Monday 20 July 2015

The Queen's embarrasmment at old footage of her giving Nazi salute.


The Queen is said to be furious and embarrassed after footage was released recently by the Sun newspaper, showing her delivering a mock  Nazi salute in 1933. Unfortunately, this is what happens when Royalty tries to bury it's past.
The actions of a naive young girl maybe, aged only 5 or 7, who did not know what she was doing, and the full implications of her actions, under the influence of others So it's a case of blaming the adults I guess. In the black and white film footage she his shown with  her mum, the Queen mother, her Uncle Prince Edward and her younger sister Princess Margaret.
Many will say, it is time to move on, and in the hearts and minds of some of her subjects she will always remain as a dignified role model. But Republic which campaigns for a democratic alternative to the monarchy said the palace should stop  dodging responsibility. Others are saying you cannot bury history, because if you try to do this, it has a habit of coming back to haunt you.
In 1933, the fact is, due to Nazism, anti-semitism was on the rise. Hitler was  already known as  the leader of the National Socialist Working Party (the Nazis) had already started rounding up Communists, Socialists and Liberals, purging as many political opponents as possible - giving him one man dictatorial powers. Already talking of the master race, building roads on the outskirts of towns that would carry millions away to their deaths. Already they saw Jews, Roma (Gypsies) and the handicapped as a serous biological threat to the purity of the German (Aryan) race. Jews became the principal target of Nazi hatred. The Nazi salute, was already seen by many as a symbol of fear.
It could be said that the Queen, was hoodwinked, by her uncle Prince Edward, later Edward V111,  it is known he was a sympathiser of Hitler's Nazi regime, he admired Hitler's economic and social reforms as the Nazis swept to power, and wanted  Britain to offer them their hands of friendship. Later after his abdication, he visited Germany with the idea of discussing becoming a figurehead for an international movement for peace on Hitler's terms. And later on in his life his view of Hitler remained undimmed declaring him to be "not a bad chap."
Thankfully Hitler was defeated, but despite all the vestiges of privilege, this story,  will act not just as  a painful reminder of the historical past. It also serves  as a warning, an echoe to our present times, when the dangers of fascism still lurk, and governments with undemocratic mandates, run amok. Lest us forget either the Nazi sympathetic 'tendencies'  at the heart of the British establishment. At the end of the day this information should have been  in the public domain 50 years  ago, what was to hide, just an innocent secret, an honest simple mistake?

No comments:

Post a Comment