the antisemitism group Anti-Defamation League
Looks like they accidentally described a zionist group accurately!
So deeply depressing when “anti-Semitism” is increasingly cover for “pro-fascism”.
Reminder that “antisemitism” was a euphemism made in the late 19th century by people who wanted to promote the ideology of hating Jewish people, to replace the previous term “Judenhaß” (meaning Jew-hatred)
The symbol in question:
I mean…I can kinda get why he didn’t know. That looks like one of those blobs therapists use to figure out what you see.
I don’t even see a skull and bones. I see a fish, with a railroad crossing sign on it’s belly.
Even side by side, I barely see the resemblance. I guess that’s what it’s supposed to be, but I could easily be convinced if you show me a fish with a railroad sign on it’s belly.
I can fully understand how he didn’t know. I don’t understand why he got a tattoo he had no strong attatchments to however. He should have at least known WHAT he was getting tattood in the first place.
In any event, nazi affiliation, no nazi affiliation, can we all agree that it’s a shit tattoo either way?
It probably isn’t as blurry in a mirror as it is in a flip phone video from 2015.
I’m still not sure I’d recognize it, especially not without the backing shield. Sure, you can say that’s just on me, but there’s so many symbols and references that lead back to nazis that I can’t imagine I’ll know them all. I’d counter that by asking if you’d think anything deep about seeing a Medusa tattoo.
Also, people get meaningless tattoos all the time, especially once you get over your first one’s novelty. You liked it that day. No one is sentimental about their cartoon toaster. No one put meaning into every single element of their full sleeves. Right now there’s a trend of just getting 20 pieces of flash, not far from the generalized traditional designs from the 1950s
I also wanted to buy an Iron Cross necklace, but my mother wouldn’t let me. I didn’t know what it meant… Cause I was like 10 at the time. How old was he to not know what a Totenkopf is?
I literally just learned what it is. I would have thought it was random pirate or metal shit
OK, then look at it this way. Would you have gotten a tattoo on your chest of something you didn’t know the meaning of?
I wouldn’t, but then again I’m not a drunk Marine.
Like the other user above, I’ve also never heard of the Totenkopf and I don’t recognize the emblem. Looks like any other skull and crossbones to me. I’m not saying it isn’t a harmful symbol, but I can understand how a lot of people would be totally ignorant to its history like I am.
Yeah, I’m more inclined to believe that he was drunk, and a foreigner wasn’t a fan of American Marines in his country, and branded him with a well known nazi symbol on his chest just to fuck with him.
No, but I’ve known people that have
I too think the picture is uselessly bad, and that’s key to another part of the story in the comments. Basically an unnamed associate seemed to be in the same boat of not knowing what it was and the man himself described it by name.
Now he didn’t explicitly say it was a Nazi symbol, but he allegedly used the specific German word for it instead of saying it’s some skull and crossbones.
Per the Jewish Insider citing a anonymous source, so take that for what you will
I suppose what helps for me is that the tatoo is kind of hard to make out, and he doesn’t deny the design intent matches what that is purported to be. I don’t know if anyone would have accurately made that connection without help.
Wait what makes it a Nazi tattoo? Are all skulls potentially Nazi tattoos? It just looks like a regular (somewhat cartoonish) skull and bones
Edit: Oh seems like part of a specific SS symbol
I mean, after the swastika, SS logo and iron cross, it’s like the fourth most famous Nazi symbol
There’s a pretty wide gap between spots three and four, bud. Even before considering that you forgot about the arm bands and the mustache.
Also skulls are the most widely used symbols for all sorts of things throughout history and modern pop culture
Yeah but that’s a very specific design, bud
That’s what I said lmao. And that it’s only part of the very specific design half the comment section’s never seen before. Some guy even tattooed it on himself without knowing it, buddy
I guess half of the comment section must not be used to dealing with Nazis, pal
Congrats on figuring it out. A rare sight in comments sections
That somewhat cartoonish skull-and-crossbones is specifically the symbol worn by, among some others, the nazis who operated the extermination camps.
He probably thought it’s a cool Darth Vader tattoo 🙄
Sen. Bernie Sanders, who strongly backed Platner earlier this month, said the revelations about Platner do not impact his endorsement.
“He went through a dark period,” Sanders told reporters on Tuesday. “He has apologized for the stupid remarks, the hurtful remarks that he made, and I’m confident that he’s going to run a great campaign and that he’s going to win.”
Vermont Sen. Peter Welch also told NOTUS on Tuesday that he is confident “Mainers will figure it out.”
Cynthia Phinney, president of the Maine AFL-CIO, said she had not seen reports about Platner’s tattoo and the controversy surrounding it. But she made clear she thought the negative news about Platner was a result of meddling from the national Democratic Party.
“I’m disappointed with the apparent engagement of the national party in our state primary the way this is coming out,” Phinney said.
Phinney said that she didn’t have proof that the national party was behind the emergence of a series of damaging news stories about his campaign but that she thought the “mudslinging” was unhelpful regardless of its source.
“I don’t think this is adding to the quality of what people are getting to think about in the campaign,” she said. “The important thing to me is to replace Suan Collins.”
When asked about the reports, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer threw his weight behind Mills’ campaign.
“We think that Janet Mills is the best candidate to retire Susan Collins. She’s a tested two-term governor and the people of Maine have an enormous amount of affection and respect for her,” he said, adding: “I’ll let the people of Maine decide.”
He has apologized for the stupid remarks, the hurtful remarks that he made
Rookie mistake. Coulda been president by now if only he… listens to earpiece I have been informed that this man is NOT a star, ergo they will not let him do it.
I live in Maine and EVERYONE hates Janet Mills. She’s been better than lepage, I guess, but not by a lot. Milquetoast at best. Voting for her would be once again holding my nose and voting for the D over the R
Okay, so having learned that, the laser treatment to remove it is probably in his calendar already, right? And he’ll be able to show everyone that it’s removed quite soon?
Right?
edit Right.
Yes, he is getting it removed
Oh, it went better than expected. My happy mistake.
He’s said that he’s getting it removed.
Now we have to wait and see if he sticks to that.
He also apologized AFTER people finding out his comments. Just the pefrect hypocrite conciousless politician ready to tell dumbfucks whatever they want just for a position of power when his actual values are pride of war crimes, racism, sexism, and slaughtering brown people for 13 years.
This is like trusting a wolf in sheep clothing after his big-pointy ears came out, and then he was “Ssorry!! I tucked them back in… Baaa Baaa… Look… I’m back to being a sheep”
The fuck is wrong with you??
The guy with 5 separate compact tours who was deployed in the same cities and time of Blackwater documented war crimes of killings and rapings in Ramadi and Faillujah, and kept rejoinging the same ill-trained war-criminal military contrator for 13 years of US imperalism invovlment in third-world countries that left them in poverty and ruins ?? Wait, he also has histroy of sexual assault allegations, rape and racist comments, and a nazi tattoo??
Edit: it turned out he only joined blackwater after they were rebranded as Constellis due to their war crime convictions. he also apologized for his rape and racist comments after people found out about them. and about the tattoos he said it was from anime or whatever but it’s not nazi symbol. He is still proud of his 5 compact tours of shame US invasions over the period of 13 years though as if he can’t stop reminiscing about the memories of seeing brown people killed.
Imo, he is conciousless af, and ready to lie and adapt to tell you whatever you want to hear, and he’s so eager to be in position of power… So it all checks out; he is perfect for the job of a conciousless lip-service politician with values open for sale to the highest bidder.
some corrections
it was one tour with blackwater, after four tours with the military, and i don’t think there were sexual assault allegations against him (were there? he did post reddit comments blaming women in the military for their assaults…).
And yet he is still the least genocide supporting candidate in the primary.
The bar is so, so low.
Can people change, recognize their bad behavior in the past, and atoll for it now?
Really hard to tell with politicians, the whole game is to seem like a good person to as many voters as possible. You only find out once they don’t need voters anymore.
Ok, well I’ll take that over politicians now that don’t even bother to lie. Democrats nowadays don’t lie and cater to the Right.
At least Obama ran on a campaign of change while fucking us all in the ass. Politicians doing that though shift the Overton Window and change the permission structure for what you can and can’t say on a political campaign.
Graham Platner will do his job in pushing the envelope, and other progressives will follow suit.
But according to a person who socialized with Platner when he was living in Washington, D.C., more than a decade ago, Platner had specifically acknowledged that the tattoo was a Totenkopf, the “death’s head” symbol adopted by an infamous Nazi SS unit that guarded concentration camps in World War II.
“He said, 'Oh, this is my Totenkopf,” the former acquaintance told Jewish Insider recently, speaking on the condition of anonymity to address a sensitive issue. “He said it in a cutesy little way.”
The exchange occurred in 2012 at Tune Inn, a popular dive on Capitol Hill where Platner later worked as a bartender and was a frequent patron while he attended The George Washington University on the G.I. bill, according to the former acquaintance. He would often take his shirt off drinking with friends late at night at the bar, and on at least one occasion had stated he knew what the tattoo represented, the former acquaintance recalled.
Platner gave varying accounts of the image during this time, saying at one point he was aware it was a Totenkopf when he had first gotten the tattoo several years prior and at another time claiming he had not known, according to the former acquaintance.
The mixed accounts indicate that Platner has at least long been aware of the symbols’s connection to Nazism, even as he said in the podcast interview he was not familiar with any such association when he chose to get the tattoo.
The source for this is Jewish Insider, which I’m sure people will say whatever they are going to say about that, but at some point this guys multiple red flags need to be taken as a pattern.
Dude has a very clear pattern of making questionable choices in the most favorable reading of circumstances. His former campaign manager said this when resigning over Grahams past comments:
“The words we choose to use online reflect who we are and what we stand for. While I am empathetic to Graham’s experiences and respect his personal journey and growth, I cannot overlook the volume and nature of his past comments, many of which were made as an adult, not as a young man.” McDonald said in her resignation letter.
Y’all need to stop apologizing for this guy and start looking for a better candidate to get behind so it isn’t Janet Mills in the general.
Man, this is all a deep bummer. I’ve only been very tangentially paying attention to this race and was excited to see a candidate gaining a lot of momentum and with a lot of messaging i could generally get behind who could replace Susan shitfuck Collins. But, whoof, I dunno if I’ve ever experienced such a sudden and complete collapse of any interest in or support at all for a candidate in my life.
Hmm, looks like he was prejudice 10 years ago, and perhaps a white supremacist before that. But, he called rural-whites racist more recently (and they definitely are more racist in aggregate), so looks like his POV changed. IDK, that seems fine to me.
He has a nazi tattoo on his chest. Not, he got a nazi tattoo when he was young and drunk and didn’t know and as soon as he found out he got that shit covered up. He, to this day, has a Totenkopf tattoo. For the people in the back:
ANY CANDIDATE WITH A NAZI TATTOO IS A NON-STARTER.
Edit: Robert Evans sums it up well on Bluesky
i liked how Platner was campaigning and I am prepared to believe a young marine could make literally any stupid mistake. but I don’t believe a guy could spend twenty years maturing politically the way he has and not know what a death’s head means
if his attitude from the jump has been “I did this as a kid and have been ashamed of it since, it was a terrible mistake” I don’t think I’d mind. but he’s just not being honest here and that’s suspicious as hell.
Hey Puritan, I’m an American zoomer AND I DIDNT EVEN KNOW WHAT A TOTENKOPF WAS BEFORE YESTERDAY.
May I remind you that most Americans didn’t even know that Lays potato chips were made out of potatoes, and so Lays is now changing up their marketing to get that fact across?
I think you highly overestimate how intelligent people in America are. We have the average literacy rate of a 6th grader. Come on.
If Platner gets it covered or removed in the next 1-2 weeks, no big deal. He’s positioning himself as a reformed veteran, and I’m willing to back him.
We don’t have many other Left leaning candidates in non-Blue states!
Jfc, are you serious? I’m a puritan because I take issue with someone having a literal nazi tattoo. The election is a year away, find a better candidate to get behind before then, it’s that simple. Do you also believe that Elon Musk was just reaching for his heart and waving during Trump’s inauguration? Do you think that Pete Hegseth got a Deus Vult tattoo because it looks cool?
Platner was a mercenary who served four tours in the middle east, has a tier-list of wars he would fight in, is into military history. Zero fucking chance he doesn’t know what that symbol is at this age.
It is ok that you supported him. He said a lot of things that are worth getting behind. There is now more than enough information out there to realize that he is, at best, a political liability.
Having a nazi tattoo is a non-starter for a political candidate. If you can’t see that, then I don’t know what to tell you. Just because you are able to look past that, which you absolutely should not, you need to realize that he is unelectable to the general public. There is no amount of rehab to his image that can be done for this.
Platner isn’t perfect. Support him or don’t.
And while you’re at it, support those other Left leaning, anti Zionist frontrunners for elections next year across the US. I’ll wait for those people to come to power while Platner takes names and kicks ass.
Of course, if another candidate for the Maine Senate race appears and has better optics while championing the same views as Platner, I’m all for it.
But let’s keep closeted leftists from taking office because they aren’t left enough.
He has a nazi tattoo!! Wtf are you talking about? That is disqualifying, end of story.
And he’s denounced it! Wtf do you want?
Why don’t you have this same smoke for the US Military that should have caught this time and time again?
That he wasn’t left enough wasn’t the criticism, and you know that. The criticism was specifically that there is reasonable doubt that the guy is a cryptofascist.
There is a reasonable doubt. That’s true.
But people are taking that one step further and making it a certain doubt. People are disqualifying him entirely, which can be seen in others responding to me in this very thread.
People have different sus meters, and mine (and Bernie Sanders’) meters aren’t just there yet.
If he doesn’t get this removed and started to capitulate more and more to centrist liberals, then my support for Platner will wane.
I’d rather defend him than be apathetic to him right now.
Now that you know what it is, why are you defending it? He definitely didn’t just find out today, so the fact he still has it is a strong indicator of what he really believes.
So if he attacks people you think are sub-human, hes a good candidate?
This is a complicated story. Reddit somehow released his username and tied it to him? No one has said how they were tied together.
The Washington Post reported Platner downplayed concerns about sexual assault in posts from 2013. CNN reported he labeled all White Americans in rural areas as racist and stupid in one 2020 post and said all cops are “bastards” in a 2021 post. The Bangor Daily News reported Platner asked why Black people “don’t tip” in a 2013 post.
Now he has a nazi tattoo that he didn’t know was a nazi tattoo. That may be true? I don’t know. He’s going up against Susan Collins. I can’t imagine the DNC wanting her over anyone.
I think bookending the two recent quotes with the obviously more problematic quotes from 8 years prior is intentional. A lot can change in 8 years, especially when you transition from military to civilian life. I think the ACAB sentiment he expressed in 2021 shows growth.
(Anecdotal bias incoming) The comment on rural white Americans, while inflammatory and unhelpful, isn’t all that off-base in my experience. If you are born into, grow up in and stay within the same rural 10 mile radius your entire life you tend to lack perspective to say the least. Growing up in a town or village that is 90%+ white provides no frame of reference for the varying struggles people of color experience.
I grew up in one such town. Demographics were roughly 90% white, 10% Hispanic. I didn’t have a black classmate until junior year of high school and I don’t want to speculate about the reception they received.
As for stupidity, acquiring knowledge is at best unemphasized and at worst actively, intentionally discouraged. Willful ignorance may be a more accurate term.
There are certainly children curious enough to seek out knowledge and learn about other human experiences (hi) but I’m still struggling to escape that bucket of crabs and it has consumed and scarred me. The access to quality healthcare was abysmal, employment was primarily factory-based and starting from a place of low familial wealth is something I’ve struggled against my entire adult life. I’d venture a guess that he was raised in a similar setting and was only able to escape via military service.
In short; I agree with the sentiments he’s expressed recently. I vehemently disagree with the sentiments he expressed over a decade ago. I’m willing to believe the tattoo was an arbitrarily chosen flash piece done in Croatia during his time in the Marines. I’m willing to give him the benefit of the doubt, but I’ll never be his constituent so my opinion ultimately means jack shit.
Reddit somehow released his username and tied it to him?
CNN didn't say where they got his username, but he acknowledged the posts were his
From the article that reported the posts:
Most of the posts were made five years ago under Platner’s then-Reddit handle P-Hustle.
In an interview with CNN on Tuesday, Platner disavowed his posts, saying they came from a time when he felt disillusioned and angry and expressed those emotions online. He said his criticisms of rural White Americans and the police, and his political comments, do not reflect who he is and what he stands for today.
Now he has a nazi tattoo that he didn’t know was a nazi tattoo. That may be true?
It is mildly plausible that he could have gotten the tattoo without realizing what it was. It is highly implausible that (as he claimed on a podcast yesterday) nobody ever told him what it was during any of the many times he says he’s had his shirt off over the last 18 years.
He’s going up against Susan Collins.
Not yet he isn’t. The primary isn’t until next June.
The reddit thing is actually the most troubling thing to me, how did CNN get it?
The second most troubling is he could also be a fetterman situation. idk.
Fetterman had a stroke so bad that it changed his political views.
We have no reason to think that Platner is going to stroke out before the primary and general next year.
It could be a Fetterman situation, or it could not. We don’t know enough to be sure.
I’m willing to believe that maybe through some crazy chain of events you didn’t know when you got it. I’m maybe even willing to believe that through some crazy chain of events you didn’t learn about it for 18 years. What I am not willing to believe is that when he decided to run, nobody in his team told him. He should have gotten it covered or removed. They go through your life looking for anything bad because they know the opposition will. All this combined, there’s 0% chance he just learned now. For some reason they’re playing this weird game. The most generous interpretation I can come up with is that he feels attachment to it and doesn’t wanna get rid of it, but even that’s pretty fucked. You can’t keep your racist tattoo just because you’re nostalgic for it.
Our senators have got skulls on them. Are… are we the baddies?
I feel like you have to try to find a tattooist in Croatia in the mid aughts willing to ink an ss symbol on an American military member. Like I’ve never been there but I know in America it’s a pain in the ass to get a swastika or ss lightning bolt tattoo because most artists won’t do it, and this is America where we skim history in schools
I’m fairly certain it’s easier in Croatia than in most countries.
I’m still trying to figure out why wet are talking about the pirate symbol
To be fair, I didn’t even know what a Totenkopf was before yesterday. Yes, I’m an American zoomer. This goes to show how shite our US history public education is.
And Platner said that he underwent multiple inspections by the military. Not one of those times did the military point out that his tattoo was a hate symbol. Should they have? Would they have? Clearly not.
Now that he knows the “truth”, whether you agree that this is his first time learning about the symbol or not, he needs to cover it up or have it removed. Post pictures on social media. Make it a big thing so the fascists and tankies don’t call you a communist and Nazi all at the same time.
If he doesn’t get it removed, well then I’m not sure if I want to back him.
I would be gobsmacked if it turns out the DNC is not behind this smear campaign. They ratfuck primaries like nobody’s business, and in true Dem fashion, it’s so they can try to get a literal 80 year old into power instead. Fucking moron democrats never learn a damn thing.
edit: saw Platner address this on pod save. Don’t think he knew. I think he should just get the tat covered, make an apology statement, and move on.
Smear campaign? I don’t see anyone denying that he has a Nazi tattoo. This doesn’t seem like the same sort of thing as the baseless accusations of antisemitism against Mamdani or the “Bernie Bros” and “Obama Boys” nonsense.
Pretty thin sauce given the pic I’ve seen. And I don’t give a rat’s ass how he was as a young man.
Watch this and tell me you can’t cheer for him.
Hey, Janet Mills is only 77! She’s a spring chicken!
What an up and coming star! I can’t wait for the younger generation in their 70s to run this country instead do of the old geriatric corpses in their 80s
This man is too real. The DNC is going to bury him.
I’ve watched his longer campaign ad twice, and twice I wept a bit, wanted to fucking SCREAM. My god my fucking god, THIS is the winning message. In my 54-years I have never heard such… don’t have words, y’all watch the fucking video.
Something about a wolf in sheep’s clothing.
Its more a wolf in wolf’s clothing saying he didn’t realize its wolf’s clothing
But this sheep is clothed in nazi-clothing
What about his reddit post history makes you think he’s a nazi?
Just a guess, and OP may correct me if I’m wrong, but it would probably be the nazi tattoo he has had on his chest for the past 20 years.
https://www.grahamforsenate.com/platform
- I don’t believe he’s a nazi. The reddit posts make me think he was never a far right guy. He was just a military guy trying to figure stuff out.
- If anyone in the election has like 90% of his platform, they can get my vote. Until I see momentum behind a candidate that supports universal healthcare, is against the genocide in Gaza, and the dozen other progressive issues, he’ll still get my support.
Getting someone that has the history and look of Platner to be fighting for progessive values is important. If we can get 20 somethings who would fall to right wing propaganda to pay attention to Platner and his growth story, we can build a better society for a lot of people.
This thread makes me believe Heritage Foundation troll factories are now operating within Lemmy as well. Nobody can be this dense.
