Swastikas, Roman Gear, modern reenactment (cont from market)

[Magnus]

Perhaps, but Japan gets to act like nothing happened and yet, Germany has to CONSTANTLY have it shoved in their faces? I think not.

I don't know about that...Earlier this year the Japanese PM visited one of their nations most notorious war shrines, within were entombed several bonefied war criminals. China was outraged, and for a few months their diplomatic relations had gone down in flames. I think it's like much of Europe; China suffered the most from Japan's aggression in terms of slaughter and occupation, so maybe it's similar for the chinese as it is for europeans?

I think we N. Americans have a very unique perspective on the war, with a few tiny excpetions, our real estate wasn't really harmed. Just our fighting men.

I digress, but I think that there are also a LOT less people doing japanese reenactment than there are German, so these issues don't come up nearly as much. Thus quantitatively, we see the "Germans" having such issues shoved in their faces a lot more in non-German nations than we do with the Japanese. Plus, we're exposed a lot more to European nations in Roman Reenacting (for obvious reasons), than we are with say...China, Manchuria, the Phillipines, etc. etc. It might be a different story if we had 10 - 20 chinese roman reenactors on this forum, we may indeed see more japanese related tom foolery.

Dude, I had some people come up to me once and tell me "You portray the Romans? Why THEY killed out Lord Jesus Christ! How could you" !?! :-0 I don't really do this for others. Not to really edjukate the publick... If I happen to do an event where the public is at, well peachy, but it ain't for them. They think we're whacky. And anyway, it ain't a pugio... Hell, I already have them on my gladius... and yeah, I'm ready for questions...

No doubt! I mean, how many people know it was auxilliaries at the time and not legionaries? Point that I was trying to make is allowing for people's sensitivies to certain subjects to influence your decision when wearing something. I personally would not want to be the one having to explain why I have swastikas on my gear to a WW 2 vet, or worse, someone who's parents or grandparents were in a concentration camp.

I don't reenact to edumacate the public either, but it is one of the results of me doing events, and I'm fully aware of that. That's why I guess for me I try and do things right, keeping in mind people's reaction to what I may be doing. Luckily I haven't been approached with the "You guys killed Jesus" line yet. I'm not sure how many people actually know who did it, though with Mel's latest movie I'm sure a lot more now! 8)

In anycase, I HATE being PC...and I hate it when people are overly sensitive to things. But for something that in my mind is still recent (60 years is still fresh, IMO), I'd rather avoid doing anything to irk anyone who may have some kind of experience with it. I don't care if they are German, Spanish, American, or what.

I think that's part of the issue though, is that WW 2 is still a fairly recent event. It still has repercussions that are being felt even today, so resurrecting anything that has to do with it's negative side is going to raise a few hockles. Why bother? When it comes to insulting or angering people who may have lived through one of modern history's darkest times, I'd rather avoid that at all costs. Who am I to consider otherwise? I'm just some guy who really has no clue what it was like...I've just read some books, talked to a few vets and seen some movies on the subject. :wink:

BTW - Panzer Commander, the Memoirs of Colonel Hans Von Luck is also a GREAT book on WW 2.