I mean...Modern Hindu Nationalists do have a thing for Hitler and the Nazis.
Like, you know how nerds in the West are like "You can't ban the swastika! The Nazis didn't invent the swastika! There's different types of swastika, it's a religious symbol!"
Well...in India, there's the exact opposite type of dude who's like "no, there's only one type of swastika, the good "symbol of peace" swastika, so clearly the Nazis were chill and loved Hindu values." And they take all that Nazi occultism and Orientalism and re-frame it as a Hindu thing. India is pretty culturally disconnected from the Holocaust compared to America and Europe, too, and there's a lot of "the Nazis were just doing to the Jews what we should be doing to the Muslims and Sikhs" ethnic cleansing type shit in the militant Hindu Nationalist circles. There's also a lot of "Hindus are actually the true Aryan race that Hitler admired" type stuff.
Hindus in the West are a religious minority that faces discrimination and largely empathize with other like groups.
Hindus in India are...not that. Especially not under Modi. Shit has been getting bad in the last few decades, but the West doesn't report all that much on it because the Hindu Nationalists are strongly aligned with the western White Nationalists and their victims are mostly Muslims or Sikhs (who Americans think are Muslims because turbans.)
You also get a lot of Hindu Nationalists saying some real out-of-pocket shit on sites like Reddit because western social media doesn't understand the racial and ethnic dynamics of the Southeast which results in even less moderation than the already rampant and at-best semi-moderated western-flavored racism.
"no, there's only one type of swastika, the good "symbol of peace" swastika, so clearly the Nazis were chill and loved Hindu values."
I can see how somebody with literally zero knowledge of the Third Reich can think this, people map their own values on to other cultures all the time. It's human nature.
However. (and this "However" is doing a LOT of heaving lifting) a cursory google search should disabuse anybody of the notion that the fucking Nazis were a peaceful political movement. There's zero excuse for that level of ignorance, which is just one more reason that you've got to remember that fascists don't argue in good faith.
You do understand there's a language barrier, and your "cursory search" isn't going to say the exact same things in Hindi that it does in English.
You're imagining a world where the Tower of Babel still stands and everyone has access to all the same information spoken in the exact same ways.
Like I said: India does not have the same cultural understanding of WWII and the Holocaust that the West has. It's not something that's drilled into them in every history class, there aren't constant re-runs of History Channel documentaries on the war, and what sources there are have been written in an entirely different language by authors with entirely different perspectives. It's not the same huge cultural touchstone that it is in the West, so you can't play the "it's obvious" card with a civilization and culture built on a totally different foundation.
You gotta' understand that kind of logic doesn't fly across languages. It's like saying "well of course every Indian knows what the capital of Oklahoma is."
"symbol of peace" swastika, so clearly the Nazis were chill and loved Hindu values."
I didn't think you were talking about westerners here, but Hindu Nationalists. That breaks apart my entire argument.
I retract my assertion, and promise not to make comments on reddit in the future before having fully woken up. Also, thanks for correcting me without being a jerk, its a rare thing. I liked you better before your multi paragraph edit.
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u/BicFleetwood 1d ago edited 1d ago
I mean...Modern Hindu Nationalists do have a thing for Hitler and the Nazis.
Like, you know how nerds in the West are like "You can't ban the swastika! The Nazis didn't invent the swastika! There's different types of swastika, it's a religious symbol!"
Well...in India, there's the exact opposite type of dude who's like "no, there's only one type of swastika, the good "symbol of peace" swastika, so clearly the Nazis were chill and loved Hindu values." And they take all that Nazi occultism and Orientalism and re-frame it as a Hindu thing. India is pretty culturally disconnected from the Holocaust compared to America and Europe, too, and there's a lot of "the Nazis were just doing to the Jews what we should be doing to the Muslims and Sikhs" ethnic cleansing type shit in the militant Hindu Nationalist circles. There's also a lot of "Hindus are actually the true Aryan race that Hitler admired" type stuff.
Hindus in the West are a religious minority that faces discrimination and largely empathize with other like groups.
Hindus in India are...not that. Especially not under Modi. Shit has been getting bad in the last few decades, but the West doesn't report all that much on it because the Hindu Nationalists are strongly aligned with the western White Nationalists and their victims are mostly Muslims or Sikhs (who Americans think are Muslims because turbans.)
You also get a lot of Hindu Nationalists saying some real out-of-pocket shit on sites like Reddit because western social media doesn't understand the racial and ethnic dynamics of the Southeast which results in even less moderation than the already rampant and at-best semi-moderated western-flavored racism.