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I lean more anti-fascist than Nazi apologist, but there's a huge difference between: > “Wagner” is literally a Nazi dog whistle. Wagner group are not just smal

I lean more anti-fascist than Nazi apologist, but there's a huge difference between: > “Wagner” is literally a Nazi dog whistle. Wagner group are not just small-n “nazis” and > Or at least some of them are. This isn't the type of substantive comment that HN is looking for. It definitely leans towards "flamebait" while lacking substance that the rest of us can work with or learn from. I don't even necessarily disagree with you, but I would argue that this comment doesn't add anything helpful to this discussion.

zarzavat 3y ago
“Some of them” = the group leadership who name the group, given that it is a Nazi reference. Richard Wagner was a notorious antisemite and Hitler was a fan. It’s like calling the group “88 Division”. Sure, not all of the grunts working for them are dyed-in-the-wool Nazis, but the leadership sure are.
- skissane 3y ago
  > given that it is a Nazi reference. Richard Wagner was a notorious antisemite and Hitler was a fan. Wagner was never a Nazi – he died six years before Hitler was born. Wagner isn't my thing, but not all fans of his music (even today) are Nazis. Theodor Herzl, the founder of Zionism, was a big Wagner fan–of course, he knew Wagner was a rabid antisemite, but he managed to look past that and appreciate his music in spite of his antisemitism. In 2001, the Israeli conductor Mendi Rodan–a Holocaust survivor–conducted the first public performance of one of Wagner's works in Israel since before the Second World War. If a Holocaust survivor can separate the artistic value of Wagner's music from Wagner's Jew-hatred, can others? I wouldn't recommend naming something after him–especially in contemporary English-speaking culture which is very focused on the historical associations of names–although it is easy to forget how specific that (relatively recent development) is to a particular cultural sphere, something alien to much of the globe–but I wouldn't assume someone who did so was necessarily motivated by any sympathy for Nazism or antisemitism, especially someone coming from a culture which lacks that focus. Actually, here's an open source project named Wagner, and obviously in reference to the composer – https://github.com/spite/Wagner https://github.com/spite/Wagner – maybe an unfortunate choice of name, but I see no reason to accuse the author of sympathy for Nazism or antisemitism > It’s like calling the group “88 Division”. Sure, not all of the grunts working for them are dyed-in-the-wool Nazis, but the leadership sure are. "88" can mean a lot of different things. To Australians of a certain age, it may make them think of Australia's bicentenary celebrations in 1988. Some in the UK may remember "Charter 88", a left-of-centre constitutional reform pressure group founded in that year. In Chinese culture, 88 means good luck–and as someone who lives in a country with a significant Chinese minority, I've seen it used in that sense a lot over the years. I have no idea what (if anything) "88" means in Russia, but I wouldn't assume a hypothetical Russian group with "88" in its name necessarily had anything to do with Nazism. "88" as a neo-Nazi code is part of American culture, in other cultures 88 means completely different things, or nothing at all. Even in US culture, it has meanings unrelated to Nazism (amateur radio, NASCAR)
  - zarzavat 3y ago
    Yes, that’s how dog whistles work. They have plausible deniability. I’m sure that Wagner group are just fans of classical music and it’s all a big misunderstanding!
    - skissane 3y ago
      The other thing about "dog whistles": you can claim anything you want is a "dog whistle", and even if it isn't, it is almost impossible for anybody to prove you wrong. It is an unfalsifiable claim, and unfalsifiable claims rarely have much value. I'm no fan of Wagner PMC – they are brutes guilty of war crimes – but why bother with this worthless "dog whistle" criticism of them when there are lots of real atrocities we can condemn them for?
      - realusername 3y ago
        The group is funded by a nazi sympathizer, the name and the skull logo isn't a coincidence....
        skissane 3y ago
        > The group is funded by a nazi sympathizer Who are you talking about here? Yevgeny Prigozhin? Dmitry Utkin? And what is the evidence either of them is a "nazi sympathizer"? As I said, I'm no fan of either man – I expect the day will come when the ICC indicts both of them for war crimes – but I don't see the point of labelling them as "nazis" on the basis of flimsy evidence. The case that they are war criminals is much stronger than the case that they are Nazis – and surely being a war criminal is a lot worse than being a Nazi (not all of whom were guilty of war crimes/crimes against humanity/genocide–Franz von Papen joined the Nazi Party and served Nazi Germany as its ambassador–first to Austria and then to Turkey–but the Nuremberg Trial acquitted him of all charges)
        realusername 3y ago
        Maybe you should stop to argue in bad faith? The guys behind this are nazis with nazis tatoos, a name and a logo inspired by nazis and are doing nazi-like actions and support nazi racial ideologies.

zarzavat 3y ago

“Some of them” = the group leadership who name the group, given that it is a Nazi reference. Richard Wagner was a notorious antisemite and Hitler was a fan. It’s like calling the group “88 Division”. Sure, not all of the grunts working for them are dyed-in-the-wool Nazis, but the leadership sure are.

skissane 3y ago
> given that it is a Nazi reference. Richard Wagner was a notorious antisemite and Hitler was a fan. Wagner was never a Nazi – he died six years before Hitler was born. Wagner isn't my thing, but not all fans of his music (even today) are Nazis. Theodor Herzl, the founder of Zionism, was a big Wagner fan–of course, he knew Wagner was a rabid antisemite, but he managed to look past that and appreciate his music in spite of his antisemitism. In 2001, the Israeli conductor Mendi Rodan–a Holocaust survivor–conducted the first public performance of one of Wagner's works in Israel since before the Second World War. If a Holocaust survivor can separate the artistic value of Wagner's music from Wagner's Jew-hatred, can others? I wouldn't recommend naming something after him–especially in contemporary English-speaking culture which is very focused on the historical associations of names–although it is easy to forget how specific that (relatively recent development) is to a particular cultural sphere, something alien to much of the globe–but I wouldn't assume someone who did so was necessarily motivated by any sympathy for Nazism or antisemitism, especially someone coming from a culture which lacks that focus. Actually, here's an open source project named Wagner, and obviously in reference to the composer – https://github.com/spite/Wagner https://github.com/spite/Wagner – maybe an unfortunate choice of name, but I see no reason to accuse the author of sympathy for Nazism or antisemitism > It’s like calling the group “88 Division”. Sure, not all of the grunts working for them are dyed-in-the-wool Nazis, but the leadership sure are. "88" can mean a lot of different things. To Australians of a certain age, it may make them think of Australia's bicentenary celebrations in 1988. Some in the UK may remember "Charter 88", a left-of-centre constitutional reform pressure group founded in that year. In Chinese culture, 88 means good luck–and as someone who lives in a country with a significant Chinese minority, I've seen it used in that sense a lot over the years. I have no idea what (if anything) "88" means in Russia, but I wouldn't assume a hypothetical Russian group with "88" in its name necessarily had anything to do with Nazism. "88" as a neo-Nazi code is part of American culture, in other cultures 88 means completely different things, or nothing at all. Even in US culture, it has meanings unrelated to Nazism (amateur radio, NASCAR)
- zarzavat 3y ago
  Yes, that’s how dog whistles work. They have plausible deniability. I’m sure that Wagner group are just fans of classical music and it’s all a big misunderstanding!
  - skissane 3y ago
    The other thing about "dog whistles": you can claim anything you want is a "dog whistle", and even if it isn't, it is almost impossible for anybody to prove you wrong. It is an unfalsifiable claim, and unfalsifiable claims rarely have much value. I'm no fan of Wagner PMC – they are brutes guilty of war crimes – but why bother with this worthless "dog whistle" criticism of them when there are lots of real atrocities we can condemn them for?
    - realusername 3y ago
      The group is funded by a nazi sympathizer, the name and the skull logo isn't a coincidence....
      - skissane 3y ago
        > The group is funded by a nazi sympathizer Who are you talking about here? Yevgeny Prigozhin? Dmitry Utkin? And what is the evidence either of them is a "nazi sympathizer"? As I said, I'm no fan of either man – I expect the day will come when the ICC indicts both of them for war crimes – but I don't see the point of labelling them as "nazis" on the basis of flimsy evidence. The case that they are war criminals is much stronger than the case that they are Nazis – and surely being a war criminal is a lot worse than being a Nazi (not all of whom were guilty of war crimes/crimes against humanity/genocide–Franz von Papen joined the Nazi Party and served Nazi Germany as its ambassador–first to Austria and then to Turkey–but the Nuremberg Trial acquitted him of all charges)
        realusername 3y ago
        Maybe you should stop to argue in bad faith? The guys behind this are nazis with nazis tatoos, a name and a logo inspired by nazis and are doing nazi-like actions and support nazi racial ideologies.