WEBVTT - Part Two: Behind the Swastika 0:00:00.200 --> 0:00:10.080 H what wasn't my Sophie, Sophie, I'm just trying. I'm 0:00:10.119 --> 0:00:13.600 trying to recapture that what's boiling my pig Anus's energy? 0:00:13.840 --> 0:00:15.760 That I still like. 0:00:15.760 --> 0:00:18.759 The class what's cracking my peppers? That's still one of 0:00:18.760 --> 0:00:20.640 my favorite ones you've ever done. I know it's been 0:00:21.520 --> 0:00:22.279 four years. 0:00:23.840 --> 0:00:27.760 Again never again, fine, just going to make it more 0:00:27.800 --> 0:00:32.640 and more off putting. You know, you know, what's trafficking 0:00:32.680 --> 0:00:33.280 my children? 0:00:33.560 --> 0:00:37.640 That kind of stuff just going to be a problem us. 0:00:38.280 --> 0:00:42.280 Yeah. Uh well, this is Behind the Bastards podcast Worse 0:00:42.320 --> 0:00:45.200 People tell you all about them? Uh and today getting 0:00:45.240 --> 0:00:50.159 behind really behind the Nazis by getting behind the Swastika 0:00:50.200 --> 0:00:52.040 with Chelsea Weber Smith. 0:00:53.159 --> 0:00:55.320 Oh, this has been so interesting so far, and I 0:00:55.360 --> 0:00:57.920 just have no idea really where it's going. So thanks 0:00:57.920 --> 0:01:00.520 for having me here and taking me on this journey. 0:01:00.880 --> 0:01:03.840 Thank you for being here. Chelsea Weber Smith, whose podcast 0:01:03.920 --> 0:01:08.360 American Hysteria is pretty cool and people should check out Chelsea. 0:01:09.400 --> 0:01:13.480 Yes you ready, I'm ready, are ready? 0:01:14.480 --> 0:01:19.840 And then a bunch of like anyway, I don't know 0:01:19.840 --> 0:01:21.920 why I hate that. 0:01:22.400 --> 0:01:23.720 That's who we are now. 0:01:25.000 --> 0:01:30.280 That's like so our uh uh well, I probably shouldn't 0:01:30.280 --> 0:01:35.240 tell that story. But I come across periodically old pieces 0:01:35.280 --> 0:01:38.360 of like Nazi paraphernalia. It's a it's a hazard of 0:01:38.360 --> 0:01:41.600 the job. And there's definitely been a few times when 0:01:41.640 --> 0:01:44.200 I've been like, oh, that would be an interesting like 0:01:44.280 --> 0:01:46.920 that book would be interesting to have because of you know, 0:01:47.000 --> 0:01:49.240 this person who signed it, and then like, no, I 0:01:49.240 --> 0:01:50.680 don't need that in my house. What am I? What 0:01:50.720 --> 0:01:53.800 am I doing? You're you're you're you don't you don't 0:01:53.800 --> 0:01:54.120 want to. 0:01:54.080 --> 0:01:56.360 Have this, Robert, this haunted ass book. 0:01:56.640 --> 0:02:00.440 Yeah, this haunted ass Nazi book. I was given through 0:02:00.480 --> 0:02:03.160 someone else, a like family heirloom that was an old 0:02:03.240 --> 0:02:06.040 Hitler youth dagger, and I had no idea what to 0:02:06.040 --> 0:02:07.840 do with it, so I just kind of like put 0:02:07.840 --> 0:02:10.240 it in my trash pile out in the yard and 0:02:10.280 --> 0:02:12.919 it's just slowly decaying, which I think is the right 0:02:12.960 --> 0:02:14.680 thing to do with a Hitler youth dagger. 0:02:14.800 --> 0:02:17.600 Was that the one that was mailed to the corporate office? 0:02:18.200 --> 0:02:22.200 No, no, no, no, no. Yeah. We get all sorts 0:02:22.240 --> 0:02:26.240 of weird stuff. So in the late nineteen twenties and 0:02:26.360 --> 0:02:29.400 early nineteen thirties you might have heard about this. The 0:02:29.480 --> 0:02:32.440 Nazis rise to power, they solidify their grip on power, 0:02:33.480 --> 0:02:37.000 you know, and while sort of the while the Nazis 0:02:37.040 --> 0:02:40.240 are kind of like moving up in their inevitable kind 0:02:40.240 --> 0:02:43.560 of like path towards taking control of the German government. 0:02:43.760 --> 0:02:45.840 There's all sorts of fighting in the street. You know. 0:02:45.880 --> 0:02:49.840 You got your old timey anti fascists, both kind of 0:02:49.840 --> 0:02:53.120 social democrats and communists, you know, duking it out with 0:02:53.160 --> 0:02:56.079 the Nazis in the streets. And these street fights, these 0:02:56.080 --> 0:02:59.200 big brawls, these murders and assassinations are kind of a 0:02:59.280 --> 0:03:02.920 regular call of fascination in the world media, right, Like, 0:03:02.919 --> 0:03:06.040 they get a lot of attention in the American newspapers 0:03:06.080 --> 0:03:09.360 in particular, and so they start sending over reporters to 0:03:09.400 --> 0:03:12.360 cover all of this unrest in Weimar, Germany. In nineteen 0:03:12.400 --> 0:03:15.960 twenty seven, an American journalist from Town and Country magazine 0:03:15.960 --> 0:03:19.200 traveled to Austria to report on fighting between local social 0:03:19.240 --> 0:03:24.120 democrats and Nazi aligned fascists. Being a dumb American, this person, 0:03:24.520 --> 0:03:26.840 she did not worry much about the fact that she 0:03:26.960 --> 0:03:29.840 had gone to Austria in nineteen twenty seven with her 0:03:29.880 --> 0:03:32.920 girls club ring which bore a swastika on it. 0:03:33.360 --> 0:03:37.240 So she's gotlub Yeah, she's. 0:03:37.080 --> 0:03:40.320 Like showing up to like embed with the social democrat 0:03:40.480 --> 0:03:43.840 like street fighting gangs, and she's got a swastika ring, 0:03:43.920 --> 0:03:45.440 and like one of these guys has to take her 0:03:45.440 --> 0:03:49.200 aside and be like, I can't be wearing that here, 0:03:50.320 --> 0:03:53.360 Like I know you don't mean it, but you gotta 0:03:53.400 --> 0:03:54.240 take that thing off. 0:03:56.280 --> 0:03:58.240 God, that is amazing. 0:03:58.480 --> 0:03:59.640 That's so funny. 0:04:00.080 --> 0:04:03.840 Oh, it's amazing. Well, history is so rich. 0:04:04.960 --> 0:04:08.680 History is rich. But also there have always been you know, 0:04:08.800 --> 0:04:11.240 as someone who's done conflict reporting, I know a lot 0:04:11.320 --> 0:04:13.680 of great journalists, a lot of people I respect a lot, 0:04:14.280 --> 0:04:17.160 but the majority of journalists who do that kind of 0:04:17.200 --> 0:04:21.240 work are always like shitheads, right, and like it is 0:04:21.360 --> 0:04:23.960 a shitheaded thing to like go to travel to like 0:04:24.400 --> 0:04:27.480 report on the fighting between these Nazis and these other 0:04:27.520 --> 0:04:30.440 groups and not be like should I bring my swastika ring? 0:04:30.960 --> 0:04:33.760 Like maybe I should leave this at You did not 0:04:33.880 --> 0:04:35.359 do that much research. 0:04:35.600 --> 0:04:38.680 Yeah, you didn't possess the very most basic knowledge that 0:04:38.720 --> 0:04:42.480 you would need to report for newspaper off those events. 0:04:42.720 --> 0:04:45.440 It is nineteen twenty seven, you had some time. 0:04:45.760 --> 0:04:48.960 Wow, Yeah, sloppy, sloppy. 0:04:49.000 --> 0:04:51.800 Six years later, in nineteen thirty three, Hitler had been 0:04:51.800 --> 0:04:56.200 made Chancellor of Germany. This obviously supercharged international resistance to 0:04:56.200 --> 0:04:59.080 the regime, and American anti fascists held a rally in 0:04:59.120 --> 0:05:02.400 New York City to protest the newly minted dictator. One 0:05:02.480 --> 0:05:05.000 journalist with The New Yorker showed up to cover the 0:05:05.040 --> 0:05:08.320 event and realized very quickly that his pocket watch, which 0:05:08.400 --> 0:05:11.640 wasngraved with a swastika, might be a bad thing to 0:05:11.680 --> 0:05:17.240 have out on the street with it. Right, Like, really again, 0:05:17.279 --> 0:05:19.120 but it does kind of show I'm making fun of 0:05:19.160 --> 0:05:20.599 these people, and I think they should be. But it 0:05:20.600 --> 0:05:24.400 does show you, like how banal it was seen as, 0:05:24.480 --> 0:05:26.880 where like somebody might show up and be like, oh, fuck, 0:05:26.920 --> 0:05:29.359 I can't have this thing on me. I didn't realize 0:05:29.400 --> 0:05:33.720 this would be a problem. Yeah. Yeah. Starting in the 0:05:33.760 --> 0:05:37.279 early thirties, American use of the swastika began to decline, 0:05:37.680 --> 0:05:40.240 and this was matched throughout much of the Western world. 0:05:40.279 --> 0:05:43.200 For reasons I probably don't need to spend too much 0:05:43.240 --> 0:05:46.640 time on, right, not not surprising that it does start 0:05:46.680 --> 0:05:52.000 to decline in its kind of anadyne usage. In Nazi Germany, 0:05:52.360 --> 0:05:55.440 the new regime actually encouraged this at first. The ubiquity 0:05:55.480 --> 0:05:57.000 of the symbol had been good for them right in 0:05:57.000 --> 0:05:59.040 the early years when they're rising to power. It's free 0:05:59.080 --> 0:06:02.480 pr but now they're in power, and the hundreds of 0:06:02.520 --> 0:06:05.400 men have died fighting under the swastikab so it has 0:06:05.440 --> 0:06:09.159 become this kind of holy symbol of sacrifice. And once 0:06:09.200 --> 0:06:12.040 they're in power, the Nazis kind of find it horrifying 0:06:12.080 --> 0:06:14.760 that some company might use it to sell coffee. In 0:06:14.839 --> 0:06:18.400 nineteen thirty three, Joseph Gerbels announced the Law for Protection 0:06:18.480 --> 0:06:22.440 of National Symbols. Quote. If the symbol is used on 0:06:22.480 --> 0:06:24.400 an object or in connection with it, it may only 0:06:24.440 --> 0:06:26.960 be used if the object itself has an interrelation to 0:06:27.040 --> 0:06:30.120 the symbol. The use of symbols for publicity purposes is 0:06:30.160 --> 0:06:34.240 in any case forbidden. So basically this law means you 0:06:34.240 --> 0:06:37.200 can't use a swastika to sell a cigar or whatever, 0:06:37.320 --> 0:06:39.359 right unless it's like you're doing a fundraiser for the 0:06:39.400 --> 0:06:41.520 Nazi Party, then you can probably get away with it. 0:06:42.240 --> 0:06:45.240 For the Nazis, the swastika then had come full circle 0:06:45.279 --> 0:06:48.359 from a symbol that they co opted to mainstream their 0:06:48.440 --> 0:06:52.360 image to a sacred object restricted from commercial use unless 0:06:52.360 --> 0:06:56.000 that commercial use was Nazi in origin. This created problems 0:06:56.040 --> 0:06:59.560 for a number of people, particularly people outside of Nazi 0:06:59.600 --> 0:07:02.760 Germany and Some of those people were Canadians who lived 0:07:02.760 --> 0:07:10.280 in the quaint northern Ontario town of Swastika, named after Yeah, 0:07:10.560 --> 0:07:13.600 just picking up the news one morning, like you know, 0:07:13.720 --> 0:07:15.600 you're living out in the middle of nowhere. Maybe you 0:07:15.640 --> 0:07:17.800 don't check in for a while, and then like you 0:07:17.840 --> 0:07:20.440 see that like Hitler's taking power in Germany and you 0:07:20.440 --> 0:07:23.640 look at the banner behind him, like, oh, fuck God, 0:07:24.240 --> 0:07:26.760 this is going to be a problem for us. Swastikers 0:07:29.640 --> 0:07:36.000 now Swastika Ontario woo. Swastika Ontario was named after the 0:07:36.040 --> 0:07:40.000 Swastika gold mines staked in nineteen oh seven. The town 0:07:40.160 --> 0:07:43.360 name was inspired by the Sanskrit symbol, not the other thing. 0:07:44.000 --> 0:07:46.880 Several mines soon came to dot the boomtown, and all 0:07:46.920 --> 0:07:49.160 of them were kind of Swastika themed. There was the 0:07:49.200 --> 0:07:53.840 Swastika mine. There was also the Lucky Cross mine. In 0:07:53.960 --> 0:07:57.160 nineteen forty, as the war breaks out, members of Swastika 0:07:57.320 --> 0:08:00.800 or citizens of Swastika started to feel preture to change 0:08:00.840 --> 0:08:03.160 the town name. There are a couple of articles at 0:08:03.200 --> 0:08:05.120 the time where like people in town are like, we're 0:08:05.160 --> 0:08:07.440 not changing the name. They don't get to take it 0:08:07.480 --> 0:08:09.400 from us, Like this has been our name longer than 0:08:09.440 --> 0:08:12.920 they've been using it, you know. But eventually the provincial 0:08:12.920 --> 0:08:16.000 government overrules them and they send like I don't know, 0:08:16.080 --> 0:08:18.960 mounties or whatever to take the swastika sign outside of 0:08:19.000 --> 0:08:23.080 town and replace it with one that says Winston. 0:08:22.400 --> 0:08:25.680 Winston doesn't have the same ring to it. 0:08:25.920 --> 0:08:27.760 No, no, no, no. Yeah. 0:08:27.880 --> 0:08:31.880 People should have owned like an NFL team with that energy. 0:08:32.480 --> 0:08:34.440 Although it does make me think what if Hitler had 0:08:34.480 --> 0:08:37.200 adopted as a symbol just a man named Winston or 0:08:37.200 --> 0:08:41.680 maybe a carton of Winston cigarettes. You know, it is different. 0:08:41.720 --> 0:08:46.720 World War Two. Yeah, a lot of Americans and Camels 0:08:46.760 --> 0:08:53.720 writing to Nurember or to a fucking Normandy. So yeah, 0:08:53.720 --> 0:08:56.520 they changed the town. The provincial government tries to change 0:08:56.559 --> 0:08:59.679 the town name to Winston, and the Swastikas are so 0:09:00.480 --> 0:09:02.960 adamant that, like, we're not going to change our town name. 0:09:03.240 --> 0:09:05.440 They tear down the Winston sign and they put up 0:09:05.480 --> 0:09:09.200 their own news sign for Swastika, telling reporters still with Hitler, 0:09:09.320 --> 0:09:11.000 we came up with our name first. 0:09:11.600 --> 0:09:14.760 Hey, I appreciate the dedication. 0:09:15.040 --> 0:09:18.199 You know, this is where things g Yeah, I mean, 0:09:18.360 --> 0:09:23.200 you know they're not wrong, right, like because it's not 0:09:23.440 --> 0:09:24.719 their fault, you know. 0:09:25.240 --> 0:09:27.480 Like that might not be the right hill to die on. 0:09:27.800 --> 0:09:29.880 I wouldn't. This is not the hill I would pick 0:09:29.960 --> 0:09:33.560 to die on. Just my little town in Ontario has 0:09:33.600 --> 0:09:37.760 the name, but it makes me think. So, Like, the 0:09:37.800 --> 0:09:40.439 first big piece of like conflict reporting I did was 0:09:40.480 --> 0:09:45.640 after the Botoclon massacre in two thousand and fifteen, when 0:09:45.679 --> 0:09:50.880 Isis murdered dozens and dozens of people in France at 0:09:50.880 --> 0:09:54.560 that like mass shooting type deal. I did this article 0:09:54.600 --> 0:09:56.360 where I went through like eight or nine hundred pages 0:09:56.440 --> 0:09:58.920 of like Isis propaganda and like wrote this thing about 0:09:58.920 --> 0:10:02.200 their weird magazine. But like I remember, I spent like 0:10:02.200 --> 0:10:04.000 two or three days just kind of like stuck in 0:10:04.080 --> 0:10:06.200 my little office writing this thing, and then I go 0:10:06.280 --> 0:10:09.000 out to like do laundry at the laundromat near my house, 0:10:09.400 --> 0:10:12.080 which was the Isis laundromat. So I just remember like 0:10:12.120 --> 0:10:15.960 looking up at it and being like, that's probably gonna 0:10:16.000 --> 0:10:17.520 be a problem for you guys. 0:10:18.760 --> 0:10:21.160 Man in the similar vein, we have a dry cleaner 0:10:21.200 --> 0:10:23.240 that is just called Q cute. 0:10:23.400 --> 0:10:27.760 Yeah, yeah, I mean it's not on you. 0:10:27.840 --> 0:10:30.200 But I know if we did it first, they haven't 0:10:30.240 --> 0:10:30.640 changed it. 0:10:31.080 --> 0:10:34.400 There is another funny story about this of Swastika Mountain 0:10:34.520 --> 0:10:38.880 in southern Oregon. Uh Now, Oregon has a famously bad 0:10:38.960 --> 0:10:42.160 Nazi problem, so you might assume probably a dark. 0:10:42.040 --> 0:10:44.880 History mountain is a combination of words. 0:10:45.400 --> 0:10:50.200 Swastika Mountain in Oregon. Yeah, in Oregon. But no, it 0:10:50.240 --> 0:10:52.840 was it was again, it predates the use of that. 0:10:52.920 --> 0:10:56.240 It was just somebody, some guy decided call it Swastika Mountain. 0:10:56.760 --> 0:10:58.840 It got renamed like a couple of years ago. It 0:10:58.880 --> 0:11:01.319 was not all that law ago that that the state 0:11:01.440 --> 0:11:03.240 was like, you probably shouldn't. 0:11:02.880 --> 0:11:06.320 Have this, Like what year are we talking? Like a 0:11:06.360 --> 0:11:06.920 couple of. 0:11:06.920 --> 0:11:10.120 Years ago, Like not all that long ago that mountain 0:11:10.160 --> 0:11:13.920 got renamed northwesterners. It wasn't a big it's not like 0:11:14.000 --> 0:11:16.480 a major mountain, right, It's not like hood. It's not 0:11:16.480 --> 0:11:20.360 one of your money mountains, you know. I also, I 0:11:20.360 --> 0:11:22.800 can remember there's this farmhouse I used to spend a 0:11:22.800 --> 0:11:24.960 lot of time in pretty old farmhouse outside of about 0:11:24.960 --> 0:11:26.400 an hour and a half outside of Reading, in the 0:11:26.440 --> 0:11:30.840 middle of fucking nowhere, north central California, that the original 0:11:30.840 --> 0:11:34.480 owner had burnt into the wooden roof all of the 0:11:34.520 --> 0:11:38.120 different cattle brands from different ranches in the area, and 0:11:38.160 --> 0:11:40.320 one of them is a fucking swastika, and it was 0:11:40.320 --> 0:11:42.880 one of knowing the area. Like I actually knew a 0:11:42.920 --> 0:11:44.520 guy who had been in the Hitler youth as a 0:11:44.600 --> 0:11:47.400 kid out there, although he was not a Nazi anymore. 0:11:48.320 --> 0:11:50.200 You know, the warned when he was fourteen. It's not 0:11:50.200 --> 0:11:52.960 really on him, but like seeing that and being like 0:11:53.760 --> 0:11:56.520 just knowing the history. This could just be a thing 0:11:56.559 --> 0:11:59.160 that people had way back in the day before the Nazis, 0:11:59.679 --> 0:12:03.920 or it could be a Nazi ranch like rural California, 0:12:05.360 --> 0:12:06.200 equally likely. 0:12:06.200 --> 0:12:10.040 I looked it up. It's August twenty twenty two, the 0:12:10.080 --> 0:12:13.520 Open Geographic Nemes Board confirmed that it would no longer 0:12:13.559 --> 0:12:14.920 be called swastikamountains. 0:12:14.920 --> 0:12:18.000 We did it, guys, We did it, guys. 0:12:18.640 --> 0:12:20.560 They almost died on that hill. 0:12:20.880 --> 0:12:25.720 Yeah, yeah, God bless Oregon. Finally, Yeah, making progress. Everybody 0:12:25.960 --> 0:12:28.160 really got that knocked out before the election. 0:12:29.120 --> 0:12:31.800 But that's like, it's so fascinating that you can look 0:12:31.840 --> 0:12:35.240 at that now and actually truly not know. I mean, 0:12:35.280 --> 0:12:38.120 you can honestly know if you have a dividing line 0:12:38.120 --> 0:12:40.640 of time, but with these certain like products, you don't 0:12:40.679 --> 0:12:44.280 have like such a definitive line that happens where you're like, 0:12:44.640 --> 0:12:47.760 this is not Nazi shit, this is Nazi Nazi shit, 0:12:48.320 --> 0:12:51.000 you know, and we can say that without any doubt. 0:12:51.000 --> 0:12:52.400 It's just I had no idea. 0:12:52.880 --> 0:12:57.120 Yeah, pretty cool stuff. So the use of the swastika 0:12:57.160 --> 0:13:00.000 as a fashion icon had started to fade, albeit uneven, 0:13:00.160 --> 0:13:02.680 by the end of the nineteen thirties, as this segment 0:13:02.679 --> 0:13:05.560 from a ride up in Slate makes clear. One incident 0:13:05.640 --> 0:13:09.280 in nineteen thirty six made that clear swastika motif receives 0:13:09.400 --> 0:13:12.440 cold reception. Read a small headline in Women's Wear Daily 0:13:12.480 --> 0:13:15.920 in nineteen thirty six, buttons crusted with swastika shown by 0:13:15.920 --> 0:13:19.040 one couture house stirred up some comment among an audience 0:13:19.080 --> 0:13:21.679 of New York buyers. The editors wrote, no sales of 0:13:21.720 --> 0:13:24.440 this particular model are reported. Although no reason for this 0:13:24.559 --> 0:13:26.800 chile response was given, it might be due to the 0:13:26.800 --> 0:13:29.280 fact that many important New York department stores were owned 0:13:29.360 --> 0:13:33.240 or founded by Jews, including b Altman, Bloomingdale's, Bergdorf Goodman, 0:13:33.360 --> 0:13:36.400 Sax Fifth Avenue, and Macy's. Although the Women's Wear Daily 0:13:36.520 --> 0:13:39.439 article left the designer of these buttons anonymous, Vogue also 0:13:39.480 --> 0:13:43.000 reported on a fashion show featuring swastika buttons, identifying the 0:13:43.000 --> 0:13:46.960 designer as Marcel rochas a well known French courtier. Unlike 0:13:47.000 --> 0:13:49.359 Women's wear daily, Vogue found the use of the swastika 0:13:49.400 --> 0:13:51.000 to be amusing rather than disturbing. 0:13:51.600 --> 0:13:54.319 Now eslately telling me it wasn't co Kerschanel. 0:13:55.559 --> 0:13:58.280 There's a pretty I mean, like Coco. There's a pretty 0:13:58.280 --> 0:14:00.800 good chance that Vogue had no problem at the swastika 0:14:00.880 --> 0:14:04.920 because the people running it were pretty fucking racist and 0:14:05.040 --> 0:14:08.440 kind of fans of the Nazis. They, along with many 0:14:08.440 --> 0:14:12.120 other publications, were cautiously positive about Hitler in the lead 0:14:12.200 --> 0:14:14.600 up to the war years. That same year, they ran 0:14:14.640 --> 0:14:17.240 a spread showing the home decors of Hitler in his 0:14:17.320 --> 0:14:21.160 mountain hideaway, including a prominent swastika cushion on his couch. 0:14:21.600 --> 0:14:23.880 Slat says that this was an example of them humanizing 0:14:23.960 --> 0:14:26.680 Hitler and trying to reinforce the domestic feel of the symbol. 0:14:27.040 --> 0:14:29.560 They did also include a profile on British Prime Minister 0:14:29.600 --> 0:14:31.920 Anthony Eden's house at the same time, so I don't know. 0:14:32.280 --> 0:14:35.320 The article goes on. As late as nineteen thirty seven, 0:14:35.360 --> 0:14:38.720 Good Housekeeping recommended creating a swastika out of cashews as 0:14:38.720 --> 0:14:42.360 a cliver cake decoration. I know that's what I'm doing 0:14:42.400 --> 0:14:48.520 my next birthday. Cashw swastika. Baby, Wow, you got a 0:14:48.600 --> 0:14:51.080 nut allergy. That's a double problem right there. 0:14:51.280 --> 0:14:55.600 Yeah, so I wonder if your local grocery store would 0:14:55.600 --> 0:14:57.240 go ahead and pop one in frosting. 0:14:57.680 --> 0:15:00.720 Oh, just going there, try, Yeah. 0:15:00.160 --> 0:15:02.160 Just going through my thirty seven issues of a Good 0:15:02.160 --> 0:15:05.760 Housekeeping and uh yeah, they recommended this. Can you do 0:15:05.800 --> 0:15:06.520 this cave for me? 0:15:06.600 --> 0:15:07.640 This is what I want. 0:15:09.360 --> 0:15:12.560 But in nineteen forty, the Boy Scouts finally decided they'd 0:15:12.560 --> 0:15:15.560 had enough of the hook cross. At that year's jamboree 0:15:15.560 --> 0:15:18.920 in Santiago, Chile, a vote was taken to abandon the 0:15:18.960 --> 0:15:21.480 swastika due to the fact that Boy Scouts and Scout 0:15:21.560 --> 0:15:24.400 leaders had been heckled and pelted with shit while marching 0:15:24.440 --> 0:15:29.120 through streets with swastikas on their uniform And again, hard 0:15:29.120 --> 0:15:32.320 to blame anyone in nineteen forty for seeing a bunch 0:15:32.360 --> 0:15:36.200 of dudes in military style uniforms with white swastika. Isn't 0:15:36.280 --> 0:15:38.680 going I'm gonna throw some stuff at those kids. 0:15:40.120 --> 0:15:42.640 It's two late boys. You gotta give up the symbol. 0:15:43.040 --> 0:15:44.880 Might have to fuck up a Boy Scout over this. 0:15:47.160 --> 0:15:49.680 The Boy Scout order of the white swastika was, of course, 0:15:49.840 --> 0:15:53.840 never sacred, and neither was really the town name of Swastika, Ontario. 0:15:54.320 --> 0:15:57.720 But all of this does create a very serious problem 0:15:57.960 --> 0:16:01.280 for the Navajo, the Papago, the Pa and the Hope people, 0:16:01.640 --> 0:16:06.040 all of whom had used the swastika or the the 0:16:06.440 --> 0:16:11.280 whirling log in various works of religious significance since time immemorial. Right, 0:16:11.600 --> 0:16:14.440 this is a religious symbol for them. It is not 0:16:14.520 --> 0:16:18.000 as simple as just oh, this weird decoration or name 0:16:18.040 --> 0:16:20.360 that we used is problematic. Now we got to change it, 0:16:20.440 --> 0:16:22.840 right Like, this is a thing that is a part 0:16:22.920 --> 0:16:27.840 of religious observances, you know. But after the Nazi invasion 0:16:27.840 --> 0:16:31.280 of France, representatives from each of these tribes, the Navajo, 0:16:31.320 --> 0:16:35.040 the Papago, the Apache, and the Hope sign a proclamation 0:16:35.280 --> 0:16:38.960 on the whirling log symbol because the above ornament, which 0:16:38.960 --> 0:16:41.120 has been a symbol of friendship among our forefathers for 0:16:41.200 --> 0:16:45.520 many centuries, has been desecrated recently by another nation of peoples. Therefore, 0:16:45.560 --> 0:16:48.320 it is resolved that henceforth, from this date and forevermore, 0:16:48.360 --> 0:16:51.040 our tribes renounced the use of the emblem commonly known 0:16:51.080 --> 0:16:54.520 today as the swastika on our blankets, baskets, art objects, 0:16:54.520 --> 0:16:58.640 sand paintings, and clothing. Now I want you to really 0:16:58.680 --> 0:17:04.240 think about that, right, because they've done nothing wrong and 0:17:04.320 --> 0:17:08.200 the Whirling Log has done nothing wrong. They are choosing 0:17:08.840 --> 0:17:12.879 to give up a sacred symbol because of something a 0:17:13.000 --> 0:17:16.560 completely different group of people across the world have done 0:17:17.320 --> 0:17:20.240 with a version of that symbol as an act of 0:17:20.320 --> 0:17:24.000 solidarity with their victims. And I want to be clear, 0:17:24.000 --> 0:17:27.000 I'm not saying like this is the right thing or 0:17:27.040 --> 0:17:28.640 not doing this would have been the wrong thing, because 0:17:28.640 --> 0:17:30.360 I don't think it would have been wrong if they'd said, look, 0:17:30.400 --> 0:17:32.280 this is our religious symbol. We're not going to change 0:17:32.280 --> 0:17:34.000 it just because of these assholes, right, I think that 0:17:34.040 --> 0:17:37.600 would have been fine too. I'm just saying that's a 0:17:37.640 --> 0:17:44.080 really noteworthy decision to matter, especially prior to Yeah, I mean. 0:17:44.119 --> 0:17:46.200 I think that's like it is, like you said, it 0:17:46.440 --> 0:17:49.480 seems like an act of solidarity. We can't exactly know 0:17:49.640 --> 0:17:52.639 what was going through their heads or their conversations, but 0:17:52.720 --> 0:17:54.520 it does. I mean, what else could it be except 0:17:54.600 --> 0:17:57.400 like we can no longer abide this, even if it's 0:17:57.480 --> 0:17:59.919 like a huge important story in our culture. It's like, 0:18:00.040 --> 0:18:04.199 what's more important is no longer allowing this symbol to 0:18:04.359 --> 0:18:08.159 have a power that we don't consent to, Right, it's like, 0:18:08.240 --> 0:18:12.080 no matter what. Now, I think it's it's obvious that this, 0:18:12.080 --> 0:18:16.359 this horrible superpower has basically usurped the use of this 0:18:16.480 --> 0:18:19.399 and it's just not going to Yeah, you know, it 0:18:19.480 --> 0:18:23.000 just can no longer mean what it means to outsiders. 0:18:23.000 --> 0:18:25.200 And maybe that would have been fine if it were 0:18:25.280 --> 0:18:27.760 just like an internally used symbol, but yeah, what, it's 0:18:27.800 --> 0:18:30.120 just like heartbreaking, it's really heartbreaking, very sack. 0:18:30.760 --> 0:18:34.440 Yeah, I do have there might be a darker reason, 0:18:34.480 --> 0:18:36.159 and I'm sure a number of things played into the 0:18:36.200 --> 0:18:39.560 decision that they made. The darker part of my mind says, well, 0:18:39.560 --> 0:18:43.560 maybe they were concerned they see what is gearing up, 0:18:43.960 --> 0:18:46.560 and they think, like, well, if we go to war, 0:18:46.760 --> 0:18:48.680 you know, this is forties is before the US is 0:18:48.720 --> 0:18:50.800 in the war. But like if the United States goes 0:18:50.840 --> 0:18:54.439 to war with the Germans, it might be dangerous for 0:18:54.560 --> 0:18:57.080 us to like have this on shit, right, Like we 0:18:57.160 --> 0:19:00.439 might fucking we might people, This might call some of 0:19:00.440 --> 0:19:02.600 our people to get targeted, right. That may have also 0:19:02.680 --> 0:19:05.000 been a factor. I don't that's certainly not like a 0:19:05.119 --> 0:19:07.359 thing that they write out here. I do think it 0:19:07.400 --> 0:19:13.040 was probably more just like a solidarity and also like, yeah, 0:19:13.119 --> 0:19:15.959 just an acknowledgment of the I mean a lot of 0:19:16.240 --> 0:19:18.560 Navajo people, a lot of Hope people. You know, a 0:19:18.560 --> 0:19:22.360 lot of Apache people are going to wind up fighting 0:19:22.480 --> 0:19:25.639 against the Nazis too, So yeah, it's anyway, it's a 0:19:25.680 --> 0:19:30.879 remarkable moment and kind of I think worth acknowledging. So 0:19:31.640 --> 0:19:33.440 we all know the next part of the story, right, 0:19:33.720 --> 0:19:36.639 you got your World War two, the Nazis, you know, 0:19:37.400 --> 0:19:40.720 you're doing some stuff, and then America, without anyone else's help, 0:19:40.720 --> 0:19:42.719 wins the war, right you know, that's I think everyone's 0:19:42.760 --> 0:19:46.159 familiar with the gist of the story. So during the 0:19:46.200 --> 0:19:49.480 war years, it becomes dangerous to be associated with the 0:19:49.560 --> 0:19:53.560 Nazis and the swastika. Laura Ingalls, a pilot and a 0:19:53.640 --> 0:19:56.840 Nazi sympathizer, is put on trial in nineteen forty two 0:19:57.200 --> 0:19:59.920 and her swastika bracelet is brought up as evidence of 0:20:00.080 --> 0:20:03.159 for fascist leadings Ingles claims it was just an Indian 0:20:03.240 --> 0:20:05.880 symbol for good luck, but she is convicted of failing 0:20:05.920 --> 0:20:08.880 to register as an enemy agent, although her swastika bracelet 0:20:08.920 --> 0:20:11.000 apparently didn't factor into this, but it does get brought 0:20:11.080 --> 0:20:15.080 up in the trial. The war ends, the swastika gets 0:20:15.440 --> 0:20:19.840 falls and as a political symbol. You know, it becomes 0:20:20.080 --> 0:20:24.960 profoundly toxic, particularly after knowledge of the Holocaust becomes more widespread. 0:20:25.880 --> 0:20:30.440 This leads to its disappearance from like, you know, anodyne 0:20:30.560 --> 0:20:32.720 normal products that like a person would want to have 0:20:32.800 --> 0:20:35.400 in their house. But it does not lead to its 0:20:35.400 --> 0:20:38.919 disappearance from popular products. It just causes a change in 0:20:38.960 --> 0:20:41.520 the kind of products that it shows up on. Stephen 0:20:41.560 --> 0:20:45.119 Heller writes quote. It was used increasingly on paperback book 0:20:45.119 --> 0:20:47.879 covers for spy and mystery yarns, and on covers for 0:20:48.040 --> 0:20:52.080 men's pulp adventure magazines. Even today, the most common sanctioned 0:20:52.080 --> 0:20:54.520 mainstream use of the mark is on jackets for fiction 0:20:54.640 --> 0:20:57.399 and nonfiction books with World War Two themes. In the 0:20:57.440 --> 0:21:00.440 late forties and fifties, the male public's fascination with things 0:21:00.520 --> 0:21:04.280 Nazi was disturbingly fetishistic, and to an extent it still is. 0:21:04.640 --> 0:21:07.680 Yet publishers knew what they were doing. From a marketing standpoint. 0:21:07.920 --> 0:21:11.119 The swastika was such an identifiable icon, a magnet, so 0:21:11.200 --> 0:21:13.760 to speak, that a browser could perceive content without ever 0:21:13.800 --> 0:21:16.720 reading the title. It is indeed ironic that the swastika 0:21:16.800 --> 0:21:20.159 has evolved from benevolent sign to sinister national emblem to 0:21:20.240 --> 0:21:24.000 a veritable point of purchase display in only a few generations. 0:21:24.760 --> 0:21:27.280 And he provides a really interesting example of this that 0:21:27.320 --> 0:21:30.240 Svie's going to show you from the men's magazine World 0:21:30.280 --> 0:21:30.680 of Men. 0:21:32.160 --> 0:21:33.640 We got the Girls, We got the Men. 0:21:34.640 --> 0:21:38.679