In Slovakia, Marian Kotleba, leader of the right-wing radical party “Kotlebovtsy – People’s Party” Our Slovakia “(ĽSNS), was sentenced to four years and four months in prison. symbolism.
In his last speech, the accused 43-year-old politician said that he “does not recognize himself as having committed any crime.” He intends to challenge the verdict in the Supreme Court. Kotleba’s final speech lasted about eight hours. If his verdict is still finally approved, Kotleba will lose his deputy mandate. This is the first time in the history of Slovakia that an incumbent parliamentarian has been sentenced to prison.
Ultranationalist and ex-head of the region
Kotleba is known as an ultranationalist, noted for hate speech against Roma people, migrants and refugees. The ĽSNS party opposes the EU and demands the withdrawal of Slovakia from NATO. In 2016, she entered the Slovak parliament and currently holds 17 parliamentary seats out of 150.
In 2017, right-wing nationalists were defeated in regional elections, and Kotleba was unable to be re-elected as head of the Banskobystritsa region, the largest region in the country, which he had headed since 2013. Investigative actions on charges of extremism have already been carried out against Kotleba and his fellow party members.
Sentence of neo-Nazis in Greece
The trial of the right-wing radicals in Athens
Earlier, on October 7, a court in Greece sentenced to long terms of imprisonment the leaders and members of the right-wing radical party “Golden Dawn” (“Chrisi Avgi”), including its leader Nikolaos Michaloliakos, who were accused of creating a criminal organization, attacks on people, murders and illegal arms trafficking. Almost 70 members of the organization were indicted, including 18 ex-members of the Greek parliament. In the 2012 elections, Golden Dawn received 6.3% of the vote.
In 1938, during the regular congress of the NSDAP, the Union of German Girls (Bund Deutscher Mädel), a women’s youth organization as part of the Hitler Youth, put on a massive show that personified uniformity, obedience and dynamics. That is, those qualities that Hitler especially appreciated in young people. In the “Third Reich”, membership in the Hitler Youth was actually compulsory for all young “Aryans”.
The murderous aesthetics of National Socialism
Blond handsome men
The cult of body beauty was one of the components of the National Socialist ideology. During the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin, documentary filmmaker Leni Riefenstahl with a team of more than 40 cameramen shot the film “Olympia”. In it, Riefenstahl draws parallels between the ancient athletes and the athletes of Nazi Germany, who were all fair-haired beauties.
The murderous aesthetics of National Socialism
The largest stadium
The National Socialists who came to power in 1933 decided to use the 1936 Olympics to promote the regime. A giant sports complex was built with a new Olympic stadium with a capacity of 110 thousand people. This gigantism and the grandiose show of the opening of the Olympics were supposed to demonstrate to the whole world the greatness of the “Third Reich”.
The murderous aesthetics of National Socialism
Gigantomania in stone
Hitler declared Nuremberg to be the city of party congresses of the NSDAP: it was an ideal place to demonstrate the connection between Nazi ideology and Germany’s imperial past. On an area of 11 sq. kilometers built a monumental complex. Its architecture was designed to delight and intimidate. The complex was built in such a way that all eyes were directed to the central rostrum, where the “Fuhrer” was sitting.
The murderous aesthetics of National Socialism
Superman without a face
The NSDAP congress was also held in Nuremberg, about which the famous propaganda film “The Triumph of Will” was shot. The Wehrmacht is represented in it in accordance with the ideals of National Socialism – a brave, decisive and loyal leader. One of the goals of the Nazi ideology was the creation of a new man – more precisely, a superman, a soldier of the “millennial Reich” who was supposed to conquer “living space”.
The murderous aesthetics of National Socialism
Souvenirs from Dachau
The design of the “Third Reich”, even at the everyday, kitsch level, is an ideology. The failed artist Hitler saw one of his missions as developing a new, “correct” German taste. These porcelain figurines of a girl in traditional folk dress and a German shepherd were made in an artistic porcelain factory near Munich. The prisoners of the Dachau concentration camp worked there.
The murderous aesthetics of National Socialism
Death row insignia
A neatly executed stand shows what insignia the prisoners wore in Nazi concentration camps. The SS guards were required to pass an examination of these differences. Terrible “visual agitation” …