Hating Jews. under the guise of hating the colonialist apartheid genocidal oppressor State of Israel, has become the new fashion accessory of the righteous left. The hard right was caught off guard, finding itself outflanked in its hatred of Jews (who have their own space laser and will not replace them). What to do? Open a new Overton Window!
This week Tucker Carlson, the former Fox News star who now hosts one of America’s top podcasts, had an apologist for Adolf Hitler on his show. Darryl Cooper, who runs a history podcast (and newsletter) called “Martyr Made,” considers Winston Churchill, not Hitler, the chief villain of World War II. In a social media post that he’s since deleted, Cooper argued that a Paris occupied by the Nazis was “infinitely preferable in virtually every way” to the city on display during the opening ceremony of the recent Summer Olympics, where a drag queen performance infuriated the right. On his show, Carlson introduced Cooper to listeners as “the most important popular historian working in the United States today.”
As a result of Carlson’s podcast, not to mention Cooper’s twitter rantings, a new discussion arose about whether Hitler was really the bad guy in World War II, and whether the true villain is none other than Winston Churchill. After all, if we’ve learned nothing else from the left, isn’t revisiting historical truisms the hip thing to do?
Over the course of a wide-ranging two-hour conversation, Cooper presented the mainstream history of World War II as a mythology shrouded in taboos intended to prop up a corrupt liberal political order. The idea that Nazi Germany represented the epitome of evil, argued Cooper, is such a “core part of the state religion” that we have “emotional triggers” preventing us from examining the past dispassionately.
And, indeed, those inclined to defenestrate themselves through the newly-opened Overton Window have take the leap.
I got a call the other evening asking me whether the Overton Window has really shifted so far to the right that a debate about Hitler being the good guy was now within the realm of serious discussion. My immediate response was “no, it’s not.” And yet here it is in a column by the New York Times millennial pixie?
For parts of the contemporary right, however, the social consensuses undergirding liberalism are artificial and even tyrannical. After all, the “Matrix”-derived metaphor of being “red-pilled” implies a realization that all you’ve been told about the nature of reality is a lie, and thus everything is up for grabs. And once you discard all epistemological and moral guardrails, it’s easy to descend into barbarous nonsense.
Why would she even consider addressing such nonsense?
Ultimately, Holocaust denial isn’t really about history at all, but about what’s permissible in the present and imaginable in the future. If Hitler is no longer widely understood as the negation of our deepest values, America will be softened up for Donald Trump’s most authoritarian plans, including imprisoning masses of undocumented immigrants in vast detention camps.
To be fair, the hook to Trump isn’t exactly a huge stretch, given that the proponents of “Hitler was the good guy” kinda dig The Donald and, to be even more fair, his scheme to round up “illegal aliens” and put them in camps does seem a bit too familiar for comfort.
But there is nothing to be taken seriously about the discussion any more than the childish rants begging the question of genocide being committed by Israel. We take the latter seriously not because there is a legitimate discussion to be had. It’s ahistorical nonsense and there is nothing to discuss when any discussion is premised on woke fantasy.
There is similarly nothing to discuss when the former, from Carlson to the desperately-seeking-attention Hitler-curious Candice Owens, just asks questions about whether Hitler, who not only tried to solve the “Jew problem,” but killed millions of non-Jews as well for being “less than Aryan,” was really the good guy. That some are willing to engage with this “question” as if it comes in through the Overton Window does not mean that it is now within the realm of legitimate political discussion.
It’s not. It never will be. Sometimes history gets it indisputably right. Most of the time, history gets it right. But even within those times when history gets it right, it’s impossible to get it more right than Hitler was the bad guy in World War II. There is nothing further to discuss.
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I didn’t think Tucker Carlson was crazy, until now. Anyone who can enable a person who thinks Churchill was the villain of Europe in WWII deserves a trip to a padded cell and a series of electroshock treatments.
The idea that Hitler was a good guy is crazy. OK. The idea that what Israel is doing in Palestine is unacceptable is crazy. That’s a bit of a stretch, but OK. Conflating deporting illegals with Hitler’s death camps is not crazy? Now you lost me.
Not deporting. Putting them in detention camps. Read harder.
OK, let’s put the worst possible light on what Trump actually said. The CNN headline is “Trump plots mass detention and deportation of undocumented immigrants should he regain power”
Also from CNN: News of the proposals comes after Trump at a rally in Florida on Wednesday promised to conduct “the largest domestic deportation operation in American history”
Nobody is proposing putting illegals in camps. The plan is to round them up and deport them. It’s not crazy to argue that it’s a bad idea. What’s crazy is the claim that it’s similar to Hitler trying to exterminate the Jews.
I know the rules, and feel free to just delete this. Besides, it’s probably too easy.
[Ed. Note: Nah, it’s good.]
Gonna kick France in the pants.
To be a bit more direct, stupid shit is stupid shit regardless of who spews it.
I live in a very conservative bubble in the rural western united states and exactly no one I am acquainted even considers that Hitler was some kind of misunderstood hero. Most have progenitors who fought and a few who died fighting the silly bastard.
However, the idea that dissemination of such a ridiculous thought is either a political hit job or a grab for more fame and money, damn the costs, does have traction.
Unfortunately, as the Greatest Generation dies out, the Overton Window on Hitler will shift. Even against the backdrop of the crazy things that are happening today, it’s hard to fathom that such monstrosities could occur, much less with the support and help of the otherwise good people in the region. The Greatest Generation’s ability to say “I was there, I saw this mess, it’s 100% true” was invaluable not only in refuting arguments to the contrary, but also in keeping a vigilant eye out for them even appearing again. No doubt Jews won’t forget, but I wish I could say the same for the rest of us.
There are more who won’t forget. My great-grandfather fought in both world wars, and brought his family to the US in 1942 (or so). I had the privilege to visit and talk with him over chess games. The things that were done to Poland, and the Polish… even some in our family for having a last name that sounds like it could be Jewish.
I am not surprised at the reappearance of right wing Hitler apologists. They have to keep up with the Joneses as Hitler has become popular with Left lately, as the frequent sightings of swastikas and “Hitler was right” banners at “protect Hamas from Israel’s wrath” events prove horseshoe theory. Then again hating Jews has been the one thing the far left and far right have consistently agreed on for years.
What seems clear is that there are forces at play, as well as the fact that the passage of time means that there are fewer and fewer WWII survivors around, contributing to young people on the left and the right who either deny or fundamentally do not understand the Holocaust and the inherent dangers in virulent antisemitism and the men like Hitler who espoused it. The question of which direction the Overton Window is being dragged, left or right, misses the point, because what is clearly happening is that it is being widened, such that defending someone as truly evil as Hitler or wanting to finish his signature policy with respect to the Jews is seen as less abhorent. Whether someone is the most “woke,” the most “intersectional,” the most “based,” or the most “trad” Hitler apologist is irrelevant, since that particular position negates any notion that they are capable of rational thought.
The basic notion that the Nazis of 1944 would be preferable to the Parisans of today is highly dubious in and of itself. Beyond that, the creators of this thesis assume that the Nazis, already more than a little hinky in 1944, would somehow have remained a static society in the 80 years since. There is really no basis for this. No other developed country has remained static since 1944. The greater likelihood, had Nazi society survived the war, is that its budding depravities would have increased well beyond even its own historic excesses.
It’s interesting to compare the actual podcast to the New York Times lies about it. Whoever wrote that article was clearly assuming that none of their readers would actually go to YouTube and watch it for themselves. I suppose it’s a fair assumption to make of their target audience.
Was it really that important to you to let everyone know you’re a Nazi sympathizer? I’m sure you believe you’re just being nuanced, but you’re just a plain old Holocaust denying Hitler loving Nazi sympathizer. And yes, there is something wrong with that.
You’re clearly in the New York Times target audience.