Alec Porter says,
I was stunned to see these handpainted Nazi toy soldiers on display in the Apple store in Korea's biggeset mall, in Seoul. It's not an official Apple Store, but it's certainly Apple's representative in Korea; everyone who shops for Apple considers that the place.
Korea is not know for being sensitive about the Holocaust or Nazi Germany. Perhaps they'd say the same about the west and how we're not very sensitive about Japanese Imperialism, and the horrors it inflicted on Asia. Still, this is pretty shocking.
Link.
Reader comments:
Michael Shaughnessy, who is a professor of German at Washington & Jefferson College, says:
While tasteless, and Hitler in no way represents today's' Germany, Korea seems to have an obsession with all things German. You can see this in the use of German as a marketing language. Here are some interesting examples of German as an advertising language in Korea.You have to assume that most people don't know the significance of the language, but find it attractive nonetheless. Link. This mirrors the use of English is used in many European countries.My research deals with visualization of culture and students and I put together a collection of some examples during a research trip. Link.
Joe says,
A few years ago I was in Korea and travelling outside of Seoul. I noticed a big ad in a newspaper with a picture of Hitler and a pig. I asked my guide to translate and he said the ad encouraged pig farmers to use this company's nutritional supplements "to raise a master race."
Jonathan says,
The BoingBoing post about Nazi 'toys" at an Apple store in Korea could use a bit more context. First, there are no Nazi toys on display at the store. Clearly, the picture is of hand-painted models. These are not toys for children. Just like every other country in the world, there are people in Korea who study and enjoy history by painting models and trying to make historically-accurate miniture scenes. You can walk into any model shop in America and buy models of German tanks and Japanese planes from the Second World War. These stores are not being disrespectful of history. (It's likely that the customers know more about history than most people do.)
Why are the models of Nazis at the store in Korea? Commonly, stores that sell models (tanks, trains, cars, soldiers and robots) lend some of the better work done by their customers to stores in the same mall. At Co-Ex, the mall in the post, you can see some really interesting models just outside the movie theater. The Apple store is not using Nazi toys to promote its wares. It is most likely taking part in a common form of cross-promotion.
The professor's comments about Koreans being crazy for all things German is also a bit misleading. In fact, most of the German words/themes used by Korean companies are there only to sell alcohol, specifically beer. This is because Germans are famous for their beer. It is not any different than a wine store in America calling itself Paris Wine Store or a watch store in Paris calling itself Swiss Watchland. None of these prove any sort of interest in other countries. Germany will not become really, really interesting to Koreans until it is used as the location of a Korean drama.
It is possible that everywhere the professor went, Koreans expressed an interest in Germany. This is because Koreans are generally friendly. If he had told them he was from Greenland, they would have suddenly shown an interest in Greenland.
In the past, Korean companies have run into trouble when using Hitler's image in ads. (Apple is not using Nazis in an ad. I am trying to address the comment about the ad for pig farmers.) One company had Hitler eating its new soft cookie and becoming a nice guy. In general, companies are trying to be more careful and more sensitive. I think that Korean companies have learnt that although some people can get away with joking about Nazis (Sienfield, Mel Brooks, Chaplin, the cast of The Producers, the writers of the Blues Brothers, etc.), some people can't.
Alec, the guy who sent this story in the first place, replies:
In response to Jonathan, I meant to show only that Apple probably would not like to be represented in that way, directly or not, and that Koreans are on average much less sensitive about Nazi symbols. I didn't notice any mention of cross-promotion, not that that would change the point of the potential to offend; it would just make it offensive and commercial as well.
I'm all for the hobby – I've painted a few D & D figures in my day. But the non-hand painting world still refers to them and thinks of them as "toy soldiers", regardless of who is playing with them.
And yes, you can buy those toys in hobby shops all over the world. What one might think twice about doing is displaying them in the window of a shop that's not for models, especially if it's exclusively a display of Nazi army men, and S.S. sodiers at that.
