"The Nazis are so horrifying and so scary because they were REAL "

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this is what bothers me most about Nazis, the American brand in particular. After these rallies and protests and such, these people go home, they pay their taxes, they usually send their kids to school...and they live right next door to you. they may subscribe to that ideology but they don't practice it all the time, so where are they in the off hours? During the summer we went to the swimming pool and a guy came in all tattooed with German eagles and Iron Crosses (apparently being smart enought not to emblazon a swastika on himself) and i thought, Neo-Nazis swim? And then I thought, holy shit, I live in the boonies and there's a neo-Nazi here?

And to me that's an aspect of these villains - be it Nazis, Klan, whoever -  that's overlooked in popular culture. Sure these guys are a wrteched hive of scum and villainy, but they live on your street, and buy their cars from the same lot you do. That's what's truly frightening.

Not that this Red Skull doesn't kick major ass, though.

Yeesh, that's a creepy story, JB!

My parents tell of a similar story. A couple from their church invited them to an Oktoberfest celebration at a German restaurant. Everyone was having a good time, until someone pointed out a guy with a close-clipped mustache and combover haircut who was sitting at a nearby table. Turns out he's an attorney for many neo-Nazi groups. Needless to say, it put a damper on everyone's evening.

(Edit to add link)

I'll never understand the Holocaust deniers. It's one thing to think it was a good thing or whatever, but to say that it never happened?

A denier, could, theoretically, just be ignorant or stupid.  One who thinks it was a good thing while acknowledging it happened, is just an evil human being.

...but denying it ever happened is not really any less evil, IMO.

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I agree, Vinny, because I don't think Holocaust deniers are coming from a position of ignorance. It's not like they are denying, say, that Poland was invaded on Sept. 1, 1939 or that Pearl Harbor was bombed on Dec. 7, 1941. The only historical event they seem to be in denial of is the Holocaust.

That, to me, indicates a willful and malicious intent. I think there's something at work here besides the type of crackpottery that leads people to think the moon landing was fake or the government distributed crack in the inner city.

(Personally, I think that Holocaust deniers know that it happened and, in fact, applaud it. But they know they can't come out and say they support mass murder.)