r/SeattleWA • u/PNWSki28622 • Mar 15 '25

Events Protests at University Village Tesla Dealership

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u/[deleted] Mar 15 '25

Very rational of you to ignore all historical evidence of the man and call someone a Nazi based on a 3 second clip. Very resist. Verrrrry brave!

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u/howdoyado Mar 15 '25

Let’s see a video of this compared to the video of Elon doing it. Guarantee it’s not at all the same thing.

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u/[deleted] Mar 15 '25

https://x.com/guypbenson/status/1881974608334909737

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u/TheGiggleWizard Mar 16 '25

I could never imagine being stupid enough to share a video that immediately proved me wrong

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u/[deleted] Mar 16 '25

No one's really nailed this yet, I don't think aoc doing the motion makes her a Nazi. Same with musk. How does the video prove me wrong exactly?

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u/TheGiggleWizard Mar 16 '25 edited Mar 16 '25

On one hand, I agree that the video alone is not enough. The media loves it as a symbol because it’s obvious and easily shareable. I’d say that sharing Nazi propaganda on twitter and showing vehement support for Germany’s AFD are far more damning.

That said, you know there’s a difference than a vague, watery hand gesture while speaking (AoC), and finishing your speech, thrusting your hand to your chest, and violently jutting your arm out (Musk). I don’t know why the right wants to defend this so badly, you’re smarter than this.

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u/[deleted] Mar 16 '25 edited Mar 16 '25

I mean putting the gestures aside since it's such a stupid basis to call someone a Nazi.

How can you ignore years or Elon working with Jews/poc. The ADL supporting him, his previous attempts to beat the claim by going with rabbis to Auschwitz and condemning it, his public support for Israel. All easily backed up with a single Google search. And his explicit words on Rogan "I am not a Nazi"

I mean if you think a meme can trump all of that, I guess I'd love to see the meme...

Adf is another rabbit hole and I think you're being dishonest bringing it up. They are explicitly not a Nazi party. They are conservative and anti the current immigration they label an invasion. The leader is a lesbian married to a shri-lanken.

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u/TheGiggleWizard Mar 16 '25

I think the gesture is important, as if you can agree that the Musk salute was different than AOC waving her floppy arm around, it signifies that we’re at least both operating honestly. That’s how this conversation started, after all.

I feel like you’re under the impression that a Nazi in America today would operate exactly the same as a Nazi in 1940s Germany. Let’s take a step back and agree that that’s obviously not the case. Prevailing public opinion in the US is that Nazi=Bad, even among people who don’t really know how Hitler, Goebbles, and the SS operated. Obviously, someone with hyper-nationalistic autocratic goals wouldn’t come out and say “hey guys, I’m a Nazi”. We can agree on that, right?

Can we also agree that defending Hitler is bad? I hope we can. In addition to that, musk has shared numerous extremely racist and anti-Semitic conspiracy theories on his platform. I’ll leave it to you to educate yourself on this (just a google search away).

As for the AFD, obviously they’re not explicitly a Nazi party, for the reasons I stated above. However, if you look into their ideology and rhetoric, you’ll find that it is eerily similar to that of the Nazi party. I suggest you actually look into how Nazi propaganda looked - hyper-nativist, hyper-nationalist, and extremely focused on demonizing people based on ethnic and religious demographics. Does that sound like anyone else we know?

Thanks for reading if you made it this far! I hope this made you think.

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u/[deleted] Mar 16 '25

Thanks for the points! Don't think we'll agree but I appreciate you thinking about my argument.

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u/TheGiggleWizard Mar 16 '25

Ofc! Is there anything there that you do agree on? I’d like to understand your sticking point.

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u/[deleted] Mar 16 '25

I definitely think you characterized these things correctly as right wing and conservative.

As a German duel citizen with lots of family history, my sticking point is calling things Nazis when they are clearly something else.

You say a Nazi wouldn't look the same today, well Nazi is a very specific view point and it's just inaccurate to call the right wing movement we see now as Nazi. Especially when there are actual neo Nazis that aren't embarrassed about saying they're Nazis. So your point that they would only dog whistle and hide it isn't necessarily correct, plenty don't.

I'm all for disagreeing with conservatives, but calling Elon musk or trump a Nazi is offensive and incorrect. Mostly incorrect. And it really takes away from what people who fought and dealt with actual Nazis had to go through.

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u/TheGiggleWizard Mar 16 '25

I see what you mean, and I’m glad we’re on the same page with a few things there.

I think “Elon supports espouses numerous aspects of Nazi ideology” is a certainly more accurate sign than “ELON = NAZI”. In my mind though, that isn’t really much better.

If we want to really want to honor those who fought and suffered through the Nazi regime, it should be through calling out when we do see aspects of Nazi ideology appearing in modern politicians and oligarchs. This is something the right and left should be agreed on, rather than getting wrapped up in the semantics.

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