The Compassionate Faith of Hitleroonism

[madnak]

This is a hypothetical question drawing on the Christian bashing thread.

Assume, 200 years from now, there is a community of people who are essentially ideal. They all live lives full of love and peace, helping one another and living lives of purity and benevolence. Nobody would ever call these people bad, and everyone who meets them is struck with great affection for them.

The catch is that this group of people follows a religion that heralds Mein Kampf as the word of God and Hitler as the messiah. According to their interpretation of Hitler's work and actions, he was a peaceful man with a loving message. They claim that only through the grace of Hitler's benevolence are they such kind, caring people. They call themselves the Born Again Nazis.

Now, the followers of Hitler are all good people, the accepted interpretation of Hitler's work is 100% peaceful and benevolent, and the social effect of Hitler's work appears to be positive.

Under these conditions, is it rude or unacceptable to criticize Hitler and Mein Kampf? Is it insulting to the good, peaceful Nazis to imply that Hitler is a villain? If so, why? Taraz, I'm looking at you in particular.

(I'm using Hitler here because I assume we can all agree he's a tyrant.)

[CallMeIshmael]

v nice

[einbert]

If you lived in this hypothetical fairy tale, what would you do? Would you devote your energies to dethroning the villainous philosophy that just happens to be accepted by a near-perfect humanity?
You could say that it would be right to do so. But is it worth any effort whatsoever to try to inflict a change on an idealized population? Of course not.

[Friedrich888]

I would not go out of my way to interfere with those people but I would not join them either.

[luckyme]

[ QUOTE ]

You could say that it would be right to do so. But is it worth any effort whatsoever to try to inflict a change on an idealized population? Of course not.

[/ QUOTE ]

I think the question was, 'Is it rude, unacceptable or insulting?'
"Is it worth the effort" is not related to any of those, at least I can't make a connection ... clarify? ( oh, and it was you that added the 'idealized' characterization, if that matters).
I think it is worth the effort just because of the nature of our view of truth. If your spouse is a secret bigamist but your marriage seems wonderful most people would still want to know. Surprisingly, a fair number of them place a high value on not 'living in a lie' even though it's a pleasant enough one. There is an evolutionary advantage to wanting to know the truth it would seems, so we're stuck with it.

I don't see how it can be anything but ok, perhaps even obligatory, nice people don't like lies.

thanks, luckyme

[bunny]

[ QUOTE ]
This is a hypothetical question drawing on the Christian bashing thread.

Assume, 200 years from now, there is a community of people who are essentially ideal. They all live lives full of love and peace, helping one another and living lives of purity and benevolence. Nobody would ever call these people bad, and everyone who meets them is struck with great affection for them.

The catch is that this group of people follows a religion that heralds Mein Kampf as the word of God and Hitler as the messiah. According to their interpretation of Hitler's work and actions, he was a peaceful man with a loving message. They claim that only through the grace of Hitler's benevolence are they such kind, caring people. They call themselves the Born Again Nazis.

Now, the followers of Hitler are all good people, the accepted interpretation of Hitler's work is 100% peaceful and benevolent, and the social effect of Hitler's work appears to be positive.

Under these conditions, is it rude or unacceptable to criticize Hitler and Mein Kampf? Is it insulting to the good, peaceful Nazis to imply that Hitler is a villain? If so, why? Taraz, I'm looking at you in particular.

(I'm using Hitler here because I assume we can all agree he's a tyrant.)

[/ QUOTE ]
I cant see how anyone could make a case that it was rude, insulting or whatever.

What they may claim though is that the current comments directed at religion are not "Hitler was a bad man" type but rather "People who follow Mein Kampf are bad". I think the second would be insulting (and wrong).

[einbert]

My point is that some things are more important than being right.

[Taraz]

I like the hypothetical. I don't think it would be rude to simply criticize Hitler and Mein Kampf. But I think there would be rude and insulting ways of criticizing. A lot of them probably would be insulted if you simply declared Hitler to be an evil guy. In their minds you would be saying that the philosophy they follow is an evil philosophy even though it's not at all. Because that is what most would infer if you just started saying randomly, "Hitler was the antichrist."

I think there would be a better way of educating these people about the past than initially declaring Hitler a villain. You could try to show them that the lifestyle they lead isn't based off of Hitler's teachings before you start attacking Hitler. At the same time I'm not quite sure it would be worth trying to change everyone's mind if it would make no difference in society.

Another two points:

- I'm not necessarily saying that you were trying to be insulting and rude before. But I can assure you that many people would be insulted by the comments you made. It seems like you could phrase your claims more eloquently. Again this relates to whether or not you want the Hitleroons or whoever to listen to you. If you don't care whether they change their minds or embrace truth/reason, then I guess there is no reason to care whether they are insulted or not.

- I hardly think you can equate Hitler and Jesus Christ. Although I think your hypothetical made the argument a lot clearer.

[vhawk01]

[ QUOTE ]
I like the hypothetical. I don't think it would be rude to simply criticize Hitler and Mein Kampf. But I think there would be rude and insulting ways of criticizing. A lot of them probably would be insulted if you simply declared Hitler to be an evil guy. In their minds you would be saying that the philosophy they follow is an evil philosophy even though it's not at all. Because that is what most would infer if you just started saying randomly, "Hitler was the antichrist."

I think there would be a better way of educating these people about the past than initially declaring Hitler a villain. You could try to show them that the lifestyle they lead isn't based off of Hitler's teachings before you start attacking Hitler. At the same time I'm not quite sure it would be worth trying to change everyone's mind if it would make no difference in society.

Another two points:

- I'm not necessarily saying that you were trying to be insulting and rude before. But I can assure you that many people would be insulted by the comments you made. It seems like you could phrase your claims more eloquently. Again this relates to whether or not you want the Hitleroons or whoever to listen to you. If you don't care whether they change their minds or embrace truth/reason, then I guess there is no reason to care whether they are insulted or not.

- I hardly think you can equate Hitler and Jesus Christ. Although I think your hypothetical made the argument a lot clearer.

[/ QUOTE ]

He wasn't equating Hitler and Jesus Christ, he was equating Hitler and God. And you are correct, that is grossly unfair to Hitler.

[Taraz]

[ QUOTE ]

He wasn't equating Hitler and Jesus Christ, he was equating Hitler and God. And you are correct, that is grossly unfair to Hitler.

[/ QUOTE ]

If it's the fundamentalist interpretation of God, I'm ok with it [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img].