As taken from the A&E website description:
This documentary takes you inside to an actual neo-Nazi Skinhead organization for a extended look at the methods and mentality that fuel the White Power youth movement in America. Focusing on the Alabama-based Aryan National Front and its leader, Bill Riccio, this special features behind-the-scenes footage of group members in their rural commune, at a series of White Power rallies, at a cross-burning Skinhead/KKK "Unification Rally," and on the brink of extinction following the arrest of Riccio.
Along with my psychology degree, I've been toying with the idea of another in sociology. Shows like this intrigue me; not necessarily my reaction to the topic, but how people come to conclusions, like this, in which the Aryan race is the supreme of them all.
I know that I used to believe (back in my Sunday-only Christian days) that 99% of Skinheads were radical Christians, which was one major turn-off to the entire faith for me. I studied (gosh, how nerd-alerty am I?) groups like this later on, and upon watching this show, within the first five minutes, the main leader, Riccio bowed down to pray. Thankfully, the caption at the bottom proceeded to inform viewers that he was not praying to the Christian God, but the Norse God, Odin. Odin, in short, is considered to be the god of wisdom, war, battle and death.
Now, this interested me further. Because I know that many skinheads see lynching as a means to halt the growing African American population, I wondered where that started. I read further about Odin and his followers and came across this quote in an article referencing Odin:
People assembled from all over Sweden....Male slaves and males of each species were sacrificed and hanged from the branches of the trees.
Another quote on Odin:
His main objective seems to have been to track down and kill the
forest creature huldran. In these accounts, Odin was typically a lone huntsman, save for his two wolves. Originally, he was armed with a spear, but in later accounts this was sometimes changed to a rifle.
A huldran is a sneaky creature who happens to be completely black when not luring moral people to have sex with them. I wonder if this plays into this White-Power movement against African Americans.
Also, because the Skinheads look up to Hitler, and his picture was displayed throughout the "safe-haven" of the southern Skinheads, they obviously don't love Judaism. In fact, a quote directly from one of the leaders:
You know, if I'm going to hell, I want the job where I can hold a pitchfork and stab all the Jews that enter after me.
I wondered what the connection was to Odin and Germanic culture, relating to Hitler, so I looked that up. In a 13th century collection of Old Norse poems, several passages had Christian elements to them. Basically, Odin hangs himself for sacrificing and has his side pierced with a spear, which some-what resembles the crucifixion of Jesus. However, because Odin was hung by a rope from the tree and Jesus was nailed to a cross, the only similarity is that both were made of wood. History suggests that early Germanic Christians connected the story of Odin and the crucifixion of Jesus and saw them as the same. This theory is supported by poems depicting Christ as a Germanic warrior-king.
Around the time of World War II, Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung released an essay on Richard Wagner (German essayist) and his comparison of Jesus and Odin's simiarities. And, just recently, the National Democratic Party of Germany released tee shirts declaring "Odin statt Jesus" (Odin rather than Jesus). Statistics show that they are more popular with the extreme right and Neo-Pagans, which sort of dismantles my previous naiveté on White Power groups and their seemingly overwhelming radical Christian population.
Let me just clarify that in no way do I agree or sympathize with this White Supremist movement, I was only curious as to why Odin was worshipped, when it seems these groups are often labeled as extreme/radical Christians.
Wow, if you read all that and wasn't bored to death with my rationalizing, congratulations? It's 2:37am right now, and I should be sleeping....but I wanted to hash all that out...let me know your thoughts.
Ciao.
Credits:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Odin#Germanic_neopaganism
http://www.ststlocations.com/Archives/Scandinavian/Folklore/
http://www.pantheon.org/articles/o/odin.html
http://www.experiencefestival.com/a/Odin_-_Medieval_reception/id/596862
http://www.answers.com/topic/german-christians
http://www.reference.com/browse/wiki/Odin
4 comments:
wow.
super interesting. i have always been curious about idiot skinheads as they were unfortunately linked to the early underground punk/ska scene (not bred from it). super interesting.
and thanks for welcoming me to the bloggity blog world.
and that's right...
i said super interesting twice (now three) times.
Well I do but it's not a problem to where going a week or so without it will destroy me. I enjoy it to relax.
But hey! If you're ever in town we should get coffee sometime or just chill. I remember the halloween night when we sat around pestering poor bradley. Poor, poor bradley...
I came across your blog via Google. I, myself, am a Norse Pagan who worships Odin, though I'm not part of any particular modern Norse religion. It's really bugged me a lot that there are white supremacy groups that claim to also follow the same gods as me. After research I've found that their draw to Odin is because of their draw to their culture. Nazis were big on their heritage, and that included the religion. I think this is the only reason. I've never come across anything racist in the myths or the sagas. In one of the texts, Odin emphasizes that hospitality to strangers and travelers is important, which I'd assume would include travelers from other lands.
In the culture of modern Norse Pagans I've found it common to be proud of your ancestry, but most Norse Pagans I've come across don't feel anyone is better than anyone else due to their ancestry. The reason for ancestry focus is the strong emphasis on family in the religion. I think some don't understand that, and thus wrongly decide it'd be good for supremacy.
As far as the human sacrifice - I'm not sure that data is correct. I've seen no academic sources backing that up. I wouldn't be surprised if there was animal sacrifice, though, since that was common then for almost all cultures, including being mentioned in the Old Testament.
Also, the slaves mentioned during the historical Norse culture were other European white races (and *if* I remember correctly, their own people sometimes), which was a common thing throughout Europe. Also, I've seen slavery mentioned in the Bible, too, so it's in their history, too.
Luckily, most of the world seems to have grown out of those practices.
As far as why supremacists are mistaken as always being Christians, I figured that came from the KKK and the burning of crosses. I really don't know much about them and figured the supremacists in the south were Christian just because of the stories of cross burnings. Maybe since that's become such a well-known association with a supremacy movement, people assume all white supremacists are Christian? Just a thought.
Whether their religion is Christian or some form of Norse Paganism or something else, I find it really sad that they don't actually follow the teachings of the god(s) they claim they are following and instead twist the religion in some way to use it as an excuse to do the opposite. Hopefully people realize those people do not properly represent the religion they are claiming.
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