The Worst Insult

categories: AntiSemitism & Holocaust Denial, Obama Administration, The Holocaust

Published August 13, 2009 @ 09:04AM PT

Calling someone a Nazi is one of the worst insults out there. Unfortunately, it's also one of the most pervasive in our culture. From the famous (satirical) Seinfeld "Soup Nazi" to recent political protests, calling someone a Nazi is the go-to way to convey how mean or unfair or overbearing someone is.

Now, the insult has returned - this time resurfacing in the healthcare debate.

Rush Limbaugh recently laid out all the reasons why Democrats are just like Nazis (via the LA Times):

Well, the Nazis were against big business -- they hated big business. And of course we all know that they were opposed to Jewish capitalism. They were insanely, irrationally against pollution. They were for two years mandatory voluntary service to Germany. They had a whole bunch of make-work projects to keep people working [...] They were for abortion and euthanasia of the undesirables, as we all know, and they were for cradle-to-grave nationalized healthcare.

Now I understand that it feels like calling someone a Nazi - or line by line "comparing" their policies with those of the Nazis - makes a powerful point. Except that it doesn't. Really, it only does it minimize the horrific suffering inflicted on the millions the Nazis terrorized and killed. And it's not a particularly effective rhetorical device.

As Fox News notes (while discussing how some Democrats have described protesters' as using "brownshirt tactics"):

But an axiom in political strategy states that whoever uses the Hitler comparison generally doesn't win the debate -- unless he's participating in a debate about Nazis.

And Mike Godwin made clear in Wired over a decade ago

once a discussion reaches a comparison to Nazis or Hitler, its usefulness is over[.]

I say let's keep it that way.

Photo from the Sam Stein on the Huffington Post.

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Comments (4)

Throwing out the term 'Nazi' usually means a) that you're ignorant, and b) that you've run out good arguments. It is important to take lessons from history, but not every situation can be compared and contrasted to the Nazi regime, and it is unnecessary to dredge it up at every turn because it really diminishes the meaning.

Posted by Simone Lebeuf on 08/13/2009 @ 09:18AM PT
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Let Rush Limbaugh's long history of sowing the seeds of fear come to fruition and be reaped ... by him. These are the tactics that desperately get used by the losing side of an issue just before realization and defeat set in.

Posted by Fred Frankenberg on 08/13/2009 @ 10:17AM PT
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I have to admit...I throw out the term "Nazi" from time to time. Shameful, I know.

Posted by Michelle . on 08/13/2009 @ 02:02PM PT
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I think a lot has to do with the abysmal ignorance of most people. Of course they don't read, and they know next to nothing about Nazism (like the idea that the Nazis were opposed to big business), or Fascism, or Socialism or Social Democracy (as in Western Europe and England) or Communism, but toss those terms around with no apparent concern for historical truth. In their minds, those movements are no different one from the other.

It was actually funny to see people holding up a sign with Obama's name and the swastika while at the same time they were calling O. Communist. Had those people had any brains, they would have realized that a Communist would hardly give out billions and billions to the banks in order to shore up the system, that is, of course, Capitalism. That's a good commentary on people's ignorance and on the failure of the US school system.

Posted by Antonio Calabria on 10/25/2009 @ 03:35PM PT
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Author

Martha is the campaign manager at the Save Darfur Coalition. She has worked with a number of organizations and institutions advocating against genocide, including Team Darfur, STAND: A Student Anti-Genocide Coalition and Voices for Sudan. The views expressed here are her own.