Hitler. We all know who he was: the man who wreaked havoc upon the world and systematically lead a mass genocide against many groups of people. What you may not know is that some believe he is now in the Oval Office as we speak. Actually, some believe that he is vacating the Senate and the House of Representatives. This absurd belief goes so far as to suggest that Hitler was also past presidents.
It seems, as Jon Stewarts says, that the American people’s voice is being controlled by the crazy minority. To say Obama, Pelosi or even George W. Bush is like Hitler is a very ignorant way to get one’s political view across, and foremost it is just plain insensitive towards the actual people who had witnessed the destruction of Hitler first-hand.
Comparing politicians to Hitler usually comes in the form of generalized speculation, logical fallacies, and/or just drawing a little black square mustache on the politicians’ faces. Before it was fringe liberals accusing Bush of being like Hitler, but now it is fringe conservatives making Obama out to be Hitler.
Can’t people just disagree with politics and soundly debate the issues without invoking the name of a mass murderer? Apparently not in the world of the crazy and the irrational.
The extreme conservatives and libertarians aren’t the only ones that practice this display of ignorance. We must also remember the years of George W. Bush when extreme liberals got press time for holding up signs of Bush in a Nazi officer’s uniform along with the Hitler mustache. Personally, I didn’t agree with Bush’s policies, but to call him Hitler would be intellectually dishonest and insensitive towards the people who died or suffered through the real Hitler’s actions.
Calling politicians Hitler employs the logical fallacy that if someone shares one hobby or belief with Hitler, that automatically makes that politician share all the evils of Hitler. Now conservatives who accuse President Obama of being like Hitler are saying, “Obama makes well-articulated speeches, and so did Hitler.” This is true, but when you hear the name Hitler do you first think “great speaker?”
When people measure the evil or creepiness, they don’t really factor in his confidence in public speaking. However, they do factor in that his speeches were about exterminating “weaker races.” All the same, if I applied the same logic and said, “Hitler smoked therefore anybody who smokes is like Hitler,” this is a logical fallacy that is intended to mislead people into fearing a political candidate that smokes.
When we regard these polarizing platitudes as viable arguments, we essentially move our voting process in the hands of the ignorant minority. Any idiot can go into Photoshop and make Obama, or George W. Bush with a Hitlerstache, but it takes a rational person to understand and contend issues in an intelligent manor.
So, jump on the bandwagon of sanity and realize that the only politician that deserves to be called Hitler is Hitler.
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