Why are fascists so cool?

[Bored Of Education]

I don't mean the racism, homphobia, general bigotry, stamping down on free speech and mass executions and whatnot.

Following on from the fact that they always have the cooler buildings, anthems and uniforms (apart from Mosely's Brownshirts obviously. How can you form a master race in autumnal colours?), I have been studying apartheid and the Afrikaaners really had a way with words and catchphrases.

"Oxwagon Sentinel"? How cool is that? They have ruined an excellent band name for future generations. The no-pussy-footing "Does exactly what is says on the tin" nature of "The Purified National Party" is impressive as well

Certainly knocks "Red Wedge" into a cocked hat.

Even the new South African flag is aesthetically awful (if symbolically wonderful)

[Rogin the Armchair fan]

Why are fascists so cool?

Aren't flags meant to be "symbolic", to some degree?

[Guest]

Why are fascists so cool?

Mosley's BUF had black shirts, actually. It was Hitler's mob who did the brown thing. Which isn't cool, whichever way you look at it.

[G-Man]

Why are fascists so cool?

Oxwagon Sentinel might sound cool, but have you looked at their women's fashions. And in its Afrikaans name, it sounds as uncool as something really hot. Ossewa Brandwag. Sounds like a half-named firestation.

[Alderman Barnes]

Why are fascists so cool?

The trouble with you, Spode, is that just because you have succeeded in inducing a handful of half-wits to disfigure the London scene by going about in black shorts, you think you're someone. You hear them shouting 'Heil, Spode!' and you imagine it is the Voice of the People. That is where you make your bloomer. What the Voice of the People is saying is: 'Look at that frightful ass Spode, swanking about in footer bags! Did you ever in your puff see such a frightful perisher?

[The Awesome Berbaslug!!!]

Why are fascists so cool?

It's because they offer cheap certainty. They talk with certainty (even though it is total bollocks) they argue with certainty. everything has a simple answer. They act with certainty. That's all

[The Awesome Berbaslug!!!]

Why are fascists so cool?

which character says that AB

[Alderman Barnes]

Why are fascists so cool?

Bertie Wooster

[Guest]

Why are fascists so cool?

All you have to do is mention 'Eulalie' ...

[DCI Harry Batt]

Why are fascists so cool?

They aren't. I've no idea why people like to wank on about how cool they are, though.

[Amor de Cosmos]

Why are fascists so cool?

I'm afraid they were. And it's extremely important that we understand how and why.

I accept that many people find it impossible to separate anything produced by Nazis and Fascists from their moral implications. That's totally understandable. However the propagandists of Third Reich knew, possibly better than any political group before or since, the power of iconography, regalia, theatre and costume in promulgating their poisonous causes. The fact that, to this day, they still "work," still send shivers down the spine, still resist irony, speaks to their effectiveness. Shutting the stuff away, or denying it's power is absolutely the wrong thing to do, those communication techniques worked once, and unless they are dissected and fully understood they can, and will, be used again. It needs to be done, and so I'm considering proposing a study of Nazi iconography as my dissertation topic, it'll be a tough sell and my lack of German might be enough to nix it, nevertheless I'm going to see if there's any interest out there.

[West End Zuma]

Why are fascists so cool?

I'm considering proposing a study of Nazi iconography as my dissertation topic

I think that's an excellent topic, AdC. These techniques really laid the groundwork for the marketing, advertising, spectacle-making and fashion-setting you see today. The Nazis produced the original template, you might say.

I've been interested in doing something like this myself, only more as a coffee table book/Video/DVD sort of thing. Dissertations are a bit out of my intellectual realm.

You'll probably arouse the half-wits into thinking you're glamorizing the Nazis, but I think this is a "Media Study" worth exploring. Go for it!

[G-Man]

Why are fascists so cool?

The Nazi and fascist iconography initially had to draw from and feed into myriad socio-cultural impulses. Such a thesis would be a massively ambitious task, AdC. Which I'm sure you'd pull off admirably.

[Auntie Beryl]

Why are fascists so cool?

people like to wank on about how cool they are

"You rang, m'lud?"

[Guest]

Why are fascists so cool?

There's a skull on our caps. Are we the baddies?

[Eggchaser]

Why are fascists so cool?

Tiny Bulcher wrote:

Mosley's BUF had black shirts, actually. It was Hitler's mob who did the brown thing. Which isn't cool, whichever way you look at it.

They realised their fashion faux pas and dealt with it in a fairly severe fashion, though.

There's an OTF staple image that needs to be run out now (not Peter Crouch or the balloon fetish guy, either).

[Wyatt Earp]

Why are fascists so cool?

Hmm. Smart uniforms and cool logos, yeah, but I don't understand the claim about anthems and architecture. Have you heard the Horst-Wessel-Lied? It's shit. Compare it to the Internationale, or the USSR anthem, or "Nostra patria e il mondo intero", or Guantanamera, or even, you know "Onward Christian Soldiers"; it's useless.

And those attempts to rebuild ancient Rome in concrete, like that building near the Englischer Garten: they look like public bogs that have been given growth hormone.

[Er Liquidatore]

Why are fascists so cool?

Yeah, I mean some of them dressed quite cool and all, but not everything they did was cool, even when coldly stepping back from the awfulness of their ideology.

Fascists over here dress terribly, by the way.

[ad hoc]

Why are fascists so cool?

And those attempts to rebuild ancient Rome in concrete, like that building near the Englischer Garten: they look like public bogs that have been given growth hormone.

The whole of the EUR is, well architecturally different, I suppose, but not really what I'd term "cool" (any more than a multistorey car park is "cool".)

[garcia]

Why are fascists so cool?

considering he plainly had access to the best fashion advice, hitler was surely one of the worst-dressed dictators ever. boring colours, awful boots, silly baggy pockets, high belt and ill-fitting trousers emphasising generous hips. mussolini looked a lot cooler. contrast the headgear. hitler's choice is drab, uninspiring, timid even. mussolini's is an expression of individuality befitting a man of his imperial standing.

[The Purple Cow]

Why are fascists so cool?

Even Franco was better dressed than Hitler.



Franco was the lamest fascist dictator wasn't he?

"Cooo-eee, over here over here, look at me, I'm playing with Adolf!"

[Eggchaser]

Why are fascists so cool?

Speaking of fascists, is it true the Italians are proposing to separate immigrant children into diferent classes from the Italian kids at school?

[Guest]

Why are fascists so cool?

Surely Goebbels was the lamest fascist?

... I'll get me leather coat.

[Wyatt Earp]

Why are fascists so cool?

The Purple Cow wrote:

Franco was the lamest fascist dictator wasn't he?

The wise men are all dead and Claudius, the fool, has survived.

[Amor de Cosmos]

Why are fascists so cool?

And those attempts to rebuild ancient Rome in concrete, like that building near the Englischer Garten: they look like public bogs that have been given growth hormone.

True, but they had more to do with set-design than architecture really. Films like Birth of a Nation and — especially — Metropolis were as big an influence on Speer as the Coliseum. Without (thank Christ) the appropriate "cast" we don't get that sense today. Triumph of the Will chillingly captures how effective that kind of structure could be when used as intended.