Hitler’s Birthday (in Color)

I’ve been eager to get rid of that sickening photo of the hate-filled children at the top of my previous post. So what do I replace it with? A rare recently discovered color photograph of Hitler on his 50th birthday. WHY? Am I trying to repel whatever readers I have left? No, but I just can’t make myself not mention today’s unpleasant anniversary. It’s Adolf Hitler’s 120th birthday. In Jewish culture, because Moses supposedly lived to that advanced age, people often greet each other on their birthdays with the Yiddish expression, biz a hundert und zwanzig, or “may you live to be 120.” I think it’s safe to say there’s not a Jewish person on the planet who isn’t grateful that Hitler didn't quite make it to the halfway mark of that. This photo was taken 70 years ago today, on April 20, 1939. He was the age I am now (gulp!) and was celebrating his big day at his mountain retreat in Berchtesgaden in Bavaria. There aren’t that many color shots of Hitler. He preferred being photographed in black and white, thinking it made him look more imposing. The creepy Children of the Damned in the photo are the offspring of top Nazi officials (but not the doomed Goebbels children). Although he never had any kids of his own (thank God), Hitler frequently surrounded himself with freshly scrubbed Aryan children, and he was endlessly extolling their important role in his 1000 Year Reich.

Der Führer’s birthday always brings out the crazies. There were already reports this weekend of early-bird revelers committing a spate of anti-Semitic vandalism in towns all over Europe. Governments around the world are taking extra measures to try to prevent such incidents today, which is also the 10th anniversary of the Columbine massacre (those boys were also big fans of Hitler). White supremacists are planning all sorts of festivities to mark the occasion this year in places such as Florida, Missouri, and North Carolina. They’re promising “family-friendly” events and are encouraging members to bring their children to honor Hitler as “one of the greatest heroes of the White Race.” As I said in my last post, this is child abuse in the extreme. These poor kids don’t stand a chance, or let’s just say it will be a major challenge for many of them to rise above their horrific hate-filled upbringings.

A few years ago, a former member of the brutal Waffen-SS opened up a shrine to Adolf Hitler in Wisconsin. Later today this guy, now 90, will be speaking at a Chicago gala to “celebrate the Great One’s 120th birthday.” He’ll be joining several other white supremacist speakers including the head of the virulently anti-Semitic Christian Identity movement. These twisted folks consider Jews to be the Satanic offspring of Eve and the Serpent. They believe that all non-whites are “mud peoples” created before Adam and Eve.

Yep, Hitler’s legacy lives on, and it’s important not to forget it even though he’s been dead for over 60 years. It’s just as possible today to whip people up into a frenzy of hate as it was back in the 1930s and 40s. Here are some additional color images of people going nuts over Hitler’s birthday, this one from his 55th birthday extravaganza in 1944. The adoring crowds are in Linz, Austria, seemingly unaware of their imminent fate or their leader’s cowardly suicide which would take place the following year. If you really want to be sick to your stomach, go to any of the old footage of the Nazis that is available on YouTube and read some of the fawning comments about Hitler and National Socialism. Comments written by people today.

Tomorrow is Yom Hashoah, or Holocaust Remembrance Day. Because of a quirk in the Hebrew calendar, this is the closest it's ever come to Hitler's birthday. Which is not totally inappropriate. Maybe we can mark the two days by thinking of small actions we can take to counteract all of the hate in our world.

Comments

[Wendi Goodman]

How ironic that today also marks the 16th anniversary of the day we found out that my mother had a malignant brain tumor. Thirteen months later, we lost her.

[Danny]

Just a bad day all around, Wendi. Maybe we should join the counterculture folks who celebrate a different holiday on April 20th every year by openly smoking pot at 4:20 pm.

[Arlene Silverman Andresen]

This date brings back alot of sad memories for alot of people that I know...don't like this date to much either. Danny, I'm with you....let's light up at 4:20! LOL!!!

[churlita]

I can't even check out any of the links it makes me so sick. Maybe if some of those A-holes would smoke some weed today instead, they'd mellow out and shut-up.

[Pooba~]

You are so wildly weird... just found you and have enjoyed all I've been able to read...

AND think of it - if we didn't have someone so horrible... we wouldn't appreciate the wonders of others????

[Ellen B.]

Very powerful post today, Danny.

We must never forget.

[Gordon]

I've read a lot about Hitler and the Nazis. I find it fascinating. It's so incredible, that it might as well be science fiction. Yet, you know that it really happened. And, to think that there are still plenty of people today who espouse such hatred and nonsense, and actually celebrate Hitler's birthday. What a waste...

[La Framéricaine]

Danny,

I'm truly sorry about the hatemongers and knee-jerk anti-Semites. They give non-Jewish people a really bad name. I was raised in Oklahoma until I was 15, but in an areligious family, so it took me until I was about 12 or 13 to learn about the Holocaust from books, although I learned from films much earlier. I actually never do forget.

Amitiés,

[brian bankston]

Man, that image is so surreal. The colors are so full of irony. Ominous......

[open palm]

thanks for bringing this out and airing it out. otherwise it just molds in our underminds somewhere.

the older i get, the more amazed i am at how people don't see the world at all at all at all the same.

i'm grateful to not have been one of the kids on the stairs in this photo.

i'm grateful to not have supremecists in my daily life.

it would be terrifying to know that all these people exist, except that part of me refuses grok it all. Dali-esque that such people exist and have existed and will exist...If i completely took in this reality, what would i do? would i be able to get out from under the bed?

it's important to remember. to imagine. to ponder.

thanks

[Pegs]

Just finished commenting on our mutual grandmothers' birthdate (4/5/10) & now here to mention my other Gramma's birthdate. Yup - 4/20/85 (we think, she lied about her age when she married my father's father). Yes, that's 1885. She died in 1965. Very, very unhappy about sharing that birthdate with evil incarnate.

But because of her, I observe the day & light a candle for her. As I do, I hope Adolph is feeling the flames.