I'm not typically a Jungian in the sense that humans have some kind of ancestral memory but sometimes I do get a deep-rooted hate and refusal to value the work of nazis. I had family who were victims of the holocaust, the primary one I know being my great-great uncle Stanislaw. His sister, my mom's grandmother, was one of the few family members my mother loved and who loved her- my birth-middle-name was her name for that reason. So that side of my mother's family is really the only ones I feel any connection towards, ancestral or otherwise. So when Heidegger, the German philosopher, is being studied in my philosophy of poetry class... I'm not trusting anything he says as far as I can throw it. My professor isn't helping, either- I asked if he thought Heidegger's Nazi sympathies may have had an impact on his philosophy on ethics, and he said, in summary (my professor is quite long-winded) "No, he just didn't live up to his own philosophy." That doesn't necessarily satiate my skepticism. Especially when Heidegger emphasizes that "ethics" is just a nominal structure used to control human beings. Like wow, I wonder why in the 1950s, when you've been forced to confront your own ethical failings, you'd now feel like abstracting ethics. I don't know if I buy it.

And I do think some of that is normal. Like, I think being skeptical of everything created by nazis is likely the best way to exist. Doesn't mean you can't look at it, you just should expect that such a vile ideology seeps into their creations- art, poetry, philosophy. I do not believe any of it is pure, coming from a nazi. Did you know that after the war, allied planes flew over German cities, sending down fliers with victims of the holocaust, that said "this is your guilt/shame," and Heidegger said that that was worse than what the nazis did?! what?! When Heidegger talks about acceptance of the unknown, acceptance of the ambiguous, he does not mean the immigrant, the foreigner. He means the violent, the justifiably outcast. When he says that ethics are just norms that confine human beings, he means the norms of justice, respect for persons, the norms of the Weimar republic, not the norms of fear, hate. It's like populism, yes there are elite individuals who have a large hand in how our country functions, but depending on who you ask it's either "those who run corporations" (correct) or "the jews" (incorrect).

But I don't know, I just feel an extra refusal to entertain Heidegger, or anything nazi-adjacent. Last year a christofacist group came on campus and distributed materiels with a symbol that was, for all intents and purposes, the iron cross. I kept being told "technically" it was an edited version that isn't "exactly" the iron cross, but why the fuck would I care?! I pushed and pushed and pushed to get the Dean of Students to do something, anything, and I still resent her for not doing so. I just feel a rage as if I have some personal experience, but... I don't, really? It's this... strong sense of justice and this almost, ancestoral rage.

It's weird, I keep thinking I like philosophy, history. I just don't like how anyone's doing it