Is the Term Nazi Becoming a Label for Whites Who Have Non PC Views?

Executive Summary

• Viewing how many people are using the term “Nazi,” it seems to be changing to be normalized personal attack.
• The term appears to be a euphemism for something that has little to do with its original definition.

Introduction

The term “Nazi” is very frequently used by the Left to describe people on the Right. While this term used to have a specific meaning, it has now been generalized to mean virtually anyone that the Left disagrees with. Now people who, say disagree with open borders, are called Nazis.

Punching Nazis

Once a person is declared as a Nazi, extreme tactics are considered appropriate against them.

The meme “punch a Nazi,” has become common. What is far less common is the request for evidence that people accused of being Nazis are Nazis.

In the past, only those that self-attributed the title of Nazi, such as Neo-Nazis, were called Nazis. However, there were never very many neo-Nazis. Now that the term has been “enlarged,” a Nazi is increasingly just someone (who is white) who holds views that are not PC or are conservative.  

“Nazi obsession” is a real thing. In this tweet, Debra Messing (an actress) sees the similarities between Adolf Hitler and Trump, because apparently, they both held up a book at one point. This is not a very well known picture of Hitler, and I had never seen it before — if this was a “dog whistle” to white nationalists and Nazis — it was very subtle. 

Debra is ultraliberal, but is not liberal enough, as a tweet about the 2020 election got her labeled a racist. When people that accuse others Trump of being Nazis get accused of being racist, we can see where this is going. 

How Do Berkeley Students Fair on “Thinking” on Freedom of Speech?

In the following interview at the Berkeley campus, students at the most elite school in California repeatedly referred to a speaker they opposed (who is not a Nazi) as both a Nazi and a white supremacist. For coverage of the latter term, see our article The Problem with Using the Term White Supremacy.

Here the question is whether it was correct to cancel a speech by Ann Coulter, the notoriously offensive conservative author, and media personality.

A Collage of Students: Ann Coulter is Racist, Xenophobic, Conservative with an Ignorant Mind Who it is Right to Use Violence Against to Stop Her Speech

It is “cool” and the “best course of action” that she was stopped from speaking on campus.

The white man with possibly an Irish accent states that the Nazis.

“were free speech.”

Which is not true. The Nazis only allowed their own free speech — they not only denied freedom of speech, but they eliminated other political parties.

If we are speaking of the Nazi rise to power and what enabled this rise to power and that their speech should have been restricted, that case is also weak. Hitler provided a convincing story for Germany’s fraught condition as the economy worsened (the country was stabbed in the back by the Treaty of Versailles, Jews were responsible, etc..). The worldwide economic depression elevated the Nazi party, who had been telling the same story since its inception. But while in the 1920s, the Nazis struggled to obtain 5% of the vote, but in the 1930s, they were able to obtain 37% of the vote in a national election. This meant the Nazis did not have the required majority to take power, which led to political negotiation that had a highly historically negative outcome.

The political situation at the time that led to the rise of the Nazis is explained as follows.

The Nazis polled almost the same 37 percent they had in the presidential election, making them the largest party in the Reichstag. Schleicher negotiated with them, proposing that Hitler become vice-chancellor. Hitler demanded the chancellorship along with five cabinet positions and important posts in the state governments; additionally the Reichstag would have to pass an Enabling act giving a new government all needed powers, otherwise it would be dissolved. Around the country Nazi stormtroopers were running riot, attacking their political opponents.(emphasis added)Hindenburg refused to make Hitler chancellor, so he met with Hitler to explain that he was unwilling to bring a single party to power.

To break the stalemate, Hindenburg proposed Hitler as chancellor,(emphasis added)Papen as vice-chancellor and Reich commissioner of Prussia, and Göring as Prussian interior minister (who controlled the police).

Hitler’s first act as chancellor was to ask Hindenburg to dissolve the Reichstag, so that the Nazis and Deutschnationale Volkspartei (“German Nationalists” or DNVP) could win an outright majority to pass the Enabling Act that would give the new government power to rule by decree, supposedly for the next four years. Unlike laws passed by Article 48, which could be canceled by a majority in the Reichstag, under the Enabling Act the Chancellor could pass laws by decree that could not be canceled by a vote in the Reichstag. Hindenburg agreed to this request. – Wikipedia

But this was not enough — Nazis did not just speak, their rise was not only a feature of their speech or popular support. They used violence and effectively set up a fake emergency to finally take power.

In 1933, the Reichstag building was set on fire, which Hitler used as a pretext to seize emergency powers and detain his political enemies. With communists and other leftists under arrest, he was able to push a law called the Enabling Act through parliament. The Enabling Act allowed Hitler’s cabinet to institute legislation without parliamentary consent. – LiveScience

One has to ask, why did Hindenburg agree to dissolve the Reichstag?

Hitler’s forces were brutalizing many political opponents at the time, and Hindenburg detested Hitler. Hitler also used violence throughout his rise. This was enforced by the Brownshirts, which were then renamed as a force after they were made illegal by the German government. As the Brownshirt organization was made illegal, it could certainly not have been news to Hindenburg that the Nazis used violent means to achieve their goals. What did Chancellor Hindenburg think would happen if he acquiesced to Hitler’s demands? Hindsight is 20/20, but there appears to have been ample evidence against what Hindenburg agreed to before he agreed to it.

In the references section, I have included more the steps that Hilter used to rise to power, and it shows multiple steps where Hitler could have been stopped. However, this is too much detail for the main body of this article.

Therefore, the explanation of the rise of the Nazis was that they are an example of free speech that should have been suppressed, does not fit with history. And secondly, there is not much of a correspondence between the Nazis and Ann Coulter, so the comparison is incoherent.

The white woman states that free speech was a

“movement for its time,”

but

“this is now a different time.”

The First Amendment to the US Constitution goes back to the founding of the country. Its protections were enlarged by the US Supreme Court during the 1960s. But apparently, it does not apply to the present day. Why this is the case is not explained.

A woman with a strange hairstyle states that..

“I am Jewish, and I know what happened in 1930’s Germany.”

However, the Nazis did not just restrict Jewish speech. Obviously, they did much more. And this woman is supporting what the Nazis did, which was to deny the freedom of speech to Jews and to any opposing voices. How she converted the Nazis’ denial of free speech into something; she is preventing by, like the Nazis, opposing freedom of speech is a serious logical flaw. It does not appear she is thinking through what she is saying but is reaching for an excuse to censor speech she does not like.

This also brings up the question of how much history these students know, and whether they have any references outside of Hitler and the Nazis. Secondly, they do not even appear to understand the Nazis — therefore, their one “historical guidepost” is false.

The black woman with the yellow headscarf than says that Trump has emboldened racists to be more assertive. However, Ann Coulter has had the same act long before Trump was elected.

The possibly Irish man then says that if the university does not listen (that means to follow directives and stop controversial speakers from speaking), then students are justified in using violence to silence speakers invited to the university by the university. He presents this as if there is no other option. One option, which is the option that is part of US history, is to listen to the speaker quietly, and then at the end of the speech, there is typically time set aside for questions. This is the part of the session, where students can challenge the speaker.

The Indian man then states that offensive speech is a type of violence, and

“violence comes in all forms.”

This is the new construct of combining speech with violence so that real violence is then justified in response to “speech violence.” And the scope of the term violence continues to enlarge. According to many transgendering — the act of “misgendering” is now considered “violence.” And naturally, as a transgender person is a victim of “violence” (misgendering), they can use real violence in return.

This is distinctly anti-speech framing. It is the direct threat of the use of violence against speech one disagrees with. How a society that was based around principles of The Enlightenment got to this point, how students at a university — that is “the educated” is a serious indictment of either the education they are receiving, the society in general, or both.

He states that he is happy to see..

“Richard Spencer get punched.”

However, Richard Spencer does not incite violence. He offends people but does not call for violence. This Indian man is saying that people that say things that are offensive should have violence used against them.

A white man with long brown hair makes a comment about violence being “inevitable, like in Spain.” It is very unclear as to what he means — but he also appears to support using violence to stop speech that you find offensive.

The woman with the strange hairstyle then refers to the Nazis again, when she says,

“Physical force should have been used against the Nazis, as that was the only way to stop them.”

It is curious that Ann Coulter is first being compared to the Nazis. As she is not the leader of a movement, not running for political office, has not written a book where she outlines the extermination of the Slavic people. This woman is also confused because the Nazis used violence against other people — they had the advantage in violence against the opposition. The Nazis stopped opposition with both violence and the restriction of freedom of speech.

If the freedom of speech had not been restricted, it would have been more difficult for the Nazis to rise to power. Stopping people from speaking is exactly what the Nazis did. Curiously, these Berkley students are supporting violence to stop speech, which is exactly what Black Lives Matter and Antifa do today.

Antifa uses violence against those that oppose illegal immigration — and they are justified because people that oppose illegal immigration are like Nazis, which is curious because the Nazis both restricted speech and used violence. 

This is a consistent theme that none of the students appear to know much of anything that is accurate or nuanced about the Nazis, and they continually use the term “Nazi” for people that have contradictory views from them.

The definition of a Nazi has broadened considerably in recent years. Many now consider the statement of the reality of biological differences between men and women to be unacceptable. The biology professor who pointed out sex differences in this video was referred to as a Nazi and a fascist. 

Conclusion

One of the problems with using the term Nazi is that it is designed to remove the person’s freedom of speech. However, freedom of speech is not restricted to any particular groups — so the logic is also problematic versus US speech laws. Although, with “hate speech laws” that are invariably coming, this may be changing. The intent is first to pass hate speech laws, then get speech that one disagrees with labeled as hate speech. This is clearly what many Left-leaning individuals would like to happen.

Secondly, those that throw the term Nazi around do not appear to make an effort to explain why the person is like a Nazi. Instead, they simply make the accusation that the person is a Nazi — of they say that because of something that occurred with the Nazis, that aggressive censorship is required of the undesirable person today. A strongly related problem is that many of the people accusing others of being Nazis, don’t know enough about what happened with the Nazis to be a reliable source of either who is or who is not a Nazi, or what would have been required to stop the rise of the Nazis. This is, of course, also not all that relevant as Nazis do not have fewer-freedom of speech rights — or at least should not. But this point is also made nearly irrelevant because there are extremely few people who identify as Nazis.

Finally, the term is only ever used to describe whites. Nazis should not be a racial term — because while the Nazis did restrict membership to whites, if a non-white holds the same offensive views as a white, then they should be able to be similarly mischaracterized as a Nazi. The fact that this does not happen is an indicator that the term is being increasingly broadened as time passes to mean ever-increasing parts of the white population. Today, opposing illegal immigration can get one accused of being a Nazi (most illegal immigrants are not white, so opposing non-white immigration is seen as very “Nazi.”) Tomorrow, the term Nazi may extend to not wanting to live in non-white areas. If a Japanese person were accused of being an “Imperial Japanese” or holding the same views of Imperial Japan in WW2 (which were not very much different than those held by the Nazis, including the idea of racial purity and racial superiority), that would be considered extremely offputting, and it would not happen. However, it is becoming increasingly considered acceptable to call whites of being Nazis.

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References

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazi_gun_control_argument

https://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/nina-turner-debra-messing-racist-black-voters

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship_in_Nazi_Germany

https://www.livescience.com/54441-how-hitler-rose-to-power.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adolf_Hitler%27s_rise_to_power

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_von_Hindenburg

How Hilter co-opted, Hindenburg is an interesting story.

During 1933 and 1934, Hitler was very aware of the fact that Hindenburg’s power to sack him was the only means by which he could be legally removed from office. With the passage of the Enabling Act and the banning of all parties other than the Nazis, Hindenburg was the only check on Hitler’s power. Given that Hindenburg was still a popular war hero and a revered figure in the Reichswehr, there was little doubt that the Reichswehr would side with Hindenburg if he ever decided to sack Hitler. Thus, as long as Hindenburg was alive, Hitler was always very careful to avoid offending him or the Army. Although Hindenburg was in increasingly bad health, the Nazis made sure that whenever Hindenburg did appear in public it was in Hitler’s company. During these appearances, Hitler always made a point of showing him the utmost respect and deference. – Wikipedia

How Hindenburg was sidelined before his death is covered in this quotation.

During the summer of 1934, Hindenburg grew increasingly alarmed at Nazi excesses. With his support, Papen gave a speech at the University of Marburg on 17 June calling for an end to state terror and the restoration of some freedoms. When Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels got wind of it, he not only canceled a scheduled tape-delayed broadcast of the speech, but ordered the seizure of newspapers in which part of the text was printed.^[119]

Papen was furious, telling Hitler that he was acting as a “trustee” of Hindenburg, and that a “junior minister” like Goebbels had no right to silence him. He resigned and immediately notified Hindenburg about what happened. Hindenburg was equally outraged, and told Blomberg to give Hitler an ultimatum—unless Hitler took steps to end the growing tension in Germany and rein in the SA, Hindenburg would sack him, declare martial law and turn the government over to the army. Not long afterward, Hitler carried out the Night of the Long Knives, in which the SA’s leaders were murdered, for which he received Hindenburg’s personal thanks in a telegram.^[119][177] A day later, Hindenburg learned that Schleicher and his wife had been gunned down in their home; Hitler apologized, claiming that Schleicher had drawn a pistol. During the Nuremberg Trials, Goring admitted the telegram was never seen by Hindenburg, and was actually written by the Nazis.

Hindenburg remained in office until his death at the age of 86 from lung cancer at his home in Neudeck, East Prussia, on 2 August 1934. The day before, Hitler received word that Hindenburg was on his deathbed. He then had the cabinet pass the “Law Concerning the Highest State Office of the Reich,” which stipulated that upon Hindenburg’s death, the office of president would have remained vacant and that Hitler would have been titled Führer und Reichskanzler (Leader and Chancellor of the Reich).(emphasis added) – Wikipedia

This is another very obvious move on the part of Hitler that should have been illegal. First, Hitler eliminated the Senate body of the Reichstag, but in the next move, he consolidates the Chancellorship and the President. 

Why did Germans not push back on this? These are textbook dictatorial moves, and it does not take a crystal ball to see what comes next.

Recall that the Nazis only received 37% of the vote in 1932, which means that most of the German electorate did not support Hitler.

Two hours after Hindenburg’s death, it was announced that as a result of this law, Hitler was now both Germany’s head of state and head of government, thereby eliminating the last remedy by which he could be legally dismissed and cementing his status as the absolute dictator of Germany.^[119]

Publicly, Hitler announced that the presidency was “inseparably united” with Hindenburg, and it would not be appropriate for the title to ever be used again. – Wikipedia

This is pure idiocy — it is a faux sign of “respect” and the elimination of the President’s office. Yet it was accepted. This illustrates one error after another that lead to Hitler’s rise. There were many steps where Hitler’s rise to power could have stopped or at least greatly curtailed.