Mocking Evil: A Lesson from "Hogan's Heroes"

Of late, I've been watching a lot of Hogan's Heroes on weeknights courtesy of METV. The basic premise of the show is that a group of allied prisoners in a Nazi POW camp run an underground operation complete with a complex tunnel system, radios and production of disguises (including German uniforms).

The POW Camp they operate from - Stalag 13 - is run by a bungling desk officer Wilhelm Klink and the over-sized sergeant Schultz. Recurring Nazis include the smarter but egotistical General Burkhalter and the easily excited Gestapo officer, Major Hochstetter.

Hogan's Heroes received some heat in it's own day for making a comedy show about Nazi POWs. This heat cooled down a bit as people learned that every single Nazi was portrayed by Jewish actors and in some cases, Jewish actors who survived Nazi Germany. To them, this was a chance to mock their former oppressors.

I believe this old show teaches us something today. Quite frankly, the Nazis have become bogeyman to the 21st century, especially to the progressive mind. Anything smacking of the Third Reich is taboo, Hitler is the worst person in history and so goes the hysteria. And while I'm not a progressive, I'm certainly not here to say Hitler wasn't bad, but I do wonder if the over-demonizing approach the left takes isn't a mistake if they want to discourage the rise of a neo-Nazism (which I doubt will happen, but there are lots of fringe groups out there).

I think all this Nazi paranoia and taboo actually encourages people to embrace such extremes. It gives an air of mystery and defiance, of excitement. But what if instead of making Hitler history's greatest villain we took the Hogan's Heroes approach and made him the biggest buffoon? In the scene below, one of the prisoner's disguises as Hitler to help pull off an operation. His Hitler impersonation is silly little man with a loud voice yelling at everyone and being generally childish. And it works.

In Hogan there is next to no mention of the Third Reich's policies, only references here and there to their racial ideology. Mostly, they are just mocked for their self-view. A running gag is that the Nazi characters won't admit the truth about the Russian front, that they are "the supermen" who often outwitted by people like a 5'2" Frenchman and a naive boy scout from North Dakota. Schultz is massively overweight and old. Klink is bald, vain and incompetent. Burkhalter is also overweight, and easily flattered. Hochstetter is easily enraged but also easily frightened. Even Hitler gets the treatment in remarks like "the guy with the funny mustache" or references to his paper-hanging days. His radio speeches are not presented as dangerous but boring and stupid, even by some of the Nazi characters.

In short, Hogan tells its audience not to be afraid of the Nazis but to laugh at them. And this applies beyond the Nazis/ any Neo-Nazis to any extremist groups. Fearing extremism only feeds it. I'm not talking about people you simply disagree with, we're talking about extreme ideologies here. As a Libertarian I prefer to mock communism with memes rather than get into a frenzy about communism infiltrating America. Sometimes mockery isn't the answer but it can be a powerful one. Because laughter is a powerful weapon. And the gang at Stalag 13 use it brilliantly.