The Second World War still holds the top of the pavement of the traumatic events to which we refer to read what happens to us.
While in France comparisons with the German Occupation marked the first confinement, to describe the strange spectacle of queues in front of food stores. Recently, the use of the term “curfew” has rebounded this rhetoric of historical anachronism.
In the United Kingdom, it was “the spirit of the Blitz” that was called upon to stimulate national unity in the face of the epidemic, while Boris Johnson liked to compare his policies to that of Winston Churchill. A comparison that reactivates a myth, according to the historian Bruno Cabanes, already active in the propaganda of the 1940s, to paint a people stoic and united in adversity subjected to the campaign of bombardments of the English cities, with a slogan which the public authorities had however given up at the time under the bombs: ” Keep calm and carry on “.
A world war also called in the United States, where the spread of the virus was baptized “Pearl Harbor moment”, in reference to the Japanese attack which justified the entry into war of the country in 1941. A two-way analogy since the invasion from abroad, which is more Asian, corresponded wonderfully with the xenophobic accusations against this “Chinese virus” launched by the president in office, in search of culprit to mask the popular distress neglected by the State.
In Germany, it is the fight against Nazism that is called to protest against the restrictions on public freedoms justified by the health crisis.
A reference analyzed by Anne-Coralie Bonnaire on the site The Conversation, which calls for vigilance in the face of the “trivialization” of Nazism. In recent protests against masks and health restrictions, one group in particular, the Querdenkers, refer directly to it. At the end of November, the emotion was strong when a young demonstrator spoke to denounce a dictatorship of the government, a “Merkel-Diktatur”, by comparing herself in the same movement to Sophie Scholl, who animated with her brother the White Rose , a group of German resistance fighters executed by the Nazis in 1943, in Munich.
This inappropriate statement followed that of a child this time, who had publicly referred to Anne Franck to describe her confinement.
Anne-Coralie Bonnaire comments with irony this mobilization of the past: “Nowadays, democracy and freedom of expression prevail: the proof, we have the right to make crazy historical comparisons without risking anything, while Sophie Scholl, she , knew what to expect. The transcripts of his interrogations by the Gestapo leave no doubt about it. It is as if, tomorrow, a lambda anti-mask compared to Jean Moulin. However, Jean Moulin risked death and knew it; the lambda protester only risks being ridiculed – and does not know it “.
Liens :
- Anne-Coralie Bonnaire, Germany: when covidoscepticism leads to the trivialization of Nazism, The Conversation, 10/12/2020.
- Bruno Cabanes, We are not at war!, The story, 01/09/2020.
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