Do you worry about guitar graphics and the potential meaning?

[guitar_player4_2_0]

When I was about 16 I really, really, really wanted one of those Dime Dixie Rebels. The not-quite-an-ML pointy deal with a big confederate flag blazed across the front. I even old school inkjet printed out a picture to lust after and put it on my wall. I never had enough back then to afford one and in retrospect, oh man am I glad lol.

I picked up an LTD Iron Cross like 5 years ago before prices went nuts and I really dig it. I like the sound, the specs, the way it plays, and I even like the aesthetics, save for the actual Iron Cross. To be honest the metal one on the body bugged me so bad I found a sticker that matches the finish really well and covers the holes perfectly and ditched it. I don’t even like Elvis that much but it works lol.

I don’t consider myself “woke” or whatever you’d say, but that Iron Cross really bothers me, and I’m kinda surprised they still sell that to be honest. I’m sure James didn’t have any ill will or anything like that, kind of strange why they put it on there though. I know it’s based on Uncle Milty, the old Gibby Custom, but even that had it. I just don’t dig it.

Kinda like those Jeff Hanneman guitars with the SS or whatever inlays. I can see how it could seem cool, but I’d never play that shit in public. Anyone have any guitars like that or know of any other good examples?

 

[ZLE]

History isn't there for us to like it or not. It is there for us to remember our mistakes and (hopefully) repeat them less frequently. If you don't like the cross,or the confederate flag visually, that's fine. But if you wanna be politicaly correct for the sake of being correct, where do you draw the line. The iron cross is much older than 1933,its basically the Templar cross, but black, rather than red. Do you feel uneasy when you drive your Mercedes or BMW? Cuzz they supplied the engines of the German planes in WW2. Do you feel uneasy, when you use your Hugo Boss perfume? Cuz they made the SS uniforms...
You put a picture of Elvis instead. Well Elvis had a 60s Mercedes 600S,exactly the model that EVERY communist and/or military dictator had aswell. Do you care if u see Vikings or Pirates themed guitar? Cuzz believe me they killed a lot of innocent people and now we make a children's attractions out of them
Peace!

 

[MetalDestroyer]

You purchase racist symbolism ima assume you’re racist. I’ve had a 100% success rate with this assumption so far

EDIT: if you defend racist imagery you’re telling on yourself

 

[narad]

I don't understand this "History isn't there for us to like it or not. It is there for us to remember our mistakes and (hopefully) repeat them less frequently". Am I supposed to think of a swastika or a lynched black man on a guitar as a learning experience for everyone? It's a poor argument.

As is the one about all the other things that come from war, which is an appallingly poor argument. Do you not have any understanding of the semiotics or the degree of association of these things? The intention of driving a mercedes is not about endorsing the Nazi party. It is to say I need to get from point A to point B, and I am very fancy.

My personal take is a lot of these things show at best an ignorance and lack of respect for the people involved, or at worst, an endorsement of the acts or party.

Ultimately I think it comes down to both your intent with the imagery, and what is a reasonable interpretation of the imagery. And so the only point raised in the above post that I think is interesting is why viking ships and things of that nature would be acceptable, but a swastika is not. There is so much time between now and the Viking age that precisely that -- we have commercialized them, and mythologized them. When people get weirdly fetishy about vikings, it's not the raping and murder that they're admiring. It's the masculinity, and the brotherhood, and the exploration of the unknown, and of man against nature, etc. But you know, if you're there in Paris in 850 trying to sell Viking merch, I think it would not be viewed in a kind light, in the same way a swastika today would not be well received when painted on a guitar.

Anyway, the other thing I dislike about some of this is the "hiding in plain sight" nature of it. I had a friend in college who was multiple generations American, but ethnically German, German last name etc. He used to think Nazi memorabilia was cool and would collect stuff like that, and try to talk about how it's historically important. But then when he's drunk he's ranting about Aryan skull shape and how a Reich-based government would be better than what we have now. I mean, use your commonsense when trying to think if people are using these symbols in reasonable ways.

 

[Nightside]

In the early 00s they had this squire strat with a badass graphic but it said OBEY on it. I didn't know what the symbolism meant or what or whom it was instructing the viewer to obey so I never got one because I didn't want to buy it and turn out I'm flashing around some kind of fascist or cult symbolism without knowing it. I think I also saw some graphic somewhere else that had what I swear looked like Andre the giant but in some kind of Mussolini style print that also said OBEY. Weird shit.

 

[KnightBrolaire]

I'm so fucking tired of people conflating the iron cross with nazi shit. It's a military medal that was in service long before the Nazis took power. The Bundeswehr still uses the iron cross as their emblem ffs.

I don't think Hetfield liked the symbol because of a supposed nazi connotation. A lot of biker gangs have co-opted the iron cross and I'm willing to bet that's more the reason he wanted it on a guitar, as he had a whole "outlaw biker" phase.

To quote the ADL: " In the United States, however, the Iron Cross also became one of several Nazi-era symbols adopted by outlaw bikers, more to signify rebellion or to shock than for any white supremacist ideology. By the early 2000s, this other use of the Iron Cross had spread from bikers to skateboarders and many extreme sports enthusiasts and became part of the logo of several different companies producing equipment and clothing for this audience. Consequently, the use of the Iron Cross in a non-racist context has greatly proliferated in the United States, to the point that an Iron Cross in isolation (i.e., without a superimposed swastika or without other accompanying hate symbols) cannot be determined to be a hate symbol. Care must therefore be used to correctly interpret this symbol in whatever context in which it may be found. "

Iron Cross

Learn how white supremacists adopted the neo-Nazi Iron Cross, and the new meanings (both positive and negative) that came from the new adaptation.

extremismterms.adl.org

Hanneman was a cringe ass wehraboo like Lemmy. Totenkopf and ss runes are very blatant nazi imagery and having them on a guitar is beyond gross, especially if you know anything about the Totenkopf/Waffen SS.



Elvis also had a BMW 507 convertible. I saw it at the Munich BMW museum.

 

[cthsqd]

It's not easy to draw a line between things acceptable and not. Everytime you want to go to the edge of good taste there will be people who dislike it, and think ill of you. It's up to you how far you would like to go.
Having a tattoo on a forhead "I"m an idiot" might be really cool, as it would prove the owner has balls made of pure steel..

 

[ZLE]

Again, where do you draw the line? And how do you ignore the imminent point of view? OK, we are guitar players, so here is a guitar player example: ESP Kamikaze. The Kamikaze fighters are perceived completely different in Japan and US. A US person can easily see the guitar as a not-so good taste example (I probably would),but for me is a bad ass guitar. Let me get back to Iron Cross. Lemmy was definitely a nazi simpatizer. James made an Iron Cross Gibson, cuz he was fan of Lemmy(same way he bought white V, cuz he was fan of Michael Schenker). I would argue that he couldn't care less about the many meanings of the cross,or the meaning that Lemmy implied. Then we come into the equation , that are fans of James, we want a guitar like his and we don't see a difference between iron cross and EET FUK sticker.

 

[Nightside]

I'm so fucking tired of people conflating the iron cross with nazi shit. It's a military medal that was in service long before the Nazis took power. The Bundeswehr still uses the iron cross as their emblem ffs.

I don't think Hetfield liked the symbol because of a supposed nazi connotation. A lot of biker gangs have co-opted the iron cross and I'm willing to bet that's more the reason he wanted it on a guitar, as he had a whole "outlaw biker" phase.

To quote the ADL: " In the United States, however, the Iron Cross also became one of several Nazi-era symbols adopted by outlaw bikers, more to signify rebellion or to shock than for any white supremacist ideology. By the early 2000s, this other use of the Iron Cross had spread from bikers to skateboarders and many extreme sports enthusiasts and became part of the logo of several different companies producing equipment and clothing for this audience. Consequently, the use of the Iron Cross in a non-racist context has greatly proliferated in the United States, to the point that an Iron Cross in isolation (i.e., without a superimposed swastika or without other accompanying hate symbols) cannot be determined to be a hate symbol. Care must therefore be used to correctly interpret this symbol in whatever context in which it may be found. "

Iron Cross

Learn how white supremacists adopted the neo-Nazi Iron Cross, and the new meanings (both positive and negative) that came from the new adaptation.

extremismterms.adl.org

Hanneman was a cringe ass wehraboo like Lemmy. Totenkopf and ss runes are very blatant nazi imagery and having them on a guitar is beyond gross, especially if you know anything about the Totenkopf/Waffen SS.



Elvis also had a BMW 507 convertible. I saw it at the Munich BMW museum.

I mean I'm sure there are people sick and tired of the swastika being conflated with nazi shit because it's been in use for long before the WW2 era. Unfortunately the nazis loved their swastikas and iron crosses so now they are both symbols associated with them.

 

[wheresthefbomb]

I'd say the iron cross is an example of a contested symbol. historically it may not have that connotation, but it's a lot like norse/"pagan" imagery that has been co-opted (and in some cases wholly invented invented) by white nationalists.

one of the ways a "sign" or unit of meaning is assigned significance is by common convention. If people are using a symbol to signify a certain thing (allegiance to nazi ideals) and that significance has mainstream recognition, even if it didn't always mean that, then when people see it they are very likely to assume the person sporting it also has that allegiance. So, while I wouldn't say the iron cross "is a nazi symbol" any more than mjolnir or othala, I think it would absolutely be a mistake to represent either without thinking very carefully about what the mainstream associations of those symbols are and whether/how one is willing to engage with that.


We have a local "heathen" group and while I'm sympathetic to their plight and fairly certain that most of them aren't nazis, a lot of their iconography reads as borderline nazi shit and that's just bad PR no matter how you slice and dice it. I personaly don't buy into the whole "we can't let nazis ruin everything" line. Like yeah, that's a nice thought, but what are you gonna actually do about it? Repping the shit anyway and saying "but I'm not a nazi" whenever anyone is justifiably confused or turned off by it isn't enough IMO and is actually worse because it does nothing to defuse the passive interpretations that absolutely will be made and has the real-world effect of inreasing the visiblity of white nationalist symbolism. Not to mention the fact that amerikan Asatru/heathenism was basically invented by crypto-nazis as a way to get their "religious" literature into prisons as a recruitment tool, but that's a rant for another day. (google else christensen and stephen mcnallen if you're interested in that particular rabbit-hole)

EDIT: visibility, not visitibility of white nationalist symbolism lmao. I mean I guess it's visitible but please do not.

 

[narad]

Again, where do you draw the line? And how do you ignore the imminent point of view? OK, we are guitar players, so here is a guitar player example: ESP Kamikaze. The Kamikaze fighters are perceived completely different in Japan and US. A US person can easily see the guitar as a not-so good taste example (I probably would),but for me is a bad ass guitar.

It's a good example because anyone who knows this history of kamikaze wouldn't be celebrating either side of it. It's like when people get kanji tattoos and never bother to read up on what it means, just an ignorant thing.

 

[Zhysick]

Only thing I have to say is:

If there are 5 people sitting at a table and one is a fascist, there are 5 fascists sitting at a table.

 

[ZLE]

And that applies literally for every group of humans that self-identifies themselves in some way, ever. Since we humans exist, we love to divide ourselves to "us" and "them". Even 200 000 years ago, the people in the cave on the other side of te hill were "them"...

 

[thraxil]

In the early 00s they had this squire strat with a badass graphic but it said OBEY on it. I didn't know what the symbolism meant or what or whom it was instructing the viewer to obey so I never got one because I didn't want to buy it and turn out I'm flashing around some kind of fascist or cult symbolism without knowing it. I think I also saw some graphic somewhere else that had what I swear looked like Andre the giant but in some kind of Mussolini style print that also said OBEY. Weird shit.

This strat? https://reverb.com/uk/item/76074699-squier-stratocaster-2006-special

The design was by Shepard Fairey: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shepard_Fairey who also did the "Andre the Giant has a Posse"/"OBEY Giant" sticker/stencil campaign that you also saw: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andre_the_Giant_Has_a_Posse

FWIW, I actually have a couple signed Fairey prints in our flat because in the late 90's he was my partner's roommate in SF and she's held onto them.

 

[MASS DEFECT]

I like camo patterns on guitars. I worry that the camo pattern belongs to a racist genocidal army (African desert fox camo used by the Rommel forces) or just a regular kill-by-the-numbers army (US desert storm camo).

So to be safe, I just stay with Olive Drab. Less tacky, too.

 

[OmegaSlayer]

Don't use imagery that others use
Make your imagery if you really have to
But keep in mind that every kind of imagery will offend someone

 

[Zeppelinskies]

No - I don't worry about it at all. I'm a huge Hanneman fan and own all of his available sig models including the S&Key. I am also a half jew married to an Indian woman, and have mixed race kids. Saying that however, I wouldn't play them in public. Not because I care what people think of me (I really don't) but I wouldn't want to upset someone for whom those symbols have a very negative meaning. People can see them in my house when they come over, and tbh no one has ever cared, because anyone who knows me knows that I'm not a nazi / fascist / racist whatever. I'm just a lifelong Hanneman fan.

And I would judge others the same; on their character.

I do draw a line at the dixie though, not because I think it's racist, but it's just an ugly guitar.

 

[wiretap]

You purchase racist symbolism ima assume you’re racist. I’ve had a 100% success rate with this assumption so far

EDIT: if you defend racist imagery you’re telling on yourself

100%.

 

[Zado]

If you feel somehow offended by symbols I might show in my guitar, then tell me and we can discuss, or otherwise don't listen to my music if it please you more.

 

[SalsaWood]

There's a 1000% chance you give more of a crap about how a guitar looks than the sig artist does. They're more into practicing and playing shows than being gear nerds or PR agents. Ya know, real life stuff, which is why they're the pros and we're having an almost entirely irrelevant convo about guitar stickers or graphics and politics.

A lot of folks who get offended at shit like that are either taking themselves too seriously or are giving another person's opinion way too much credit by default. Both are moronic and the guitars are ugly, congrats.