I think in Russia/Slavic areas they behaved a lot more similarly to the Japanese than in the West. But then Hitler actually really liked France, if you were just an average French guy...they weren't likely to just kill you for fun. I think for your average guy life under the Nazis may have been more survivable than life under the Japanese.
Japan in practice was more of just really really bad traditional authoritarian government that just didn't give a shit if people died. It was complete obedience and servitude first or a bullet to the head.
Official policy was not extermination, however just the sheer brutality of it all led to significantly more people dying.
On the other hand, there was a certain country where deliberate post-war policies directly led to more deaths than both Germany and Japan combined.
It's REALLY hard to play "Olympics of Suffering"
Well, part of it could be because the Nazi's did help the Chinese during the Nanjing massacre.
Not directly, but a Nazi did work with other foreigners to create "safe areas" where the Chinese refugees could hide out from the sex crazed rapist Japanese.
They would put up a huge swastika flag that would scare the Japanese, thinking that it has been authorized by Hitler himself. Which, of course it had not... in fact the Nazi's didn't care and were obviously killing Jewish people at the same time.
But maybe this had an impact on the Chinese thinking in their minds that the Nazi smay have been evil to other countries but good to China and saved many Chinese...
When in fact, the Nazis were pro-Japan and helped to organize and supply Japan but Chinese are kind of dumb.
Here's the guy anyways: http://knowledgenuts.com/2013/07/27/the-good-nazi-of-nanking/
expatlife26:
Right...I mean you can always find instances of genuinely moving humanity in even the most savage conflicts. But they can't be overstated to "Nazi Germany loved China!" because they were allies with Japan.
It's possible that story is over-circulated here because it supports the narrative of "Japan should be more like Germany!"
I know Germany fucking hates that shit, I remember earlier this year there was some high level visit to Germany and the Germans more or less said "It's tacky politicize the holocaust for your own gain"
I've heard about this before. Knowing the stupidly copied, propagandist opinions locals parrot off of CCP media, I have no doubt a great many people share these immoral opinions of the Nazis. I wonder if that 'historical' Chinese movie with people hiding under a Nazi flag started the Nazi-love accidentally, or it was part of the CCP agenda to glorify fascism. And people wonder why I don't try to learn Chinese, so I can speak with locals... I'm saving myself money on headache and heartburn medicines by not knowing what locals are talking about.
You are over analyzing. The only answer is because chinese people are stupid. Chinese dont read anything but weibo and do not think. They are instructed ( brainwashed). Therefore any logical argument is only met with a blank stare. There is no hypocrisy or irony. There is the intructions and that is all. They will think Hitler is cool and Japan is bad because they werent taught Germany was bad. That would take time away fromnthe anti japan classes.
You can see it everywhere. Express to a million chinese persons that the attacks in vietnam is just desserts after them destroying and attacking japanese people and businesses last year. And not a single one would spare a second to consider it.
Dont even bother to mention that the vietnamese are smarter as they are attacking chinese while last year while attacking all things japanese they where causing by far the most damage to their own.
Also with chinas obsession with maps. Every argument for land is that they have a 1000 year old map showing its china. Anything that happened after that map was made is complely irrelevant. Oh todays map shows that its clearly the philipines? I DONT CARE THIS ONE MAP SAID ITS CHINA!!!
But this map was made before your map and it also said its philipines.
NO ! IM ONLY TALKING ABOUT THIS MAP! This logic is why xingjiang and tibet and every island is Chinas but taiwan with it own government and culture and identity and army could never be another country.
You dont need to explain your hypocrisy if you put a gun to their head.
expatlife26:
Ha!
A buddy of mine who has a trading company here...Chinese wife and son etc. Any time I tried to analyze the motivation of average people here he'd say the same thing:
"You're over thinking it, they're just stupid"
"They don't know why they prioritize luxury cell phones over not piling 10 deep in a studio apt, they just do."
"They don't know why they leave the door open with the AC on, they just do."
"They don't have any goals in yelling hello at white people, they just do."
That shit with the maps is stupid...and labeling any treaty that doesn't give them 100% of what they want as being "unequal". You don't see portugal making claims on every place they knew existed at a certain point in time.
It's like the US trying to renegotiate the Canadian border after 1950 when we become the dominant military force saying that it was an "unequal treaty with a colonial power" It's fucking ridiculous.
China is so obviously spoiling for a fight right now...and thats cause they have ZERO people with combat experience. You ask anybody who served in combat (at any level including officer corps) and they're WAY less hawkish. You get all these assholes thinking "oh it'll be fun and glorious we can defeat japan over these islands!"
I kinda think they need to be humiliated and see what modern combat is really like, but it would best if it wasn't japan you know? It's a shame the only force capable of really dominating them is Japan, cause that could get outta hand QUICK with the riots your know?
I came across this a lot when teaching, I had a lot of students tell me that they admired Hitler because he was a 'strong leader' and a few thought that he was really handsome too which I really didn't get...
the only way I could get them to understand how offensive that is to a Westerner was to compare it to me saying 'Oh, the Japanese were amazing during world war 2, they were so strong, such good leaders who cares if they raped, murdered and enslaved thousands of Chinese and Korean people.' Then they got it, kind of.
The best way is to ignore this type of crap. The more we talk about those horrible things, the worst its impact will be. If you just ignore them, they will eventually pull off.
ironman510:
But you, yourself are a Nazi. How else do we describe you?
thefidu881:
FO... You are not an ironman rather a bag of dust when gets under feet spurs the filth everywhere.... A nut bag like you, I have never seen even worst than mike,mark or NoTimeToLose for you claim wisdom while he didn't claim that.
RobertZimmerman:
You're a dunce. Those who don't learn from the past are doomed to repeat it.
thefidu881:
Did I say we shouldn't learn from that? We learnt a lot from the past and that's why we have wars going on in almost each continent in this world.
I hang out regularly with chinese ppl but never really notice about their admiration for germany or nazi, none of them ever bring it up either. But yeah most of them are clueless or brainwashed, the creepiest thing to me in here is that there are old war movies on their television every single time when I went to a chinese restaurant or just taking a walk. I honestly don't know if they just lack good tv shows or the government trying to brainwash some extreme nationalism attitude.
royceH:
There are no good tv programs and the govt have a serious brainwashing thing going on. It's very effective too.
A friend of mine who's Jewish has a very unique way to make locals understand that he does not want to hear about their hate of Japan, when they bring the topic he usually tells that he should burn their BMW/Mercedes/else (German cars are very popular in China) and kill them for driving a German car because of what Nazi Germany did to his people. Usually the locals have no idea how to answer and simply stop criticizing Japan when he is here.
I've never understood why the truth about the Nazis has never been revealed, all the big production ceremonies, the goose stepping and THOSE pretty uniforms. Yes the Nazis were gays gone bad. Just look at them now with that thought, SS officers had to be 6'4'', blonde etc. Blitzriegs they just couldn't wait to show off those uniforms and they loved marching. During the Night Of The Long Knives Hitler led troops against SA members that were sleeping with each other. Hitler never had women, no evidence.
Anyone else in Hitlers place would have an army of hookers protecting him.
bill8899:
OK whatever. I'm not that interested in arguing about his sex life.
Only thing I can add is that it's not just a Chinese thing, there was a controversy in 2012 when a Chiang Mai ThaiGuo high school had a rally where students dressed up as Nazis and had a big march, complete with the "Sieg Heil" salute. Also read of a BK fried chicken shop being named as "Hitler's Fried Chicken" with a rip-off of the KFC logo with Hitler in place of Col. Sanders (bad taste!).
Also saw the Nazi swastika in Myanmar and had the impression the people knew exactly what it represented.
Methinks it's a result of the lack of PC thinking in east Asia (they don't have to constantly worried about being branded "racist" or the like) plus they haven't quite come to grips with their own authoritarian tendencies; most the east Asian countries are under openly authoritarian regimes and that doesn't appear to be changing any time soon.
expatlife26:
Interesting.
As much as political correctness can be a bad thing, for example making discussion of (and therefore progress on) certain issues virtually impossible.
But a lot of what people rail against as being "PC" is just basic politeness. I don't need the threat of being fired to tell me it's just plain rude to tell a female colleague "nice ass!" or not to make tasteless holocaust jokes in front of jews. Haha, I hate hearing about "PC run amok" when someone obviously did something rude to begin with.
What i'm calling out the Chinese on is their cluelessness. Just how revealing it is that the ally of their "sworm enemy", little Japan, is completed spared any kind of ill-will.
Especially when the reality was that Germany enabled a lot of Japan's expansionism by weakening the western powers. England by itself had twice the tonnage and carriers of the Japanese navy, if they weren't stuck guarding Atlantic convoys they could have had huge garrisons at Hong Kong and Singapore. Because of Germany there was no force in Asia capable of challenging the IJN.
But, you know...you'd have to actually be interested in learning something to know all that.
sam239:
Ah, well about the PC thing: I worked on a federal gov't project a few years back, ended up leading a team of about 10 people. One of them (who happened to be black) was turning in blatantly fraudulent paperwork regarding hours worked and I had sufficient evidence to prove this. I reported to my superiors and they said that we couldn't fire him because he was black, we were all white, and he would likely file claims of racially based discrimination.
So instead of firing him outright we pulled a bureaucracy trick, approved all the previously fraudulent paperwork (so he got paid for that even though it was a flat-out lie) then re-submitted it to a review board with a 3-6 month waiting period, basically fired him without actually firing him.
Also there was that Ch. spy/thief Wen Ho Lee who seems was pretty obviously up to no good, but he also pulled the race card and claimed the federales were chasing him due to his race (in fact he came on the radar due to contacts with high-level Ch. nuclear officials and other suspected spies). Both of these cases seem like "PC run amok", when you can excuse yourself from a federal crime by "pulling the race card", no?
Good point about the German/Japanese thing. I have 0 interest in talking with some brainwashed Ch. about this. I'm too busy "doing nothing" and trying to get some sex in China on a 30 day visa.
