David Bowie a nazi ?

[story]

As I understand it, Bowie's MO about anything that he found interesting was to push and explore until he found the outer edges of it, and then grope along the boundaries til he felt that he had a proper and thorough understanding of it. He wanted to know things, all things, subjectively rather than objectively. He explored his own madness, and the social malaise around him, in the same manner. He seems to have become more measured in the 80s and thereafter, but during the 70s, he just kept pushing and probing. If that sometimes took him into deep dark murky waters, well, yes.

To judge and condemn him on one of the many things he explored and examined seems a bit reductive here. Plenty of people felt/feel that his exploration of gender and sexuality was similarly wrong.

I'm not supporting his interest in fascism. And for me, his interest in it was far more complex and intelligent than Souxsie and Sid wearing swastikas. Certainly, he made me think about fascism and its outward trappings in ways I'd not really considered before (e.g. how integral and necessary that was/is for it to exist)

I felt challenged by it at the time, because it was at odds with what I believed and wanted to believe about him, and it felt as if he was challenging me to follow him against my principles: "You wanna godman? Try this on for size then…" In a sense, it was like a slap in the face, forcing me to think for myself rather than be a slave to a leader.

 

[pocketscience]

As I said, the video, which is what I was referring to as maybe making sense as a parody in the 80s, was in 83...though if its recorded in 76 that puts it right in the possible fascist years, and recorded in Germany no less - so the swastika and blue eye lyrics, recorded in Berlin and Munich ... whatever the meaning and intention, its clearly on his mind

tbf It's hard to be in Berlin and not have fascism cross your mind. I dare anyone to stand in front of the old Reichluftfahrtsministerium building in the middle of the city and not have visions of swastikas overlaying it.

 

[story]

Being/acting like a messianic figurehead must have necessarily led him to consider the whole leadership thing, and any sensible consideration of that must include attention to tyranny and fascistic tendencies.

 

[ska invita]

a lot of people have thought shit things and then come to their senses though.
ricky tomlinson was once in the NF

of course and not saying otherwise

 

[pocketscience]

As I understand it, Bowie's MO about anything that he found interesting was to push and explore until he found the outer edges of it, and then grope along the boundaries til he felt that he had a proper and thorough understanding of it. He wanted to know things, all things, subjectively rather than objectively. He explored his own madness, and the social malaise around him, in the same manner. He seems to have become more measured in the 80s and thereafter, but during the 70s, he just kept pushing and probing. If that sometimes took him into deep dark murky waters, well, yes.

To judge and condemn him on one of the many things he explored and examined seems a bit reductive here. Plenty of people felt/feel that his exploration of gender and sexuality was similarly wrong.

I'm not supporting his interest in fascism. And for me, his interest in it was far more complex and intelligent than Souxsie and Sid wearing swastikas. Certainly, he made me think about fascism and its outward trappings in ways I'd not really considered before (e.g. how integral and necessary that was/is for it to exist)

I felt challenged by it at the time, because it was at odds with what I believed and wanted to believe about him, and it felt as if he was challenging me to follow him against my principles: "You wanna godman? Try this on for size then…" In a sense, it was like a slap in the face, forcing me to think for myself rather than be a slave to a leader.

Perfectly put

 

[story]

I've not been able to find the tape of it, but the transcript is interesting: a discussion between Burroughs and Jimmy Page about the crowd, the group mind and how to manipulate it, control it. That conversation cannot have happened in isolation. I have no doubt that Bowie was at least thinking about similar themes if not actively discussing them with his confidants. Those rockgods (and Ziggy in particular) were inventing something, describing the parameters of something that has become a mainstay of our (pop) culture. To have done so without looking at the fascistic nature of it would have been ridiculous; and given that things suppressed emerge by their own volition anyway, potentially dangerous.

 

[butchersapron]

The idea that someone whose knowledge of fascism and nazism at the time consisted of repeated readings of the trash/pulp Occult Reich and who seriously thought that his actions "brought to the fore, for the first time, that the national front are a fascist party and that until then the NF were nice and polite" was thinking seriously about fascism in any sense at all beyond the shallow and and sensationalistic is preposterous.

 

[goldenecitrone]

tbf It's hard to be in Berlin and not have fascism cross your mind. I dare anyone to stand in front of the old Reichluftfahrtsministerium building in the middle of the city and not have visions of swastikas overlaying it.

Exactly. An English boy, born in 1947, spending time in Berlin and Munich would certainly be thinking about the history of those places.

 

[ska invita]

Exactly. An English boy, born in 1947, spending time in Berlin and Munich would certainly be thinking about the history of those places.

yeah but a lot of this stuff happened before he went to Germany. The fact he went to Germany to escape the UK (according to the Rolling Stone peice) is a loaded choice.

 

[ska invita]

As I understand it, Bowie's MO about anything that he found interesting was to push and explore until he found the outer edges of it, and then grope along the boundaries til he felt that he had a proper and thorough understanding of it. He wanted to know things, all things, subjectively rather than objectively. He explored his own madness, and the social malaise around him, in the same manner. He seems to have become more measured in the 80s and thereafter, but during the 70s, he just kept pushing and probing. If that sometimes took him into deep dark murky waters, well, yes.

To judge and condemn him on one of the many things he explored and examined seems a bit reductive here. Plenty of people felt/feel that his exploration of gender and sexuality was similarly wrong.

I'm not supporting his interest in fascism. And for me, his interest in it was far more complex and intelligent than Souxsie and Sid wearing swastikas. Certainly, he made me think about fascism and its outward trappings in ways I'd not really considered before (e.g. how integral and necessary that was/is for it to exist)

I felt challenged by it at the time, because it was at odds with what I believed and wanted to believe about him, and it felt as if he was challenging me to follow him against my principles: "You wanna godman? Try this on for size then…" In a sense, it was like a slap in the face, forcing me to think for myself rather than be a slave to a leader.

I hear where you are coming from... he definitely had a provocateur instinct

 

[goldenecitrone]

yeah but a lot of this stuff happened before he went to Germany. The fact he went to Germany to escape the UK (according to the Rolling Stone peice) is a loaded choice.

Why? Berlin was a cool city back in the 70s and has a history of English artists going to live there.

 

[ska invita]

Why? Berlin was a cool city back in the 70s and has a history of English artists going to live there.

why? because of the other things he said and did before he went there!

i havent got the total timeline sorted out but it was around this time he got caught on the border with nazi memorabilia.

I think its wrong to just paint it as a bit of tourism curiosity

 

[eoin_k]

A profoundly intellectual subjective enquiry into the nature of power or an embarrassing coke binge combined with some half baked ideas that need not be dwelt upon in too much detail: this thread needs a poll.

 

[pocketscience]

A profoundly intellectual subjective enquiry into the nature of power or an embarrassing coke binge combined with some half baked ideas that need not be dwelt upon in too much detail: this thread needs a poll.

Or he had designs to be the second coming of the Fuhrer, take over the world from his Berlin bunker and force us all to wear sequined spandex onesies .

 

[goldenecitrone]

why? because of the other things he said and did before he went there!

i havent got the total timeline sorted out but it was around this time he got caught on the border with nazi memorabilia.

He was probably going to sell it to Lemmy.

 

[story]

A profoundly intellectual subjective enquiry into the nature of power or an embarrassing coke binge combined with some half baked ideas that need not be dwelt upon in too much detail: this thread needs a poll.

I don't think it was intellectual. I think it was instinctive, and without much thought being given - at the time - to impact or outcome. I think it was driven by curiosity and his own experience of knowing how to explore his own interests.

 

[albionism]

I'm surprised you can't see the parody. Combining Nazi aesthetic whilst dressed thus:

Seriously? Does he look like your average Hitler worshiper?

Sid vicious also did it, albeit not quite as subtle:

70's

Love the Bjorn Borg wristband Sid is wearing!

 

[William of Walworth]

As I understand it, Bowie's MO about anything that he found interesting was to push and explore until he found the outer edges of it

That's what I used to blame Bowie's 70s fascism-praising crap on -- his ridiculous levels of coke consumption at the time. And he was insanely into coke, definitely.

But as people said in this thread, to put the fascism just down just to that is an embarassingly incomplete and over-simplistic take on all this. Just to 'blame' (or even 'excuse' ? ) it on coke, that is.

Thanks especially for your excellent posts, story

I was relistening to 'China Girl' today (i've been listening to lots of Bowie stuff again since Monday) and I'm glad I've read peoples' take on the lyrics here now, because listening to them freaked me -- if I'd properly ever listened to them back in 1983, or since, I must have forgot -- I tend to concentrate on his earlier work mostly.

TBF though, as mentioned in one of the other threads as well as here, DB did subsequently express remorse and regret about the fascism-appreciation shit. Which is more than the far more stupid Eric Clapton ever did

(Edited Friday am to clarify a couple of things)

 

[ViolentPanda]

apparently if you play warszawa backwards you can just about make out a massive rant about untermenschen and liebensraum.

Undermen and loving room?

 

[Bonfirelight]

Undermen and loving room?

Just because he was a Nazi it doesn't mean he could speak German!

 

[Sea Star]

Didn't he recant all previously held right wing beliefs and issue a 'My wife and best friend are jewish, my best mate is black' type statement? What made it more believable was the large donation to some anti-racist type charity that went alongside.
If I remember correctly.

Bowie was a fierce campaigner against segregation in music venues which still existed in the 70s and was the first rock musician to take a multi racial band on a major tour across the US. He also challenged MTV on their white only policy in the 1980s. So I'd say not racist - or at least if he was he was full of contradictions.

 

[Sea Star]

Bowie flirted with Nazi/Fascist stuff years ago. There are photos of him in Nazi uniforms, exaggerated jodhpurs and brilliantly shined jackboots; seems he liked the ‘clean-cut’ image, the aesthetics over the ideology – I imagine if the Soviets were doing a line in classic cut uniforms, he’d have jumped in there.

But, I could be wrong; and Bowie may well be a Fuehrer-in-waiting...

he played a Nazi officer in a film. So that's what that is. Acting. He was acting. There are also off screen stills from between filming.

 

[Favelado]

Cocaine seems to be used to explain anything bad he did. Cocaine makes some people a bit obnoxious but it doesn't make them more right-wing.

 

[Sprocket.]

Bowie used fashion as a main drive in creating his characters and I could imagine the draw that Hugo Boss designed Nazi uniforms would appeal to an artist's eye.

 

[ska invita]

Bowie was a fierce campaigner against segregation in music venues which still existed in the 70s and was the first rock musician to take a multi racial band on a major tour across the US. He also challenged MTV on their white only policy in the 1980s. So I'd say not racist - or at least if he was he was full of contradictions.

Bowie stuff aside, as has been said fascism and racism are not necessarily mutually exclusive.

Cocaine seems to be used to explain anything bad he did. Cocaine makes some people a bit obnoxious but it doesn't make them more right-wing.

Again Bowie stuff aside, not sure about that, cocaine is all about boosting ego, and concentration on ego marries very neatly with individualism which in turn marries with "no such thing as society" capitalism. Partly why its the drug of choice for the rich as it doesnt challenge them mentally to their social position, in fact reinforces their sense of superiority.

 

[butchersapron]

Bowie stuff aside, as has been said fascism and racism are not necessarily mutually exclusive.

Of course they're not mutually exclusive - one necessarily implies the other.

 

[ska invita]

Of course they're not mutually exclusive - one necessarily implies the other.

agree in practice, but some fascists draw the distinction and believe it in their hearts - such as Paolo Di Canio!

 

[butchersapron]

agree in practice, but some fascists draw the distinction and believe it in their hearts - Di Canio!

Di canio who has openly been racist against jews? There is a distinction between fascism and nazism if you want to argue that, but it most emphatically is not on the grounds of the non-racism of one of them. This is what they want you to think though.

 

[ska invita]

Di canio who has openly been racist against jews? There is a distinction between fascism and nazism if you want to argue that, but it most emphatically is not on the grounds of the non-racism of one of them. This is what they want you to think though.

fair enough
it does kind of depend on the definition of fascism though, and there are competing definitions... from my understanding it is theoretically possible to give a definition that doesnt include racist elements - but authoritarian nationalism would seem to inevitably lead to racism (through defining Others not of the nation), even if it isn't originally explicit

 

[butchersapron]

There are no non-racist fascisms. And i know of no serious substantive definitions that suggests there are, that there were or that there could be.