'The gesture speaks for itself': German newspaper blasts Elon Musk’s 'Hitler salute'

21 January

Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk – who is one of President Donald Trump's top advisors — went viral on Monday for throwing up a gesture described by a fascism expert as a "Nazi salute." Now, a leading German newspaper is criticizing both the gesture itself and the American press for trivializing it.

In an op-ed published in Tuesday's edition of Berlin's Die Zeit newspaper, journalist Lenz Jacobsen said it was clear that anyone "who raises their right arm in a sweeping and diagonal manner several times during a political speech in front of a partly right-wing extremist audience is doing the Hitler salute," and that there was "no need to make this unnecessarily complicated." He added that terms like "allegedly" or "similar" or "controversial" were also unnecessary in describing what happened.

"The gesture speaks for itself, it is documented in the video," Jacobsen wrote in German. "Anyone who then wants to reinterpret it, anyone who does not want to see the Hitler salute, does so on their own account."

Jacobsen lamented that the future was "foreseeable," writing that "neo-Nazis and right-wing radicals can interpret the stretched right arm as a gesture of fraternization and encouragement." He also predicted Trump and Musk's more "well-meaning supporters" would view the salute "as an escalated gesture of celebration."

"Everyone else is faced with an impossible choice: Either ignore the taboo being broken and thus contribute to its removal. Or mark it as a taboo violation and thus produce outrage, which the other side then takes pleasure in and gets worked up about," he wrote. "One can complain about this, but one must probably expect that a significant part of humanity now sees scandalizing the Hitler salute as nothing more than virtue signaling."

After the video of Musk's salute spread on social media, hate groups — as Jacobsen predicted — viewed the gesture as a show of solidarity with their cause. Andrew Torba, who founded the far-right social media platform Gab (where the Pittsburgh synagogue shooter was radicalized), responded by writing: "Incredible things are happening already."

"I don’t care if this was a mistake. I’m going to enjoy the tears over it," neo-Nazi leader Christopher Pohlhaus posted to Telegram.

Click here to read Jacobsen's essay in Die Zeit (subscription required).

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