Pink Hitler
May 26, 2010 3:04 AM   Subscribe

 
Top rejected title: Master Puce
posted by twoleftfeet at 3:12 AM on May 26, 2010


Top rejected title: Master Puce

Groan!
posted by aqsakal at 3:17 AM on May 26, 2010


You know who else had a colorful ad campaign?

That's right, Pepsi.
posted by zippy at 3:18 AM on May 26, 2010 [7 favorites]


In Italy, we're pretty used to NSFW ad campaigns already.

Not that that's any excuse for Hitlering, though - twoleftfeet is right (as long as he keeps his puns to himself...).
posted by aqsakal at 3:31 AM on May 26, 2010 [1 favorite]


"leader of the group, Ottavio Terranova said the posters were a "serious" offence against all "those who fought fascism, and violate our democratic and constitutional principles."

Wait a minute. Didn't the Italians fight WITH Hitler? Didn't Italy stab France in the back in 1940? Wasn't Mussolini the first fascist dictator?

You know, if I were an Italian, I think I'd just say nothing at all when the subject of Hitler comes up.
posted by three blind mice at 3:38 AM on May 26, 2010 [3 favorites]


Appart from the hairy discussion of what the stance of contemporary Italians on WWII should be, you might want to check Wikipedia out.
posted by Dr Dracator at 3:43 AM on May 26, 2010 [2 favorites]


Burt Reynolds, keep him in the ghetto or train to Auschwitz?
posted by gman at 4:04 AM on May 26, 2010


Wait a minute. Didn't the Italians fight WITH Hitler? Didn't Italy stab France in the back in 1940? Wasn't Mussolini the first fascist dictator?

This may come as a shock to you, but "Italians" are not a monolithic entity and many did indeed fight fascism.
posted by dontjumplarry at 4:09 AM on May 26, 2010 [4 favorites]


Yes they are, and no they didn't.
posted by Evilspork at 4:13 AM on May 26, 2010 [1 favorite]


Well, if there's a group I wouldn't like to annoy, it's Sicilian antifascist WWII veterans. Just sayin'.
posted by Skeptic at 4:23 AM on May 26, 2010 [3 favorites]


yeah, we tried some hitler comedy. I think it was pulled after one episode.
posted by marienbad at 4:25 AM on May 26, 2010


re: above link - skip to 0:50
posted by marienbad at 4:25 AM on May 26, 2010


I am aware of the Italian partisan movement, Dr Dracator, but the fact remains that the Italian nation did some very unsociable things together with Herr Hitler.

dontjumplarry: This may come as a shock to you, but "Italians" are not a monolithic entity and many did indeed fight fascism.

And many did indeed not. Italy's role in the European fascist movement has been overshadowed by the super badguy that was Hitler. Fascism was invented in Italy by Italians. Mussolini and the Fascisti were the role models for Hitler and the National Socialists. Italian fascism was on the move while Hitler was still pondering how to get the back the Sudenland. Italian soldiers invaded Ethiopia four years before Hitler invaded Poland. (The world hardly noticed and did nothing - which gave Hitler the idea that he could get away with this sort of aggression too. Appeasement did not start with Neville Chamberlain.)

By and large contemporary Italy and contemporary Italians have received a pass for this. Italy is not associated with the horrors of WW2 as Germany is. Let the sleeping dog lie.

------

There have to be some clever plays on fashion and fascism that could be used for the pink Hitler.

"Follow your sense of faschion"

"Hitler misunderstood when they told him he needed some Italian fashion."
posted by three blind mice at 4:34 AM on May 26, 2010 [1 favorite]


Yeah but three blind mice, you were quoting a guy from the Partisan movement. When he refers to those "who fought fascism" yes he does have a subgroup in mind. And the latter part of the quote is referring to the modern state.

An analogy would be, in the US, for a civil rights pioneer to declaim a racist billboard and say it was against "those who fought for civil liberties, and violate our democratic and constitutional principles."

Would you tell that person to shut up and let sleeping dogs lie?

Just because the US has an ignoble history of slavery. I'd say it is even more reason to speak up. Italians, especially with this creepy Berlusconi government, need to be reminded that fascism is nothing to be proud of or even jokingly be associated with.
posted by vacapinta at 4:50 AM on May 26, 2010 [9 favorites]


And his second in command.
posted by qvantamon at 4:53 AM on May 26, 2010


Hello Adolf.
posted by davelog at 4:59 AM on May 26, 2010


marienbad: Wow, that was like a MADtv sketch that went on too long. Even by the standards of MADtv sketches. And they wanted to make a whole series of that?
posted by Anyamatopoeia at 5:10 AM on May 26, 2010


This is in incredibly poor taste.

That shade of pink with that eyeliner? That's got to be a crime.
posted by litleozy at 5:14 AM on May 26, 2010 [4 favorites]


It's to early to bash on Italians, and it's way to early for me to be seeing a pinked out Hitler. Must. make. coffee.
posted by nola at 5:17 AM on May 26, 2010


OK, so the Italians founded Fascism and provided Hitler with a role model. No historical doubt whatever. To their credit, they even teach this in the schools here. But that was in another country, and besides, the [dictator] is dead. After (or even during) the brutality of the Mussolini regime and the Nazi occupation, they saw the error of their ways and in 1947 voted in a constitution (by a huge majority) which, among other things, forbids Fascism and any praise or support for it. According to Wikipedia, Fascists believe that "a nation is an organic community that requires strong leadership, singular collective identity, and the will and ability to commit violence and wage war in order to keep the nation strong." Well, one thing they don't have at the moment (and haven't had since WW2) is strong leadership, however much Berlusconi postures and blathers. And another is a singular collective identity: as dontjumpharry rightly points out, they have anything but a monolithic identity; Sicilians and Lombards and Tuscans and Sardinians can't stand each other (and can barely understand each other's speech). And there is no widespread will or ability to commit violence and wage war; the mission in Afghanistan was voted in as a peace mission, is widely perceived as such, and if there are many more casualties it'll be out of there.

Yes, OK, there's no doubt that Italy (like most of the rest of Europe) is drifting to the Right. It's the hangover after the heady post-WW2 days when the Communists almost made it into power throughout Western Europe, until people realised that that would have been just as stupid. But it's not a Fascist Right, it's a constitutional Right. Gianfranco Fini has been described as "the ideal son-in-law" for being so salonfähig: no matter what his origins in his youthful folly, he's dragged the Italian Right towards the Centre (Disclaimer: I vote hard Left, so I've no hidden agenda to praise Fini), and the few hard-core Fascists today (none of them old enough to have experienced it in first person, all of them young enough to be swayed by any unacceptable, semi-clandestine, violent gang identy that beats the boredom of the suburbs) are in a numerically tiny minority.

Yes they are, and no they didn't. Evilspork: can you substantiate that with some acceptable sources?
posted by aqsakal at 5:23 AM on May 26, 2010 [4 favorites]




Hitler in pink is also offensive to fans of the Giro d'Italia. The leader wears the maglia rosa or pink jersey.
posted by fixedgear at 5:29 AM on May 26, 2010


aqsakal, I read a piece by an Italian journalist who argues that one part of the Italian core identity is to reject the idea of an Italian core identity in favour of specific familial ties and personal networking contacts. Also, that Berlusconi is something of a heightened representation and a perversion of the same principle which makes him so attractive. He says that as these familial ties are weakening it leaves many people adrift, identitywise. It sounded interesting.
posted by Omnomnom at 5:31 AM on May 26, 2010


Coming Soon to Broadway: GODWIN! The Musical!
posted by bwg at 5:37 AM on May 26, 2010 [2 favorites]


Omnomnom: yes, it does. I'd be interested to read that if you can remember the source. Of course, there are lots of reasons why Berlusconi has undoubtedly been (note past tense) so attractive, and this could well be part of the mix. But (to stay on topic) he is by no means a Fascist, even if he looks more like Mussolini every day, and has made his Rome HQ right across the street from Palazzo Venezia, where Mussolini used to harangue the crowds: just needs to walk across and up a flight of stairs to the famous balcony where Mussolini announced Italy's entry into WW2...
posted by aqsakal at 5:43 AM on May 26, 2010 [1 favorite]


Fashion Goodwin!
posted by jeffburdges at 5:47 AM on May 26, 2010


Agency executive Daniele Manno said the campaign "invites young people to create their own style and not to be influenced by their peers, but by us instead".
posted by Naberius at 5:49 AM on May 26, 2010


I was expecting to find out that Sicilian war vets wore pink uniforms back in the day.
posted by Halloween Jack at 6:00 AM on May 26, 2010 [5 favorites]


By and large contemporary Italy and contemporary Italians have received a pass for this. Italy is not associated with the horrors of WW2 as Germany is.

Quite a broad-brush generalization there, three blind mice. It'd be nice to see some evidence. How is it that contemporary Italy has "received a pass" for their involvement in World War II and the Axis? I have my doubts that Albania, Greece, Ethiopia, and Libya would say that they have given Italy a pass.
posted by blucevalo at 6:04 AM on May 26, 2010


blucevalo: Broad brush, maybe, but 3bm isn't so wrong. He did, after all, specify contemporary Italy and Italians. I've lived in Italy (still do) and Libya, and know many Greeks, Albanians and Ethiopians in Italy. You'll find that on the whole they get on very well with contemporary Italians. Albanians and Ethiopians in particular come here to Italy and form local communities. In general, if there are enough reasons to feel good about someone, and enough not to dwell on what his grandfather may have done to your grandmother, you'll get on well with them. (We Brits tend to be lucky that way; somehow we manage to find people who like us in India and places like that.)
posted by aqsakal at 6:46 AM on May 26, 2010


Idioti! If they used George Bush, it would have been a spectacular success.
posted by digsrus at 6:58 AM on May 26, 2010 [1 favorite]


If they are really serious about attention-getting bad taste, may I suggest that the Pope would be pretty in pink?
posted by warbaby at 7:11 AM on May 26, 2010 [2 favorites]


Even more significant than the Giro d'Italia -- pink is the color of U.S. Citta di Palermo.

Re: Italy and collaboration with Hitler's regime:

"In 1931, approximately 48,000 Jews lived in Italy. By 1939, up to 4,000 had been baptized, and several thousand other Jews chose to emigrate, leaving 35,000 Jews in the country. During the war, the Nazi pressure to implement discriminatory measures against Jews was, for the most part, ignored or enacted half-heartedly. Most Jews did not obey orders to be transferred to internment camps and many of their non-Jewish neighbors and government officials shielded them from the Nazis. Some Jews were interned in labor camps in Italy.

After the north was occupied by the Germans in 1943, the Nazis wanted to deport Italian Jewry to death camps, but resistance from the Italian public and officials stymied their efforts. A gold ransom was extorted to stop the S.S. commanding officer in Rome from killing 200 Jews. Still, nearly 8,000 Italian Jews perished in the Holocaust, but this number was significantly less than in most countries in Europe. Roughly 80 percent of the Italian Jews survived the war. In 2000, a stone plaque was unveiled at the Tiburtina train station, the site of the deportations, to honor the memory of Rome's Jews, whom the Nazis deported from the city on Oct. 16, 1943."

Source: The Virtual Jewish Library
posted by katemonster at 7:14 AM on May 26, 2010 [3 favorites]


On preview, what Halloween Jack said..
posted by Philby at 7:18 AM on May 26, 2010


I would like to see hello kitty Hitler. That would be HAWT
posted by digdan at 8:21 AM on May 26, 2010


GOOGLE CHRIS KATTAN
posted by Sys Rq at 8:29 AM on May 26, 2010


Italy!
posted by grobstein at 8:31 AM on May 26, 2010


You'll find that on the whole they get on very well with contemporary Italians.

... and we Americans get on very well with contemporary Germans. Does that mean they've been "given a pass"?
posted by oneirodynia at 8:34 AM on May 26, 2010 [1 favorite]


It always astounds me that protestors about things like this fail to recognize that it's their reactions that give these memories their negative power. Taking the wind out of these myths in popular culture is exactly what should be happening. The protestors are the ones perpetuating the feelings they purport to oppose.
posted by cmoj at 9:59 AM on May 26, 2010 [1 favorite]


grobstein: You called, Sir?

oneirodynia: Well, yes - that's how I read it. I may be wrong - it has been known to happen. 1946 was the last time, I believe..

Shrugs

cmoj: A-men, brother!
posted by aqsakal at 12:07 PM on May 26, 2010


He did, after all, specify contemporary Italy and Italians.

Yes, I know that's what three blind mice specified. My question was why. It makes even less sense to say that "contemporary" Italians get a "pass" than it does to say that the grandparents of contemporary Italians got a pass 60 years ago, if indeed they did.

For what, exactly, are contemporary Italians getting a pass? And who is granting the pass?
posted by blucevalo at 2:29 PM on May 26, 2010


On Monday, the former partisans, as the Italian resistance fighters were called, demanded the giant posters be torn down.

They wrote to the mayor of Palermo, the regional governor, the state prosecutor and the media to voice their anger.


Huh. I thought Palermo loved pink...
posted by moons in june at 2:29 PM on May 26, 2010


tl;dr, but I looove that pic.

However, isn't this thread self-Godwinized?
posted by theora55 at 3:04 PM on May 26, 2010


Not going into detail on what "given a pass" means (but remembering the cliche in hollywood movies of the evil guy being German or having a german accent), I instinctively know what three blind mice means. Thinking about it, I believe it has to do with the way Hitler and Mussolini were killed. Having the Italians kill their own fascist leader sort of gave them a redemption the germans didn't achieve. But anyway, I'm speaking more out of personal instinct than rational facts.
posted by lucia__is__dada at 3:19 PM on May 26, 2010


your wish is granted: Hello Kitty Hilter
posted by liza at 6:52 PM on May 26, 2010


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