I had a very disturbing experience today.

[Danmel]

I brought my car in for service. I live on Long Island. Guy is there with his dog. A very good looking German Shepherd, named Rommel. Seriously, WTF is wrong with people? My father survived Auschwitz and I have neo Nazis in my neighborhood in the suburbs of NYC. It is disturbing.

[Nevernose]

1. Ill make it worse:

The movement to distance Mussolini from fascism has been making big inroads with young people the last few years. “Hitler messed it up by adding socialism and racism” is a quote I hear more and more often from actual, in real life, human beings.

[MLAA]

2. That is just awful. Sorry you had to experience that.

[lunasun]

3. I hope you are OK this evening . Disgusting and disturbing

[stevenleser]

4. As a fellow child of a Holocaust survivor, I might have an explanation that is less disturbing

There are some folks out there who admire Rommel for his military strategy and have convinced themselves that he was not a Nazi. There is a fair amount of debate on the subject. This link has a good discussion on it: https://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10008295

Like most of these discussions, for instance see the same kinds of arguments regarding Albert Speer, or Admiral Karl Doenitz, there is no escaping Rommel's guilt on the subject. It is almost impossible to be that high up in the Nazi war machine and not be at least somewhat complicit.

But many of the Rommel admirers have convinced themselves that he was not a part of that. So they aren't condoning the antisemitism aspect of it. Perhaps it is the same with the person you encountered. I'd like to think so.

I also grew up on Long Island. (Massapequa). As an adult, I was disturbed to find out that Long Island had a very vocal pro-Nazi community in the runup to the Second World War. See https://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/20/nyregion/query-for-home-buyers-in-a-long-island-hamlet-are-you-german.html

[TheDebbieDee]

5. I think people are taught fairy tales instead of history anymore...

How can younger people NOT repeat mistakes that were made fifty or a hundred and fifty years ago if their history books are full of white-washed fairy tales...

[Danascot]

6. I had a neighbor with a German Shepherd

he'd named Blondi. It took me a while to realize what it meant and then I was well and truly freaked out.

[LeftInTX]

12. OMG - I just looked up Blondi

I would freak out.

Man I hope you were able to avoid this neighbor.

[Demonaut]

16. it means:

MEANING:
This name derives from a nickname for a person with blond hair. The origin of the name includes two theories: 1) From the Latin “Blādum > Blŭndus”, meaning “fodder, flour, hay”. 2) From the Frankish “*blund”, meaning “soft, delicate”. However, Blŭndus was a vulgar pronunciation of the Latin “flavus”, meaning “yellow”. Another guess (discounted by German etymologists), is that it represents a Vulgar Latin “*albundus”, from “alba”, meaning “white (understood as clear, bright)”.

[Codeine]

17. More to the point, it was also the name of Hitler's dog.

[Dave Starsky]

26. Or maybe he's a Debbie Harry fan.

Do we know if there was an "e" on the end?

I could see naming a dog Blondie. Unless she were a black lab. In which case, I would just call her Debbie.

[True Dough]

28. Or if the dog shed a lot

then call it Harry.

[ecstatic]

29. Agreed. My dad's first dog was named blondie

I only know that because I helped him set up security questions for one of his log-ins. He's NOT a Nazi sympathizer in any way, shape, or form.

[MFM008]

7. I think

In the end Rommel tried to right something by joining the plot to kill Hitler. A good nazi is a dead nazi.
Although Rommel didn't have much choice.....

[roamer65]

8. Nazis are disgusting...

BUT...the guy with the dog has me a bit confused.

I assume the dog is named after Field Marshal Erwin Rommel. Rommel participated in the 20 July 1944 plan to assassinate Hitler. He eventually swallowed a cyanide pill for said participation. Too bad they screwed up the plot.

I probably would have asked why he named the dog Rommel. I would have been curious to the response.

[raven mad]

9. I will never understand it.

My dachshund was Hansel. And the most lovable pup ever. Our neighbors, at that time, had also survived Sobibor.

[gopiscrap]

45. as a child we had a pair of wiener dogs when I was still in Germany named

Hansel and Gretel

[Dave Starsky]

10. Rommel was actually executed by the Nazis.

He was not a Hitlerite and was suspected to be a co-conspirator in a bomb plot that nearly assassinated the bastard. (A table leg got in the way of the explosion.)

He was also known to be a competent general who treated his own troops and even Allied POWs with respect and fairness, despite often being ordered not to.

Rommel was an interesting man. You should read about him. It's possible your neighbor just thought it sounded like a cool, tough German name, seeing as how it was a GSD (which are GREAT dogs, by the way). If your neighbor were a real Nazi, I think he would name it something else, like Goering or Von Fritsch. But I highly doubt he would name it after Rommel.

[LeftInTX]

11. I think it was weird that he named a German Shepherd after a WWII military guy

I would think it would be weird if he named it MacArthur.

Although I can see a bull dog being named Churchill.

Or naming a cuddly lab named Eisenhower.

I would look to see if the guy shows any pro-Nazi stuff. If you feel comfortable follow the other posters lead and ask him.
If he is just some random dude, I probably wouldn't bother.

[WinkyDink]

24. I think it's down the rabbit hole when one commences "judging" the names of pets.

[BamaRefugee]

13. My Jewish girlfriend named her Rottweiler "Rommel".

No big deal to her or her family as far as I can tell. My Maltipoo is named Bentley, but that doesn't mean I admire big gas guzzling cars. In fact I drive a Prius.
I'm gonna show her this thread and see what she says, she's always ready to share her opinion.

[ChoppinBroccoli]

14. The Explanation COULD Be Even Dumber Than You Think

In the movie "True Romance," Dennis Hopper's character has a German Shepherd named Rommel. Maybe the owner is just a fan of that movie, or simply heard the name and thought it sounded cool. Not saying you're wrong, but I tend to jump to the conclusion of "stupid" before I jump to Nazi.

[orleans]

15. i had a neighbor who had a golden retriever named brinkley

i asked him where they got the name & he said some friends suggested the name.
i told him brinkley was the name of the golden in the movie "you've got mail" with tom hanks -- so i was just wondering if that was where the name came from.

(trivia, i know, but i thought it was interesting that their friend threw the name out there and they kept it, not knowing where where it might have originated from)

[Doreen]

18. I named my beautiful German Shepherd Shultz.

After Shultz on Hogan's Heros. That is the worst I would do naming a dog.

[Dave Starsky]

22. That's a cute name for a German Shepherd.

Shultz wasn't a bad guy. Kind of an affable doofus.

If I had a GSD, I'd probably avoid all military connotations and name it something like Gustav or Lorelei.

[True Dough]

30. True story!

I grew up with a black and white German shepherd named Shultz that we adopted from another family. Great dog. Very loyal and protective (but not overly aggressive).

[Doreen]

31. My Shultz was the epitome of what German Shepherds are supposed to be like.

He was extremely smart, loved everybody of any age, knew how gentle or rough he could be with any one person, he was a lover, he did extremely well with other animals, and he was beautiful. OK, I will come clean though, cats were his bosses and he was afraid of little dogs ( that's another story ) other than that he was perfect.

[lunatica]

49. Being afraid of cats just made your Shultz smart as a whip!

If a cat puffing up and hissing while clawing the air doesn't scare you, you're dumber than shit!

[Doreen]

57. He respected cats but was not afraid of them...hell he snuggled with them.

It is little dogs he is afraid of.

[cwydro]

19. Rommel was executed by the Nazis

because he plotted to kill Hitler.

[Downtown Hound]

36. Only because Hitler was becoming more and more irrational and making bad decisions

He didn't try and kill Hitler out of some sense of justice for the countless wrongs he had done. He did so because he could see that Hitler was leading Germany to defeat through his meglomania. Rommel was perfectly content to go along with Hitler as long as he was winning.

[cwydro]

37. Ah, are you a historian?

Because there are many who say otherwise.

[Downtown Hound]

39. You spend your life being a conquerer for a despot

Who cares if you have a few private reservations? Your actions speak louder than words, and if you know something is wrong, such as conquering most of Europe and North Africa for a genocidal madman, in a way that almost makes you worse than those who are unwitting dupes. At least they think they're doing the right thing.

But Rommel only really turned against Hitler when the war started to go real bad for Germany. So...what? Am I suppose dot be super impressed because he finally mustered up some real courage in an attempt to ward off the firestorm he could see was coming?

Sorry, but ride with an outlaw, die with him. Rommel may not have been an extreme fanatic but that doesn't change the fact that he only really turned against Hitler when things were looking pretty dire for the Nazis.

[cwydro]

40. Reading some history might be illuminating for you.

but don’t let facts get in the way of your opinion.

He was never a Nazi.

[Downtown Hound]

41. I've actually read quite a bit of history, thank you

And my point is, who gives a shit? He spent his career conquering for the Nazis and only tried to kill Hitler when the war was going badly for them. People who try and excuse people like Rommel are the same ones who try and portray Robert E. Lee as some kind of saint, even though he sided with slavers, betrayed the United States, and caused hundreds of thousands of deaths to uphold a vain and immoral cause.

[cwydro]

42. Lol.

Nice twist of narrative there.

[Downtown Hound]

44. Actually, it's repeating what I said all along. n/t

[Danmel]

20. I'm just a little sensitive these days

Last edited Sun Nov 12, 2017, 10:08 AM - Edit history (1)

Rommel was still a Nazi

[Dave Starsky]

21. That's actually still debatable.

He was somewhat of an enigma.

Many higher-ups in the Wehrmacht hated Hitler and the Nazis. They had been through one horrible war and didn't want to go through another one again, particularly with a gang of incompetent crazies leading the charge.

[cwydro]

32. No, he never joined the Nazi party.

Many of the top generals never joined the Nazi party.

The Wehrmacht had many top officers who never joined.

It is an assumption nowadays that every German in those days was a Nazi. It is not true.

[WinkyDink]

23. I went to school with someone named "Adolph"---born in the US in 1947. WTH?!

[MichMary]

27. He may have been named after a grandfather or beloved uncle.

I hope he didn't get too much grief over his name.

[WinkyDink]

48. Oh, I know, relatives and all that. Still! No grief--He was well-liked, and went by a totally

unrelated nickname. Indeed, as a doctor, he still has the nickname as his formal name!

[sunonmars]

25. The further from this atrocity, the more those apologists will attempt to rewrite history

Seriously, what will happen when those who were affected are no longer around, history gets rewritten all the time by those in power, Trump is already trying to do it with throwing out baseless shit all the time.

History gets rewritten by those in power, think of how many rewrites of the bible there have been, who the heck knows what the original said.

[VMA131Marine]

33. Rommel was somewhat rehabilitated after the end of WWII

The West Germany Navy even had a destroyer named after him.

[Turbineguy]

34. What about this?

http://propertyvendors.com/property-preservation/scharnhorstgneisenau-6257

Some time ago I saw a van from this company. Who in their right mind would use that name? On the other hand, I remembered it.

[Willie Pep]

35. Rommel has a reputation as an honorable German general.

I honestly don't know how true that is because there was a lot of mythology associated with the regular German Army in World War II. It is sometimes called the myth of the clean hands or the clean Wehrmacht myth.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clean_Wehrmacht

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rommel_myth

[Pope George Ringo II]

53. It's fair to ding all of them some morally, and then you have the Guderians and Keitels

As a general statement, the standard view as I understand it was basically, "Politics isn't our business, we don't have to worry about it." That's fine as far as it goes, but there are certain standards of human decency you can't cross and remain one of the good guys. Most of the best told themselves lies about "We'll fix this after the war is over, but right now I have a job to do and my country needs me." The worst were pretty ugly, doing things like cashiering the July 20 plotters so they lost military justice protections. So many of them desperately wanted the prestige and chance at revenge offered by an expanded and modernized military, and they put on their moral blinders and insisted for the rest of their lives that they were just doing their jobs. But eschewing moral decisions doesn't actually make you moral, and can make you immoral if you go along with enough. I appreciate that morally they died a death by inches, and the guys who finally fought back really earned some plaudits. There's a reason von Stauffenberg has a street named after him. And I still can't believe we fished Hjalmar Schacht (banker unhappy with destroying the economy to fight a war) out of a concentration camp to put him on trial at Nuremburg. Having once gone along with the Nazis was something to be ashamed of at best, but a very few actually redeemed themselves.

[Kentonio]

55. In fairness Schacht was aquitted.

[doc03]

43. Pretty common name for a German Shepherd at least it is not Hitler, a friend of mine

had one named Rommel. I also know of a Rottweiler named Rommel.

[Morris64]

46. Perhaps next time you can choose to have a conversation rather than an assumption

that the people you come into contact with are horrible bigots memorializing a controversial figure in the Second World War via their pooch.

Sorry this was traumatic for you, but pull it together! I grew up next door to a family of Rommel’s. They were nice folks, treated others well.

[stevenleser]

47. That is a nasty criticism delivered safety and anonymously via the internet

The OP was face to face with the person in question.

Clearly you have never felt what it is like to have virulent bigotry leveled in your direction. Anyone who has can clearly understand the OP preferring not to engage at all rather than have their worst fears confirmed and a possible resultant confrontation.

[EX500rider]

50. "Clearly you have never felt what it is like to have virulent bigotry leveled in your direction"

Except that didn't happen here......all he knows is some stranger named his dog Rommel for reason's unknown and frankly none of his business why.

[stevenleser]

58. I never said that it did. I said that person probably didnt want

to risk dealing with that.

[Morris64]

59. You have no idea.

[InAbLuEsTaTe]

51. Sorry, didn't catch the "Rommel" part at first...

I'm thinkin' when did owning a German Shephard become so politically incorrect?! Had to re-read your post twice to see your point and, yes, it IS disturbing to say the least.

I'm guessing you're looking for a new place to have your car serviced? Hope so!

[Pope George Ringo II]

52. I once came thisclose to naming a GSD "Lorraine." It's an Alsatian thing.

Maybe he liked the Schwarzenegger-ripoff character in "Son of the Beach." Some people just have fun with dog names.

And I'm on the list of people who respect Generalfeldmarschall Erwin Rommel. He was a competent military man who was not a monster. He served his country honorably and earned a "Blue Max" for it as an Oberleutnant at Caporetto under Kaiser Wilhelm II, and was rewarded for treating the Italians with more respect than anybody else ever did in World War II. Whatever his faults during Hitler's rise to power--and he did have his share of the Wehrmacht's characteristic technocratic tunnel-vision--he died as a result of a failed attempt to save his country from the Nazis. Even with the disputes about exactly which Nazi actions he had a problem with, dying fighting Nazis is enough redemption for me to overlook a lot.

[left-of-center2012]

54. Your "very disturbing experience" is nothing compared to my life

Try living on Social Security and Section 8,
with multiple life threatening illnesses requiring me to see five different doctors.

Seriously, a dog named 'Rommel' doesn't even come close.

[EX500rider]

56. Yea I thought it was a tempest in a teapot myself...

....even if you assume the worst, it's a known fact that there are American Nazi sympathizers. Running into one is something that is possible and wouldn't faze me in the least.