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IG_urban wrote:the OP did not have anything to do with comparing the two in their lives, it has to do with comparing the ways humanity may remember them in the coming century....

Which will be intrinsically linked to what they did during their lives. Seriously, did you just post what you just posted..?

yes I did, a man's life and a man's legacy are two very different things...one begets the other, but they are not one and the same.

IG_urban wrote:yes I did, a man's life and a man's legacy are two very different things...one begets the other, but they are not one and the same.

Yes, they are two different things in the way that a banana and a banana peel are two different things.

Well, then maybe we should be talking about if Lady Gaga will be as revered as Ghengis khan.

Hitler was a failure. the only thing he came close to accomplishing was jewish genocide in central europe. That's all.

ShumaGorath wrote:

IG_urban wrote:yes I did, a man's life and a man's legacy are two very different things...one begets the other, but they are not one and the same.

Yes, they are two different things in the way that a banana and a banana peel are two different things.

HA! Little do you know...

once again Shuma and others stating that their opinion is the opinion of the world, one more reason to go back to reddit.

what's it like having ultimate cosmic powers?

IG_urban wrote:once again Shuma and others stating that their opinion is the opinion of the world, one more reason to go back to reddit.

what's it like having ultimate cosmic powers?

Its not a matter of opinion to suggest that Hitler and Genghis Khan were nothing alike, because they simply weren't. Genghis Khan was a successful conqueror who, while brutal in his methods, instituted a number of relatively progressive social policies within his empire; including things like equality before the law, and the abolition of slavery. Adolf Hitler was a would be conqueror and architect of genocide whose reign lasted only 12 years, and failed to spawn any powerful successor states.

The only person that would consider the two comparable is one that knew nothing of either man's life.

what about the amount of time that has passed since Ghengis was around compared to Hitler?

I think that has a large part in how regard them both? Doesn't it?

Polonius wrote:Well, then maybe we should be talking about if Lady Gaga will be as revered as Ghengis khan.

Hitler was a failure. the only thing he came close to accomplishing was jewish genocide in central europe. That's all.

Bingo!

Hitler was rubbish.
He was a gakk painter. His 1000 year Reich lasted but 12 years. He had a really naff comedy moustache.
Ghengis Khan didn't have stupid facial hair. Look If you are gonna have a tash grow a good un. Look at our very own Matty's upper lip caterpillar. That's what I'm talking about, a REAL moustache.
The only thing that Hitler wins hands down on is that he has appeared in far more, and much funnier Youtube skits.

IG_urban wrote:what about the amount of time that has passed since Ghengis was around compared to Hitler?

I think that has a large part in how regard them both? Doesn't it?

Of course it does. The brief time is the only reason we remember hitler. I think it far more likely that Hitler joins the list of wannabes that are barely remembered outside of dedicated histories, and if he is, it'll mostly be for the Holocaust. Look at a map of Europer in 1939 and now... not a huge difference.

ok, I totally see your point, and I agree with you to a point...

What about Nero? In comparison with Hitler, one could make paralels (remember I am going from a semi educated opinion on Nero here, I don't know too much about him), but we still remember him. Do you think that Hitler will be completely forgotten? Remembered as more of a cautionary tale? Or something different...

..I have a hard time imagining him being completely forgotten.

We'll remember him, of course. We remember Boudica and Tamerlane and even the guy who burned down the temple just so he'd be remembered forever.

I doubt opinion on Hitler will shift positively, in fact I think his early successes will be forgotten (or ascribed to luck) while his failures and crimes will be remembered.

Time creates distance, future generations don’t hold as much animosity for the tyrants of their ancestor’s time. History has no shortage of murderous loons, but when we read about them we read about them in the context of a whole other world – the alien nature of the society makes us less able to relate, so the same emotional effect isn’t there.

Pirates are frequently shown in modern media as fun and goofy characters with eyepatches and parrots on their shoulders. They’re even shown as sympathetic underdogs. This kind of works because when we think of pirates we think of the age of sail and all that exotic wonder, and kind of miss the point that tirates were murderous brigands who preyed on merchant ships. When we’re brought back to that reality, such as when we talk about the pirates operating today off of the coast of Somalia, we see the pirates for exactly what they really are.

Society will advance and progress and our society will become quite alien to them. Kids in the future will put their skull jacks into the global network to learn history, and they will read about these ‘nations’ led by ‘politicians’ who lived on the surface of the Earth, who actually moved about by themselves without the help of robot butlers. In that context who started the war and who committed what atrocity to whom will be unlikely to have the same emotional resonance it has to us.

Typeline wrote:Europe and Germany rebuilt.
Cold War did wonders for us.

Last time I turned on the history channel and watched something about Hitler, I felt like the program was singing him praises for the invention of the autobahn. America responded to it by building our super highway system. That large public works project reinvigorated our nation. The Nazi's also brought everyone up to speed on how to fight a modern war. The biggest strives in nuclear energy came out of WW2. We owe Hitler something, he gave us the enemy we needed an enemy we haven't had in a long time.

Okay, that’s some grade A wackiness right there. Thirty million are dead but think of the road network he indirectly encouraged us to build!

Phryxis wrote:A while back, I read an article about a restaurant that wanted to open in India, which was Nazi themed. The claim was that they just thought it was cool visually (which it is), and they didn't really realize it was a bad deal. Perhaps that's a fabrication on their part, and they were trying to be edgy and missed the calculation, but I think on some level they probably just don't really know how the West views Hitler.

Mein Kampf is a constant seller in India, and Hitler is viewed among a significant portion of the Indian youth in a very different context. They aren’t neo-Nazis, they’re just don’t emphasise Hitler’s genocide, instead they focus on his aggression and nationalism. He’s seen as edgy and a go-getter. Seriously.

He may be remembered, as you say, Nero still is.
However the OP questioned if Hitler would be revered in the same way as Ghengis.

Not sure that the latter is revered either, but that may be due to my limited knowledge of how he is widely perceived.

Of course there is the possibility of cult status and hero worship of Hitler by neo nasties, but not sure if the OP is refering to popularly held opinion.

My initial reaction upon reading the OP, all British Empire referances aside:

Hitler lived in a different age. Ghenghis lived back when every culture made war on its borders against its neighbors and just happened to be damn good at conquering before being conquered first. They did not have communication or transportation or industrial ability like the western world did during Hitler's war.

The difference is that Hitler had an awful lot more information available to him, and international diplomacy, rather than just a notion of 'kill your neighbor'. Ghenghis was operating in the dark, Hitler knew exactly what was going on all around the world when he decided to go forth and conquer and kill. I think that is a huge difference. Sure if Hitler lived under a rock or something before he went rampaging around with his insane ideas, he might be forgiven the downside of being a conquering fascist prick. But he had radio, telegraph, phones. He had international relations that went beyond just negotiating with the next villiage over.

feth Hitler. Ghenghis was not a nice guy, but he wasn't a complete obsessive lunatic either, just a guy playing the game of the time, while Hitler was playing against all the progress and diplomacy that was developing in his time. No comparison. I would party with Ghenghis if invited, and meanwhile tell him he was being a jerk... and we would have some wine and laugh about it. I would kill Hitler as an infant in a crib given the chance and a time machine...

so... um... no comparison. There's lots of conquerors. All are donkey caves. Hitler should have known better though given the times he lived in and the wealth of knowledge and communication at his disposal. Ghenghis lived in a yurt and just conquered because that was all everyone around him was doing anyway, just did it better.

The Khans were ALOT more successful then Hitler.

Just throwing that out there. No I think Hitler will be hated even in the future, since it's easy to say in Genghis's time people fought over everything.

He also came from a people that thought fermented yaks milk was a good thing. So this just shows the difference of the time.

Hitler was a modern man doing things people did in the dark ages, it's also much easier to hate him.

I find it interesting though it's just Hitler's allies that get slack, the Japanese or the Italians.

The Japanese get slack because you can blame it all on Shinto (aka Japan is the center of the universe and Emprah is all powerful... sounds familiar) So they have religious dogma to blame... plus they are all completely nutty anyways if samurai movies are to be believed... Italians get slack because they changed sides once they realized that they were losing, plus they make better food than Germany.

People don't remember the bad things Japan and Italy did off the top of their heads. That's why no one compares presidents to Tojo.

Guitardian wrote:The Japanese get slack because you can blame it all on Shinto (aka Japan is the center of the universe and Emprah is all powerful... sounds familiar) So they have religious dogma to blame... plus they are all completely nutty anyways if samurai movies are to be believed... Italians get slack because they changed sides once they realized that they were losing, plus they make better food than Germany.

The Japanese don't really get less slack.

The Italians get less criticism because they simply weren't as bad.

BUt comparing pre-world war japanese to post war japanese is kind of like comparing old beatles to new beatles after the drug binge... one is bad, and one is kind of good but just crazy.

Frazzled wrote:

Typeline wrote:We have Hitler to thank for many modern advances and America's place as a world power. Without Hitler we would not be where we are today. That being said, I do believe people in the future (if they exist) will see him as a figure with a lot of duality, both a murderer but someone who strived to push the world forward.

Take a moment and think of Hitler. Now remove from your mind the fact that he killed so many people simply because they were Jewish. You'll come to see he did a lot of good for the world.

Please please tell me you're being saracastic or, or something?

Germany utterly destroyed.
Europe in ruins.
The Soviets hyper paranoid with armies to central Europe to keep it from happening again.
Cold War.

Ok the VW Bug did come along. That was a cool car.

It's interesting that you bring up the Bug, since it was the car the hippies lauded in the 60's while they called this country facist. I remember half my sister's friends back then driving bugs or vans, not realizing who initially had them created using slave labor.
Holocaust deniers seem to be springing up like weeds these days and I'm afraid that as time goes on, the OP will be proven to have a good point.
Look at Napoleon for one example among many that could be used. We aren't really far in history from when he turned Europe into a Hell, yet I have seen countless movies that make him a great hero and liberator.

Guitardian wrote:BUt comparing pre-world war japanese to post war japanese is kind of like comparing old beatles to new beatles after the drug binge... one is bad, and one is kind of good but just crazy.

What? Umm, why is it Hitler and 'the Japanese'? One is a person, the other is a nationality.

Hippies were for the most part just kids being trendy. Sure they're mostly well intentioned but it was a lot more about music, and the fashion of being rebellious. I know many folks like that now who own stocks and wear nice shoes. It was just to get laid, they didn't have the balls to actually do anything except yell and smoke pot because everyone else was doing it. Hippies with their stupid Bugs sold out like everyone else in their generation. Sorry but I see my parents and their lives and I can't help but see it any other way. My GFs parents didn't live in campsites either, just liked the music and put flowers in their hair... its a bit of a stretch to modern day disenfranchised angry government-hating youth culture... yay we get a VW camper with a daisy painted on the front! we're free! lets listen to the doors and have an orgy... the baby boomers are such hippocrites when now they overcharge us for rent on stuff they own because of their inheritance from some WWII or sleeper gen 50s parents who left them money back when you could buy anything, then send their 'values' out the window the moment they want a new ride on lawn mower or whatever. The hippie generation FAILED and the bug is a great symbol of that. Oh yeah... and folk music kinda sucks and all sounds the same anyways. Those BUG riders are all working bank jobs, owning businesses, etc and gak nowadays


Automatically Appended Next Post:

sebster wrote:

Guitardian wrote:BUt comparing pre-world war japanese to post war japanese is kind of like comparing old beatles to new beatles after the drug binge... one is bad, and one is kind of good but just crazy.

What? Umm, why is it Hitler and 'the Japanese'? One is a person, the other is a nationality.

Emperor worship. The person IS the nationality.

Khan's greatest accomplishment was making a cohesive fighting force and empire out of traditionally nomadic people. Hitler was a success in unifying a traditionally fractured Germany. Yes, they were a country, but many elements in the country (like the myriad of political parties) led to little progress being made and lots of partisan issues.

Khan is widely regarded now, however I see his accomplishments as somewhat cheapened by the fact that almost every state he conquered was small and isolated, but he was indeed a good conquerer.

Hitler's biggest folly was believing his own hype. After some relatively easy victories from 1939 to early 1941, his ideas just got too ambitious, too quickly.

As for the dismissal of Hitler as a crackpot, his ideas about social policy were (barring genocide) pretty widespread at the time.

As per the original question, Hitler will be remembered in a negative light. Khan should be as well.

I agree that a Napolean comparison would have been more appropriate. Was about to post such.

As to how Hitler will be seen in the future? Don't know. Whatever happens, I hope that people study closely, the exact methods of how the Tyrant powers of the 20th century came to power.

What I mean by this is that most modern nations military industrial complexes could probably be tied as to being patterned off of how Nazi Germay organized theirs. Now whether such will be admitted to will depend upon how long the current trend of PC "new speak" censors the conveyance of accurate information. What I mean by this is that discussing how the man came to power shoulf not be a taboo subject.

Education that focuses upon accuracy without the taint of PC censoring will help defend future generations against the mistakes of our ancestors.

I will repeat... Khan was just better at it than everyonne else who was doing it at the time, a sign of assholiness and also of competence. Kahn was a warrior. Hitler was a politician. And as a military dictator he kind of sucked and made, as the above poster stated, a lot of premature decisions and the rest of the world had to deal with him at great consequence to everyone. Khan was just rampaging because everyone around him was. Anyone who tries to defend Adolf as 'not as bad a guy as he is made out to be' can have words with me in PM, rather than here on the forum. That feth KNEW what he was doing, the kahn was just following tradition. They all suck, all of these conquerors... napoleon, alexander, caesar, jackson, G.Dubyah, they are all asses... but none can be compared to the next, nor held to the same moral standard given their time frames are so drastically different and the fact that communication is so much improved for our recent times, where we judge people's actions based on what we know in a new quickly increasing high tech world. hitler was the first who had the information and acted like an donkey-cave anyways.

They all suck, all of these conquerors... napoleon, alexander, caesar, jackson, G.Dubyah, they are all asses...

/end thread

We can not answer this question, ask us again in 500 years

Turns out they've already joined forces!

If it were not for all of the Nazi scientists that the US and the Soviet Union took in during the end of WWII, our space program would not have happened. However, our CIA was also structured after the SS.

In India, Hitler is revered by many people, but they don't really know more than a few superficial bits of trivia about him.

Also, Vlad Dracula is still revered by the people of Romania, because he liberated his country. Never mind that he did it by impaling people on long poles and sitting there, eating lunch while they screamed.

It's all a matter of perspective. And anyway, just think, if the German generals would have been successful in assassinating Hitler and running the war themselves, they probably would have won.