Late last week, City Pages published photographs that showed men dressed in German SS uniforms seated in the main dining room of northeast Minneapolis restaurant Gasthof zur Gemutlichkeit surrounded by Nazi flags. According to a participant, this was a WWII Historical Re-enactment meeting and "just like any club that has a party."
In Germany and several other European states laws prohibit the public use of symbols of Nazism, in particular flags, insignia, and uniforms. The reason: it assaults the human dignity of others by insulting, maliciously smearing, or defaming segments of the population.
While in the US the First Amendment to the Constitution warrants constitutional protection to this type of manifestation -no matter how offensive its content- incidents of public display of racist or extremist symbolism have usually been followed by indignation, outrage and demands for action.
On this occasion, however, the gravity of the case seems to have gone unremarked upon. The protagonists of the dinner were "reenacting," i.e. playing. "Play-acting" can claim the mantle of harmlessness. According to the mentioned participant it is "cool" to dress up like Germans from World War II and go to a German restaurant, eat German food, and drink German beer.
We wonder what exactly the mostly male participants in this Nazi-themed dinner party were re-enacting. A militarized, fundamentally anti-democratic, and ethnically cleansed community? A supremacist fantasy of conviviality stipped of its underlying genocidal violence and passed off as nice and normal? To witness fellow Minnesotans entertain themselves in this fashion and to do so at a restaurant named "Gasthof zur Gemuetlichkeit"--German conviviality inn--is nothing short of obscene.
The Nazi-themed dinner is a grievous insult to the WWII victims and survivors and their families and to American veterans of WWII and their relatives.
It is also offensive to present day Germans and to the way the Federal Republic of Germany has tried to deal with this awful legacy.
The Gasthof episode is symptomatic of a wider phenomenon that should be reflected upon seriously. It seems that Nazism and the Holocaust have entered a stage of extreme trivialization.
As University of Minnesota professors and center directors committed to teaching about the Holocaust and genocides, German culture and history, and Jewish Studies, we resist such trivialization. As Minnesotans we are proud of our state's distinguished record as a haven for political refugees and victims of civil wars. That ethos of sharing and that vision of community are incompatible with what the Gasthof supposed "re-enactors" aim for.
Free speech is a crucial good. But we are also free to choose to react to it. We hope that as a fellow Minnesotan you will join us in distancing yourself from what has been happening for the past six years at the Gasthof.
Prof. Alejandro Baer, director, Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies
Dr. Sabine Engel, director, DAAD Center for German & European Studies
Prof. Rick McCormick, chair, Department of German, Scandinavian and Dutch
Prof. Riv-Ellen Prell, director, Center for Jewish Studies
Read this piece in the Star Tribune.
