I'm putting this behind a cut due to anti-semitic and Nazi imagery and apologism for said anti-semitic imagery.

I am completely unfamiliar with the series myself, but in short, Axis Powers Hetalia is a webcomic/manga/anime series that depicts history in the form of personified countries. Here's The TVTropes page.

The fandom has been in the unfunny spotlight several times (see: a group of Hetalia cosplayers doing a Nazi salute at Anime Boston), and here's another mindblowing example.

I am not sure which character(s) these folks are cosplaying, but that's irrelevant in the face of the fact that they were photographed POINTING GUNS AT a depiction of a Star of David.

Let that sink in for a moment.

A Tumblr user named yumikarp, who has since deleted their entire Tumblr, has been quoted in reblogs defending said cosplayers:

This is called art.
I see nothing wrong in it, they are just living into their roles and doing what history has told. I have nothing against Jews, not at all, but I see nothing wrong in this because there is nothing wrong of it.
Sheesh, it’s like the over-religious people being all against that photographer woman who made pictures of Jesus being gay and having group sex. She didn’t do it without a meaning, and it wasn’t a racist meaning of any kind. It’s called art.
This is just the same.
These two people might actually be Jews themselves, who knows.
All they’re doing is making a scene of what history has told in the past.
The end.
Why take it so personal?
Why so serious?

One of the Cosplayers also tries to defend the photo as a "joke".

Hello, I’m Prussia in this photo.

This was just for a joke and very casual, because that place isn’t a church or anything related… just toilets’s park. LOL

The ORIGINAL pic is in Deviantart and mature CENSORED for obvious reasons. The other place is Photobucket, an album made for the ones that were in this photoshot. We didn’t want to offend anyone.

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Impossible is nothing xDD Really I don’t care about what can people say about a photo that supposely we offense Jews, my mind is clear, since beginning that photo was just a joke, nothing serious and in a non-sacred place (oh well, maybe park’s toilets are sacred after a “bad meal” <33) Anyway <333 Relax yourself, if we have to be this point almost all hetalia’s fandom is historycally offensive. xDDD

Finally, and advertisment <333 ~ Use copyright in photos, because you’ll never expect who wants to fight or be a jerk <33

Because adding hearts and "XD" faces totally makes it better amirite?

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keri
2011-07-03 03:14 am UTC (link)

I suspect it's only going to get worse - the fourth generation since WW2 (more or less) is about to enter their teens, and when something's as far back as your granparents' parents, it's ancient history and prime for twisting in new ways (not that the distance has stopped the Nazi fetishisers all these years). All they will have are second-hand stories.

I mean, why else is Steampunk with late-Victorian elements getting so big now? And in the late Victorian and Edwardian periods, it was the turn of the 18th century with the Neo-Classical and Romantic stuff. (I think. My dates might be slightly off, but I remember thinking how interesting it was when I learned about the cycles of art and stuff that it seemed to be about 3-4 generations between when something was new and when it became quaint and fetishised - right when the only people who actually lived in the original period were almost gone.)

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harrylovesron
2011-07-03 03:22 am UTC (link)

Agreed, and it's a sad but true fact- the distance is what my generation, for example, felt with the first World War. WWII was a bit more "current" in that many of us know (or knew) older relatives and aquaintances who lived through the Holocaust or served in the U.S. Army during that time, etc. I suspect the same thing will begin to happen with Korea and Vietnam in a few decades.

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