Mickey Z
Cool Observer
Friday, January 14, 2005
Nazi Costume vs. Nazi Deeds
This is such a nonsensical non-issue. It’s brought to us courtesy of the same celebrity-journalism culture that makes the modern advertising industry work.
Prince Harry, not personally known to me, went to a party themed as “Bad Taste.” Ho hum. He chose a Nazi uniform as his exemplar of bad taste. Okay, I can hang with that...my father’s mother’s cousins died in camps, very little will make me see anything Nazi-themed in a kindly light. Was he stupid and meat-headed for doing this, since he is an heir to the British Throne?
WHO THE HELL CARES.
This is a twenty-year-old (were you stupid at 20? I was) who shows no public signs of being all that bright. He did something in bad taste (theme of party, mind) and suddenly it’s all over everywhere. Knowing that my dead relatives were Nazi victims, His Highness would have been stupid and insensitive to come to MY bad-taste party in a Nazi uniform. If he had no way to know whether or not anyone there was touched by the German war crimes (and I don’t want to hear about the Aliied war crimes here, MZ, that’s a different discussion), he showed poor political instincts in dressing this way...but King’s Little Brother isn’t an elected position.
Sheesh.
Posted by Richard on from The great Red State of Texas 01/14 at 05:49 PMIt wasn’t even good satire, a la Springtime for Hitler and Germany (currently a hit in London’s West End). No excuse, but when I was 20 years old, I made a lot of stupid mistakes. But my parents brought me up to be sensitive to others. It was a Colonials and Natives party. The folks in Harry’s aristo/upper class set get off on such stuff. I wonder the reaction if it had been a Masters and Slaves party. Tasteless idiot, yes. This, coming a week before the 60th anniversary commemoration of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau.
The story first appeared in the Sun, a stupid tabloid rag.
I think a more important story the same day was the plea bargain Mark Thatcher made at his trial for contributing money to fund a coup in Equitorial Africa. People have known about Mark Thatcher’s shenanigans for year.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/equatorialguinea/story/0,15013,1389296,00.htmlI’m Dutch born and remember Prince Claus, the late spouse of the current Queen, and a German who as a young student joined the Hitler Jugend and later served in a Panzer division. He also saw it as his task to build bridges between Germany and the Netherlands and to heal the wounds of the past, while never denying the pain - he even took his three sons with him to visit Auschwitz.
Posted by Jay Vos on from Burlington, VT, USA 01/14 at 07:29 PMIf young Harry follows the path laid out for clueless privileged people, he’ll be another obnoxious twit providing fodder for tabloids. If he were smart, he’d run away right now and ditch the all the crap wished on him by the perverse anachronism of aistrocracy. That would make him interesting. I’d be pleased to welcome him to the fellowship of sensible Harrys.
I read the Counterpunch article before, Mickey. It’s a good one, and I bet not many people know about that nasty part of history.
Posted by Harry on from 01/14 at 08:45 PM
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