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Comment by meragrin_ | Hacker News Reader

I can't take any source seriously when they push a clearly false narrative. Nazi helmet? Those tattoos look nothing like Nazi helmets. If anything, they look like US WW2 paratrooper helmets, but that obviously does not evoke the same sort of reaction they are looking for.

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That is straight from the report from the Loyola Law School.

And? They obviously have an agenda if they cannot tell a Nazi helmet from another.

Have you heard the term "bikeshedding"?

Well, it's straight from a citation from Loyola Law School. Following the citation takes us to Maya Lau's article titled, "Inked with a skull in a cowboy hat, L.A. County sheriff’s deputy describes exclusive society of lawmen at California station"[0]. This article makes no mention of The Executioners or the tattoo they use. For that you need to look at another LA Times article titled "After decades of problems, new allegations surface of a secret clique within L.A. County Sheriff's Department".[1] If we find the relevant quote in that article here's what we get.

"Aldama described a tattoo on his calf as a skull with a rifle and a military-style helmet with flames surrounding it. On the helmet are the letters “C P T” for Compton."

So at some point "military-style" was switched to nazi. I don't know why, but since there's apparent conflict let's do our own research. Googling Nazi helmet gave me plenty of images, and they generally have a large flare on the back and the brim turns up. The helmets also seem to typically have badges on the side and I didn't see any that had a band on them like in the tattoo. I think these helmets look far more like the type worn by US troops in the Vietnam war.

[0](LA Times) https://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-palmdale-sheriff-t...

[1](LA Times via Archive.is) https://archive.is/gNquP

Who then came home and brought all of that to US streets.

Where did you even come from? Absolutely nothing to with my comment, the comment above mine, or the one above that. I'm talking about helmets and issues in how Loyola cites their sources, not the effects of the Vietnam war on domestic policing. Go make your own thread if that's relevant to the article but you won't get a good discussion here.

You're right. See my other comment in this thread but it seems like Loyola changed the quote where it initially said 'military-style'. Personally the helmet reminded me of helmets worn in Vietnam but they definitely do not match the design used by Nazi's in WWII.

People who know a lot about the exact appearance of Nazi uniforms are sorta showing their whole ass, imho.

How hard is it to perform an internet search for 'Nazi helmet'? I personally thought the tattoos looked like US army helmets so I did the search to see what a Nazi helmet looks like. Well, it is obvious the "researchers" never performed that research.

Given that a lot of war movies try to have the uniforms correct, I think that anyone who likes to watch war movies will have a good idea how uniforms of bygone wars looked like.

That is obviously a much larger set of people than closet Nazi admirers, even in the U.S.

And the previous poster might be an European from a country once occupied by Nazis, or even Germany, where such knowledge is part of the historic memory.

Most Czechs with at least elementary history knowledge could distinguish Nazi helmets from other ones at first sight; the Stahlhelm is a very distinct design and it is part of a very dark memory for us. It had some innocent uses too (Austrian firefighters or Chilean cavalry, IIRC), but it is tainted here forever.

So, history buffs are nazis? And just when I thought I'd heard it all...

We've reached https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Godwin%27s_law

"By all means, compare these shitheads to Nazis. Again and again. I'm with you."

Mike Godwin, https://twitter.com/sfmnemonic/status/896884949634232320

No, Nazi insignia buffs are far more likely to be (or sympathise with) Nazis than random people. It's a real problem anong historical reenactors (who are otherwise awesome imo, nothing cooler than living history.)

I think that correlation is backwards.

I don't know if you intended it this way, but to me your comment reads like you're promoting ignorance and making baseless accusations

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