The Hitler Story
Sometimes memories just hit you out of nowhere. There’s no trigger for them to appear, but they show up at your brain’s front door uninvited with a suitcase and a baby, barging in and saying, “We really need to talk.” This happened to me yesterday. I remembered the time I learned about the Hitler salute.
“My god, you’re ugly.”
I remember watching Superman: The Animated Series every Saturday when I was a kid back when Kids WB was a thing and life was slightly less miserable than it is now. Although I’ve always been a Batman fan first and foremost, I still enjoyed watching Superman’s adventures. In one episode, Superman’s enemies were some rogue Kryptonians who followed a militant philosophy. I can’t remember anything about the episode except that the salute those Kryptonians made was the same as the Hitler salute. Of course, I would pretend I was Superman and his enemies (because my IMAGINATION is so large) while I played inside. One day, my mom was in the room and, with excellent posture, performed a Hitler salute. She saw this and told me not to do it. I couldn’t understand why, since it was just from a kids’ TV show.
“Imaginaaaaaaation!”
You know those “A-ha!” moments we all have a few times in our lives? Years after the incident described above, I finally learned about Hitler in history class. I was told about the atrocities this man had committed, how he was pure evil… and all I could think was, “So THAT’S why Mom didn’t want me doing that salute!” The moral of the story is that I miss the golden age of the DC animated universe. I think I might go watch Batman Beyond after I’m done with my midterms.
