Candidate of the National Rally in Côte-d’Or, Jean-Marc Ponelle, lawyer by profession, registered with the Paris bar, resorts to a communication which leaves, to say the least, perplexed while the party seeks to “de-demonize” itself. Decryption with Dijon Info.
In another century, in the glorious days of punk-rock, some Western artists had the genius to shock the bourgeois by adopting crypto-Nazi references during the period of economic recession following the oil shocks of 1973 and 1979.
At the same time, while the memory of the Nazi extermination centers was relatively stifled in the immediate post-war period – once the Nuremberg trials had passed in 1945-1946 –, thirty years later, a whole new generation took over the archives to exercise a historical duty. Thus, Claude Lanzman turns “Shoah” between 1976 and 1981 (released in theaters in 1985).
Joy Division spawns New Order
In this context, between punk and new wave, the group Joy Division was founded in 1976 by Ian Curtis, a singer with a dark charisma, in Manchester, England. Joy Division is the translation of the German “Freudenabteilung”, a term designating part of the concentration camps organizing the sexual exploitation of detainees by the German army.
In 1980, Ian Curtis committed suicide by hanging. The other members of the group continue in the same vein under the banner New Order, “Neuordnung” in German, the new order that the Third Reich was to impose after conquering the world. The manager of the group then regularly dismisses the controversies by saying that he ignores the meaning of the term.
Ludwig von 88 enrages neo-Nazis
In France, at the same time, the punk group Bérurier Noir attracted redskinsthe communist counterpart of skinheads neo-Nazis, with titles with explicit anarchist, communist and anti-fascist references. Producing many avatars, the group saw the departure of a guitarist, Olivier “Olaf” Felingstone who founded in 1983, with Laurent Manet, Ludwig von 88, always evolving in a punk spirit but this time tinged with fantasy and derision.
As time goes by, the piling up of references to name a formation becomes more complex. “Ludwig von” refers to the passion of Alex, a young, ultra-violent character in the film “A Clockwork Orange” by Stanley Kubrick (1971), for the German composer Ludwig von Beethoven.
’88’ is nothing less than the numerical encoding of ‘HH’, the H being the 8th letter of the alphabet, in turn meaning ‘Heil Hitler’. This time, the reference is assumed by the members of the group who see there a way of annoying both the petty bourgeois and the fachos. The first concerts being regularly animated by clashes between skins and redskins.
Prohibitions of certain number combinations in Germany and Austria
If England or France tolerate the musical exploitation of these encrypted references, it is not the same in Germany or Austria, countries deeply bruised by the Nazi regime.
Since the racist riots that occurred in 1992 in Rostock, a city of the former GDR, the authorities have been sifting through and banning crypto-Nazi titles and groups.
Seeing signs creeping in everywhere to help supporters recognize each other, Austria decided in 2015 to ban a series of coded messages on vehicle license plates. NSDAP, SS, 18 (“AH” for “Adolf Hitler”) and, of course, 88. In Germany, HJ (“Hitlerjugend”, Hitler Youth), NS (short version of the NSDAP) and KZ (“Konzentrationslager”, camp of concentration) are also banned.
The “sign of the devil” contravenes the “de-demonization” of the RN
In terms of communication, a fortiori political communication, integrating the scope of these references is therefore of great importance. At a time of “de-demonization” of the National Rally, a party that is trying to shed its far-right label like some with a band-aid on the face or chewing gum under the shoe, why lawyer Jean-Marc Ponelle he retained “jeanmarcponelle88” as the identifier of a campaign email? (read the press release)
Asked by Info Dijonthe RN candidate for the legislative elections in the fourth constituency of the Côte-d’Or confirmed that he had “no connection” with the Vosges (88th French department), having chosen “the first number which [lui ] went through his head” and confess that he saw there “possibly the sign of the devil” (the “number of the Beast”, being however, in the Apocalypse, “666”).
The lawyer registered with the Paris bar opened the account “well before the legislative elections” and chose the numbers himself since, with the service provider in question, the similar identifier with 86 or 87 is available.
After Mélanie Fortier’s “hesitation” during her first televised debate, on May 8, during the local program “Sunday in politics” on France 3 Bourgogne-Franche-Comté (find the article), after two substitutions of candidates at short notice (read our article), this communication error confirms the accumulation of dark clouds over the campaign of Marine Le Pen’s party in Côte-d’Or.
Jean-Christophe Tardivon
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