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Hudson restaurant closed today due to threats over the Nazi re-enactors who had dinner there over the weekend
By adamg on Tue, 10/15/2024 - 1:16pm
Kith and Kin in Hudson announced today:
After last night's news airings, our restaurant has been the target of increased harassment and threats.
Therefore, for the safety of our staff, we will unfortunately be closed today, Tuesday, October 15.
On Saturday, after a local museum held its annual reenactment of a European World War II battle, several participants, still dressed in costume - including two in German uniforms - went to the restaurant, where they had dinner reservations.
As word spread online - one patron posted that on seeing Nazis sit down to dinner, he walked out - the restaurant apologized and said it should have insisted on the "Germans" changing their uniforms.
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Comments
Fed by Bluesky?
I read those threads in the previous post on this subject. What a bunch of sanctimonious twats! I guess it's the new home of Cancel Culture.
When you become the thing you object to being signified, like the Internet Tuff Guy who said he would punch them out in the previous thread.
You know this how?
I know this might interfere with your enjoyment of your state of high dudgeon, but please, do reveal your source.
Wait
Are we under the impression that the threats came because the Nazi cosplayers were seated, and not because the restaurant apologized for seating them?
Any other uniform would likely have gone unrecognized
If they'd been in British, French, Italian, or even Soviet uniform, few people would have taken notice. But Wehrmacht uniforms with the eagle and swastika logo, almost everybody knows -- the bad guys wear them in every World War II movie.
The Chilean army today still parades with similar uniforms, including the iconic German Stahlhelm steel helmet, even goose-stepping to the very same marches the Germans played. There are no swastikas, but watching the Chileans, you'd be forgiven if you thought you were in Berlin in 1939.
In fairness to Chile, those
In fairness to Chile, those are all traditions they adopted from the Prussians and Imperial Germany well before the Nazis came to power.
Mean while in Quincy . . . .
Brown Shirts have quietly taken over part of the city with little media coverage.
Shocking!
https://sites.google.com/qfos.org/presidents-trail-camporee/home
Thanks for noticing us?
I mean, I don't particularly enjoy the "brown shirt" connotation though tan is a shade of brown but it was a fantastic weekend of experiencing American history, performing service and enjoying the fellowship of 1,000 fellow Scouts and Scouters.
There was some media coverage: https://www.boston25news.com/news/local/presidents-trail-scouting-campor...
On the other hand, I'm not sure I saw any press coverage of the 100 inning baseball game that was taking place at the field next to where we camped, I believe raising money for ALS research.
Now we've certainly strayed off topic but our event also had historic reenactors and historically themed musical ensembles, like the Middlesex County Volunteers Fifes and Drums, but none from the losing side of history was represented there.
Scouts do good work helping develop young people.
I'm glad to see them getting back on track.
At our level
working directly with youth members, I'd say we were never off track!
I'd be lying if I said that no impacts have been felt at the unit level from the issues that our overarching organization has been grappling with, but we've never stopped delivering on our mission to prepare young people to make ethical and moral decisions throughout their lifetimes, and to develop in them leadership, character, citizenship and fitness.
Who's next?
Volkswagen drivers?
https://www.businessinsider.com/elon-musk-volkswagen-nazi-origins-alyssa...
my stars
this is brand new information /s
Sent from berkleealum’s Jetta
sure
if they have arm bands with swastikas on them, which was the actual problem. Are you not aware that people who identify as nazis and neo nazis are in MA? That they're threatening synagogues, hospitals, schools, mayors? It's an actual problem so cos players willing to wear nazi insignia while having dinner might be upsetting (since you need to be informed that they are in fact cosplayers) or that the restaurant is super cool with swastikas? It's not the German part that is offensive - eat a brat, drink from a stein, wear friggin leaseholder while jamming to a tuba playing next to your VW bug - who gives a s*&t? Nazis were at Jan 6, Mara Lago for dinner, Trump rallies this week.
So?
The soft drink Fanta, the Olympic torch run, and the predecessor of the Saturn V moon rocket were all invented by Nazis. That doesn't make those things themselves Nazi.
Plenty of people who detested the Nazis bought VW Beetles, even though the car was designed after a sketch by Hitler himself.
Plenty of people believed
Plenty of people believed that you could make green diesel too.
Springtime for hudson.
Springtime for hudson.
"Stochastic terrorism?"
Maybe we shouldn't throw that term around so much here.
If you believe in the concept (I don't) this incident would fit into the parameters which have been set.
Maybe "we" should be less dismissive
Maybe "we" should be less dismissive of concepts that are beyond our grasp.
The sound of your ax grinding is really impossible not to notice.
You keep using that phrase
I do not think it means what you think it means.
Nobody's calling two guys in Wehrmacht uniforms stochastic terrorism, because that's not what that phrase means.
A deranged presidential candidate using Nazi phraseology to demonize people who don't support him, knowing from experience that could lead to mass murder in a country full of high powered weaponry? That's what that phrase means.
what's the word for wilfully missing the point? obtuse?
I'm not talking about the reenactors as stochastic terrorism, of course, and you know that.
I'm talking about the framing of them- "at the end of Yom Kippur" and the sanctimonious critical publicity on Bluesky as "stochastic terrorism."
https://www.universalhub.com/2024/stochastic-terrorism-childrens-hospita...
https://www.universalhub.com/2023/stochastic-threats-salem-satanic-temple
In which you assert that truthful or critical commentary on events is "stochastic terrorism" because it excites rando kooks to call in bomb threats.
We had commenters here threatening to punch the reenactors out - maybe they called in the threats.
Again, I don't believe in the concept, it's a propaganda term, but want to point out the hypocrisy.
Again, that was me you're fainting over
That you have taken what I said personally is something you should look into.
Or, wear a swastika out of context. FA if you want to FO.
Also, weirdly triggered guy - You are the only person in the story or this comment thread saying anyone called in a bomb threat.
The lady doth protest too much, methinks.
Try again
I realize "stochastic" is a funny, weird word, but concentrate on the "violence" part for a moment. When I've used the phrase in the past, I've meant people who are basically pushed out of their own little orbits to do something that is either actually violent or threatens violence - to use local examples, like that lady in western Mass. with the mental-health issues who was convinced by Libs of TikTok to threaten to blow up Children's Hospital (followed the very next day by that guy in Texas who basically threatened to have a Fenway Health doctor carved up).
Nobody is saying the LARPing Wehrmacht officers in Nazi regalia sitting down to dinner at a restaurant were committing or even threatening to commit violence. That doesn't mean going out in public with swastikas on your German uniform isn't offensive, but there's more than a slight difference between that and calling in a bomb threat to a hospital.
let us continue to remember
the real victim of the rising undercurrent of fascism in the United States: the guy who is just asking questions
a moment of silence please
The proximity to the High
The proximity to the High Holidays gives me pause, but these are historical re-enactors and we are rational, we are strong. Heartache to heartache we stand.
Were there any survivors present? If so, I’m sure a family member from that table would say something and the Axis re-enactors would have very graciously turned their shirts, or blouses inside out.
Beware the dominant paradigm. That is to say, is this a matter of sensitivity, or intolerance and the desire to control others?
https://www.thecrimson.com/
Also, there are actual swastikas being plastered in animus by bad actors around Harvard Square.
The high holidays made it seem very weird
How does that happen? The whole thing seems like bait.
A true historical reenactment would understand context. Also, these costumes are expensive. It seems Suss that they would eat and drink without changing.
You're assuming that a
You're assuming that a survivor or their family member would be comfortable approaching a group of men in Nazi uniforms, and asking them to please take off their insignia.
Not everyone is comfortable asking men who walk into a restaurant in Nazi uniform "please take that off, it's upsetting to my Holocaust-survivor mother." Because not all of us believe that someone in that uniform is neither an actual Nazi, nor someone who thinks it's fun to "trigger" people by dressing up that way.
Possible that
The restaurant staff felt the same way and would rather just hope they eat and leave quickly instead of confronting someone.
Telling someone they need to leave is a fraught conversation, especially if they are part of a group that might make a scene.
tl;dr
people felt wrong; they are invalid, how dare anyone be intolerant of nazis (and nazi cosplayers) rights?
Not everyone is as insensitive as you.
And I'm not going to play 'ignorant or evil' with someone proudly wearing a swastika.
Are people genuinely
Are people genuinely distressed by seeing re-enactors, or are people motivated to police others?
"Graciously Turn Their Shirts Inside Out"
So many things obtuse things wrong with this statement, "High Holidays" doesn't even enter into it.
1. As if only the direct survivors of the holocaust should get pissed off when people in nazi cosplay parade around in public wearing swastikas? For starters, I guarantee you that almost every Jewish person in this country has family members that were slaughtered by nazis, and even then, its not going to be only Jewish people that get pissed off by nazi cosplay in a Metrowest restaurant.
2) As if people proudly parading around in public in nazi cosplay would "graciously turn their shirts or game blouses inside out" because a holocaust survivor accidentally showed up. No, these people are the ones who go to Trump rallies wearing a "f*ck your feelings" t-shirt, they're not going to "graciously" do anything because they likely have zero empathy for anyone else. Let's remember, they are in a public business, proudly wearing nazi uniforms that they bought with their own money.
I’m open to seeing it as a
I’m open to seeing it as a mistake to dine in re-enactment garb, especially if it is found they knowingly violated their own guidelines, and their motives, if any, become known, but my first reaction is still my first reaction: that it would be a gift to the imagination to see these individuals and a low-key cautionary tale (another gift) to see where we may be headed.
Maybe I am insensitive, I didn’t grow up in a Jewish family, though I question if my mom’s mom’s family hid their Jewishness in Germany and England, I don’t know, but now I live in a Jewish family and I’ll ask how they feel about this.
I can see being bothered by this, but I still feel like we should be governed by reason and this tempest in a teapot is an expression of our lower selves, namely our fear and our drive to control our environment and other people and we should not feed and laud our fears. What happened to distress tolerance?
Seems at least as likely (if
Seems at least as likely (if not much more so) that the threats are coming because they apologized for seating people in Nazi attire, since it’s the Trump party that fumes at apologies, especially for something so many of the GOP love to do (fly confederate flags or wear nazi uniforms to go out to eat).
I feel for the resturant
It's a sucky position to be in. I fault the actors, not the management of the establishment.
Exactly. How could people who are into history enough
to cosplay it on weekends not be aware of the impact of wearing Nazi uniforms out in public, especially at a moment when the Gibbering Orange Baboon is echoing Nazi hate speech and racist tropes? Did you see the cult boat parade a few days ago flying Nazi flags?
Spare me the notion that the restaurant and other patrons are overreacting.
Totally agree. The people
Totally agree. The people dressed in Nazi uniforms, if people are claiming they are just so interested in the details of history, would know to take off their uniforms when they finished playing. They knew exactly what they were doing. Anyone who derives pleasure from dressing as a nazi is at least partially sympathetic to their cause.
Boat parade?
No, I missed that entirely. Was it out in the harbor, or on the Charles, Mystic, or Neponset river?
"The Ultimate Trump Boat
"The Ultimate Trump Boat Parade" was held at the Jupiter Inlet in Jupiter, Florida.
Not exactly in the Greater Boston Area. /snark
That boat parade was organized by and
starred one of the Large Adult Sons, not sure if it was Uday or Qusay.
"But they're reenactors!"
The (extremely convoluted) argument being advanced seems to be that reenactors are so very much into their thing that they should be held blameless for the impact of their costumes on the public -- that, indeed, the idea that such a thing would even occur to them is unreasonable. The problem with this argument is that anyone who is that much of a stickler for authenticity is not going to sit down to dinner with someone wearing the uniform of the opposite side.
I think this is bait.
They wanted to cause a stir.
agreed
I think this is just more boundary-pushing. As long as you stay juuuuuuust on the "plausibly deniable" side of the line, you can pull the "who, me??" thing (or your allies can) and pretend like the people calling out the bullshit are the ridiculous/aggressive ones.
Not that there's anybody here who does that. Of course not.
I second that
The restaurant suffers while the idiots who wore their outfits to the restaurant go on with their lives.
To be clear, the reenactors should not be facing threats. They definitely deserve criticism.
Even the museum says the
Even the museum says the “living historians” actions were repugnant (from the Globe):
The museum said the reenactors’ decision to wear the uniforms was “repugnant.”
“At a time when acts of anti-Semitic violence continue to rise, when neo-Nazis have taken to the streets, and the horrors of the Holocaust continue to be denied, wearing German uniforms in a public space is beyond thoughtless, it’s repugnant,” the museum said. “These uniforms were meant to be used in the context of an historical reenactment designed to educate a new generation as to what American GIs confronted and defeated some 80 years ago.”
On the other hand...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yO2eXXtKMys
https://nypost.com/2024/10/16
https://nypost.com/2024/10/16/us-news/dimwitted-tiktokker-tore-down-gree...