Comparison to Nazis

[redbhoy]

Whats the big problem with comparing people to Nazi's? People seem to blow a fuse once the Nazi word is used.
If you want to compare someone to an extreme wrongdoer surely a Nazi is a good synonym to use seeing as most people reckon that the Nazis were abhorrent??
Are we afraid of upsetting the Jewish people?

 

[ClubMan]

Re: Comparison to Nazi's.

Whats the big problem with comparing people to Nazi's?

Godwin's Law for example.

If you want to compare someone to an extreme wrongdoer surely a Nazi is a good synonym to use seeing as most people reckon that the Nazis were abhorrent??

It depends on the seriousness of the abhorrence. Calling a traffic warden a Nazi for example would obviously be a gross overreaction.

Are we afraid of upsetting the Jewish people?

Or Germans, Poles, Gypsies, homosexuals, Communists etc.?

What is the context of your query or is this simply an attempt to for the sake of it?

 

[CCOVICH]

Re: Comparison to Nazi's.

Well if I was referred to as a Nazi I would feel fairly aggrieved as I have never gassed anyone etc. Someone did call me a fascist when I banned them from AAM recently, but that's a bit more generic and fascism does not (to me) imply the same level of evil/horror as the word 'Nazi'.

I'm not sure that the stigma attached to calling someone a 'Nazi' has anything/much to do with upsetting the Jewish race (or any other race/nation that suffered at the hands of the Nazis), I think it's more that the person who is called a Nazi is upset.

 

[Humpback]

Re: Comparison to Nazi's.

I'm not sure that the stigma attached to calling someone a 'Nazi' has anything/much to do with upsetting the Jewish race (or any other race/nation that suffered at the hands of the Nazis), I think it's more that the person who is called a Nazi is upset.

Unless you're the Mayor of London and you describe a Jewish person as a Nazi.

 

[CCOVICH]

Re: Comparison to Nazi's.

Unless you're the Mayor of London and you describe a Jewish person as a Nazi.

That certainly was ironic/moronic of Mr. Livingstone.

 

[ubiquitous]

Re: Comparison to Nazi's.

If McDowell had compared Bruton to Comical Ali nobody would have blinked an eyelid - despite the fact that Saddam Hussein's regime have also gassed people in large numbers, albeit on a much smaller scale than the Nazis

 

[Purple]

Re: Comparison to Nazi's.

As usual the substance of what McDowell said is lost because of the way he said it. If he just said that Bruton had totally misrepresented the truth by cynically using a statistic out of context he would have been correct. He could have scored a political victory. Instead he shot himself in the foot.

 

[CCOVICH]

Re: Comparison to Nazi's.

If McDowell had compared Bruton to Comical Ali nobody would have blinked an eyelid - despite the fact that Saddam Hussein's regime have also gassed people in large numbers, albeit on a much smaller scale than the Nazis

I was reading an article on Sierra Leone recently and there have been some truly evil things happening there in recent years. Maybe not on the same scale as Nazi Germany, or even Stalinist Russia for instance. But the term 'Nazi' certainly seems to have attracted proportionately more notoriety than many other evil/abhorrent movements throughout history.

 

[ClubMan]

Re: Comparison to Nazi's.

That certainly was ironic/moronic of Mr. Livingstone.

Wasn't it the case that the (admittedly injudicious) comment was aimed at a journalist who happened to be of Jewish background - i.e. the fact that he was from such a background was not necessarily known to Livingstone or pertinent to the situation in hand?

 

[stuart]

I thought that Mc Fool referred of John Bruton acting simlar to Goebbels in his presentation of the information

I don't think this is in any way the same as calling him a Nazi which the media seemed to pick up on and to to town on

If you stated that someone had a haircut like Hitler would you be calling them a nazi

stuart@oilean.ie

 

[ubiquitous]

Can anyone explain why there is no public protest/outcry/derision over the fact that a Dublin restaurant is named Mao, after one of the most murderous tyrants in history?

The supreme irony is that the same man was directly responsible for the deaths of millions of his own people due to famine.

 

[CCOVICH]

Re: Comparison to Nazi's.

Wasn't it the case that the (admittedly injudicious) comment was aimed at a journalist who happened to be of Jewish background - i.e. the fact that he was from such a background was not necessarily known to Livingstone or pertinent to the situation in hand?

Yes, but that doesn't change the fact that calling him a Nazi was offensive, and consititutes moronic behaviour IMHO. And I would feel that calling someone from a Jewish background a Nazi is somewhat ironic (whether he knew of the journo's background or not).

 

[Betsy Og]

Can anyone explain why there is no public protest/outcry/derision over the fact that a Dublin restaurant is named Mao, after one of the most murderous tyrants in history?

The supreme irony is that the same man was directly responsible for the deaths of millions of his own people due to famine.

On a similar theme, was thinking a grizzly name for a restaurant would be "Pol's Pot", serving "Khymer Oiwancha" - for the Limerick clientele.

 

[Sherman]

Can anyone explain why there is no public protest/outcry/derision over the fact that a Dublin restaurant is named Mao, after one of the most murderous tyrants in history?

The supreme irony is that the same man was directly responsible for the deaths of millions of his own people due to famine.

I have pondered this on many occassions, with no satisfactory answer.

 

[redbhoy]

I wasn't trying to stir up trouble here. I just dont see how people go to town on others who use the word Nazi.
It wouldnt offend me if someone was to compare some of my behaviour to a Nazi.
One of the contributors got me by asking why others arent used i.e Saddam. Pol Pot, Mao etc.

(P.S. Im not a white supremicist or anti-semite, Im just very inquisitive)

 

[icantbelieve]

I felt that McDowell was trying to portray Bruton as a manipulator of propoganda and used what he considered the prime historical example of the manipulation of facts for false purposes to make his point. I think he was a giant sized chump for doing so but I think the reference was meant as specific to Goebbels' job rather than a generalisation menat to also encompass the fact he was a nazi and murder (of his own family amongst others). Very surprised at McDowell for tripping up like this he should know that a) calling names in politics results in the loss of the point you are trying to make b) most of the people voting in this country don't know anything about Goebbels other than the fact that he was a nazi c) truth doesn't get you elected. Perceived truth does, the only arbitrator on Brutons claim is whether the public feel there are enough gardai, which they don't, irrespective of the facts or figures put forward by McDowell.