I didn't know the current Pope was an ex-Nazi

[Postman]

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2089-1572667_1,00.html

[in_cog_ni_to]

1. Yes, he was. The BFEE also have a Nazi background. n/t

[Postman]

2. I'm casually familiar with Prescott Bush's fascist connections...

eom

[otherlander]

3. It wasn't the actual Nazi army, it was

Hitler Youth. And it was basically join-or-die. He never actually killed anyone, and it does say that he deserted.

[Asgaya Dihi]

4. He's not really

I'm not a fan of the guy, dislike him for a few other reasons myself, but he wasn't a Nazi. He was a Hitler Youth. At the time about any kid of that age and the right race would have been, the allies were nearing and the war wasn't going well so they had no problems putting guns in the hands of kids.

As far as I've read he wasn't a volunteer, enthusiastic, or around any longer than he had to be. If it affected him or not I've no idea, might have in some way but he didn't seem to be there by choice to start with at least. Lots of other good reasons to have a problem with him without that one.

[Cleita]

5. He was Hitler's youth, an organization sort of like the

Boy Scouts with guns, but formed with the intention of indoctrinating the young into Nazi philosophy, and to spy on their parents. Towards the end of the war when Hitler had killed most of the able bodied men with his wars and fatal expedition into Russia, the Youth were conscripted into the army. G. I.'s were finding that the German soldier they just killed looked like he was fourteen years old.

Like the other DUer said you had to belong if you didn't want your family singled out as hostile to the Reich.

[Hoping4Change]

16. Pope joined Hitler Youth in 1941.

"After 1936, the Hitler Youth was a compulsory organization, mandatory for all young German men."

Wikipedia

[Joe Chi Minh]

6. This amounts to disinformation, however well-intended.

Below is a paragraph from the Wikipedia site: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benedict_XVI

"Following his fourteenth birthday in 1941, Ratzinger joined the Hitler Youth as membership was legally required after December 1936.<3> According to one of Ratzinger's biographers, the National Catholic Reporter correspondent John Allen, he was an unenthusiastic member who refused to attend meetings. His father was a bitter enemy of Nazism, because he believed it was in conflict with their faith. In 1941 one of Ratzinger's cousins with Down's Syndrome was murdered by the Nazi regime. In 1943, when he was 16, Ratzinger was drafted with many of his classmates into the Luftwaffenhelfer programme. After his class was released from the Corps in September 1944, Ratzinger was put to work setting up anti-tank defences in the Hungarian border area of Austria in preparation for the expected Red Army offensive. He was eventually drafted into the German army at Munich to receive basic infantry training in the nearby town of Traunstein. His unit served at various posts around the city and was never sent to the front. Ratzinger was briefly interned in an Allied prisoner-of-war camp near Ulm and was repatriated on June 19, 1945. The family was reunited when his brother, Georg, returned after being repatriated from a prisoner-of-war camp in Italy."

Another interesting article:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,13509-2189410,00.html

[Sarah Ibarruri]

7. It was compulsory to join

"He joined the Hitler Youth aged 14, shortly after membership was made compulsory in 1941. "

I'm not defending this Pope. I hate his conservative ideology. However, if something is compulsory, and one is 14, one does what one is told. He was not an adult that he could analyze the evils of Naziism and join the resistance by himself. 14 is young.

At 14 I was sure I was going to marry the lead singer of a famous rock band. I would've bet my yearly allowance on it.

Still, I can't stand Ratzinger's ideas at all. However, I'm surprised he hasn't proved to be more right wing in his doings so far.

[Rufus T. Firefly]

12. Well, the Nazis were understanding people.

They would have left him and his family alone if he refused to join. :sarcasm:

[PassingFair]

14. WUWJHJ?

What Unit Would Jesus Have Joined?

It seems to the that the bar would have been set
a TEENSY bit higher when considering the choice
of the living Representative of GAWD ON EARTH.


...but that's just ME....

[Warpy]

8. Remember, he was a KID at the time

and you had to join up if you wanted you and your family to survive.

It was like that.

Nobody knows if it was a willing association or not.

[Greeby]

9. At least hes showing more respect visiting Auschwitz than Cheney did

[LibDemAlways]

10. Thanks for reposting that.

Stupid ass beanie, boots, ski parka - his entire demeanor shouts, "I'm trying to be as disprespectful as possible to show I'm pissed to be here." Arrogant POS SOB.

[Sinti]

20. "Staff 2001" embroidered on his beanie, what the hell was he thinking?

I'm sure it's not some sick inside joke - but I can't help but wonder.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A43247-2005Jan27.html

[otherlander]

24. Photoshopped? I'd like to think so, but....

NOPE!!! Grrr.....

[Coventina]

11. As others have previously posted, there are plenty of reasons to dislike

the "Rat".

But this isn't one of them. How many of us could say with any certainty what we would have done at the age of 14, given the circumstances?

[Lefty48197]

13. Are you purposefully trying to mislead other people?

Or did you just allow yourself to be misled?

[TallahasseeGrannie]

15. I think that is a smear

that won't go away. He is called a Nazi because he is German. Period.

Nazi youth was not something you got out of. He was basically just a kid.

[MrBenchley]

17. This sums up Pope Ratz in a nutshell:

When it comes to laws enforcing tolerance for gays, he says Catholics are honor bound to commit civil disobedience because moral relevance is evil...but when it came to joining the Hitler youth, he went along to get along, and that was okey-dokey.

[ruggerson]

18. But he was 14!

He didn't know what he was doing! He didn't know what he was doing a few years later when he joined the army! He was not able to think for himself! You condemn him withhout understanding that young adults can't make moral decisions!

:sarcasm:

[MrBenchley]

22. Besides, he only joined the Nazis to get the Hitler discount

for seminary school....(snicker)

[ruggerson]

19. I think it's disgusting that this bigot goes to Auschwitz

Putting aside his Hitler youth background and his Nazi army background, as an ADULT, as a Cardinal and now as Pope, he is perpetuating policies which destroy lives and render people inhuman.

For him to continue the terrorist anti-gay policies of the hierarchy of the Catholic church and to go to Auschwitz where tens of thousands of gays and lesbians lost their lives to Nazi genocide, is tantamount to spitting on the graves of the victims of the Holocaust.

He is an evil man pursing evil policies and he has no moral foundation whatsoever to step on the graves of murdered gays and lesbians to try and score public relations points for his evil agenda.

[Igel]

21. And one of the members of my

dissertation committee is an ex-Communist, having been rehabilitated after being fired from his job because he sympathized with the 'wrong kind' of literature at the wrong time--who knew? Then again, his grandfather's life was pretty much ruined by the Soviet machine (those that innovated the term 'politically correct'), but not his talent. His father's life and talent was ruined by the Soviet soul-destroying machine. This guy managed to find a way to be a genius and a scholar and not be destroyed, just maimed. Think one thing, say another, and do a third: in academia, he could be consistent, in politics, he learned to think nothing, say what needed, and do as little as possible.

Such is life in an authoritarian police-state of a society. It provides perspective on hyperbole about US society, and humility about some challenges we face.

If you're in Slavic, you're pretty much sure to have to deal with lots of ex-Communists. The key is, in my view, to distinguish between Communists that were simply CPSU members and communists that were ideological true believers and unstinting supporters of the regime.

[Vidar]

23. Ex?