Creative Footprint: The Swastika Has Hit The Fan

"Creative Footprint" encompasses, explores and examines the ways in which we and other creatures leave marks on culture and community. Created by Marc Dennis, artist, professor, Holocaust researcher, and bug chef.

In 2005, the U.S. Navy announced that a barracks complex at its Coronado Island base in Southern California will undergo more than half a million dollars in renovations because it resembles a swastika from the air. 

After aerial images on Google Earth revealed the architectural pattern a few years back, and online forums buzzed like crazy with heated discussions about the building, hundreds of news organizations picked up on it, including CNN, posted in the video below. The swastika no doubt had indeed hit the world wide fan. 

Boley Toy Corporation based in California, in the early 90's marketed what can be argued I suppose as a badly executed design for a children’s toy called “Cool Toys Racing Game.” An image of the game is on the left.

                     

Regent Products, a toy company based out of Chicago, around the same time, offered yet another badly executed design for a children’s toy called “Speed Game.” It can be seen posted on the above right. Two swastika infused toy designs about racing. Hmm...maybe I missed something in all my years of researching the Holocaust about the swastika representing speed. 

Zara Fashion recently manufactured handbags decorated with swastikas; intertwined with designs of embroidered bicycles and flowers and other non-descript elements. The interesting thing about the bag design is that it harkens to some degree to the history of the swastika as an ancient symbol. 

A Zara spokesman said: "We did not realize Swastikas appeared on some of these bags, the swastika was not on the bag which was sourced by us after being supplied by an external producer. "Of course we apologize to anyone who was offended by the bag, and we will be withdrawing it from all our stores."

Though the image of a swastika on a designer bag or as a toy design may prove to be problematic and evoke emotional reaction its usages throughout time have indeed been complex, its meanings diverse, and its visual presentations varied. 

But let's face it, the swastika simply isn't the kind of symbol that can be easily modified, interpreted or re-appropriated. Let's have a look at its history and you be the judge.

Until the Nazis used this symbol, the swastika was used by many cultures throughout the past 3,000 years to represent life, sun, power, strength, and good luck. The word “swastika” comes from the Sanskrit suastika - “su” meaning “good,” “asti” meaning “to be,” and “ka” as a suffix.

Bowl with swastika painted on the side in the collection of The Archeological Museum in Athens, Greece

The swastika predates the ancient Egyptian symbol, the Ankh. One of the earliest known swastikas appears on a pottery bowl, which was found in ancient Samarra (ancient Baghdad) and dates to about 4000 BCE. Swastikas have been found on many artifacts such as pottery and coins dating from ancient Troy. 

 

It has been seen on terracotta articles as well as ancient vases of Greece, Cyprus, Crete and Rhodes. It was a favorite symbol on the coins of ancient Greece and India. Swastikas were also found engraved on funeral urns that have been dug up in northern Italy.

All throughout history, the image of the swastika could be found in many cultures around the world, including in China, Japan, India, America and southern Europe. 

By the Middle Ages, the swastika was a well known, if not commonly used, symbol but was called by many different names in different countries.

In China it was the “wan,” in England, a “fylfot,” in Germany, a “hakenkreuz,” in Greece it was known by two names, “tetraskelion” and “gammadion” and in India, the “swastika." 

The image on the left above is called an "ayagaptha" found in this case as a carving on the interior of a temple in Mathura, India. 

Swastikas have been discovered at several locations as well in the New World. They were found in monumental remains of the primitive Mexicans and Peruvians and on objects exhumed from prehistoric burial mounds within the limits of the USA. 

Though it is not known for exactly how long, Native Americans both from southwestern and northeastern woodland tribes also had long used the symbol of the swastika. 

Even as late as the early 1900’s Native American sports teams used the swastika as their logo. 

Early in the twentieth century the swastika was still a symbol with positive connotations. The swastika was also a common decoration that often adorned cigarette cases, postcards, coins, poker chips, cards, and buildings.

Poker chips made by the United States Playing Card Company in Cincinnati, OH 

Postcard, copyright 1907 by E. Phillips, a U.S. card publisher

A postcard sent from the town of Swastika, Canada, dated June 1910

The town in Ontario  was named 'Swastika' after a lucky Gold strike in 1911. On a related note, Swastika, New York, located near the Adirondack Park Preserve in the northeast corner of the state, is adjacent to "Swastika Road." 

 The public access area of Fish Lake near Windom, Minnesota is named Swastika Beach. Swastika Park is also the name of a housing subdivision in Miami, Florida, created in 1917.  An upscale subdivision in Denver is named "Swastika Acres." Its name has been traced to the Denver Swastika Land Company, founded in 1908. 

 Pacific System Homes surfboards' first label or insignia was a swastika. This was before WWII and Hitler. The swastika at the time was viewed as a symbol in Eastern religions of peace & prosperity.  

 In the early part of 1940, because of the perverted wide spread use of the swastika, Pacific System Homes Surfboards changed their swastika label to a more popular 'Waikiki Surfboards."

In 1925, Coca-Cola made a lucky watch fob in the shape of a swastika with right-facing arms and the slogan, "Drink Coca Cola five cents in bottles."  During War World I, the swastika could even be found on the shoulder patches of the American pilots of the 45th Division that fought for the Allied forces before America's entry into the war. Below is the swastika design found on the patches of the airmen. 

In ancient times, the direction of the swastika was interchangeable. Some cultures in the past however had differentiated between the clockwise "swastika" and the counter-clockwise "sauvastikaIn." 

These cultures claimed the swastika symbolized health and life while the sauvastika took on a mystical meaning of bad-luck or misfortune, which brings us to the symbol of Nazism. Nazi Germany’s use of it has an interesting history. 

The initial association that the symbol seems to have had was that of extreme nationalism, but not necessarily associated with the Nazi Party. In the 1800s, countries around Germany were growing much larger, forming empires; yet Germany was not a unified country until 1871. 

To counter the feeling of vulnerability and the stigma of being such a new unified country, German nationalists in the mid-nineteenth century began to use the swastika, because it had ancient Aryan/Indian origins, to represent a long Germanic/Aryan history. By the end of the nineteenth century, the swastika could be found prominently displayed on nationalist German periodicals. 

In the beginning of the twentieth century, the swastika was a common symbol of German nationalism and could be found in a multitude of places. 

The emblem of the Thule Society, a German occultist and “völkish” group in Munich, named after a mythical northern country from Greek legend, was a swastika as seen pictured in the image on the left. 

By 1912, the swastika was seen in use by many “völkish” groups, and the “völkish” thought began to take on an anti-Semitic cast. 

It was popular enough that the firm of Ecklöh began manufacturing badges, tie pins, buckles, and other such artifacts incorporating the device to be sold to German citizens to display their honor and loyalty to Germany.

It was revived dramatically by Hitler when he made it the national emblem of Nazi Germany. He believed that this ancient Aryan sign would bring prosperity and victory. 

On August 7, 1920, at the Salzburg Congress, the swastika encircled against a solid colored backdrop became the official emblem of the Nazi Party. 

In Mein Kampf, Hitler described the Nazis’ new flag: "In red we see the social idea of the movement, in white the nationalistic idea, in the swastika the mission of the struggle for the victory of the Aryan man, and which as such always has been and always will be anti-Semitic.” 

According to historians, there are two ways of examining the swastika and its history as a symbol, by viewing the meanings of its two variations -- the clockwise, or otherwise Nazi version of the swastika means hate and death, while the counter-clockwise version, or otherwise ancient multi-cultured symbol, means life and good-luck. 

It really isn't all that simple though. You just can't use a swastika say on your vehicle's bumper or post one on the front stoop of your brownstone, slap one on the side of your bike helmet,  or tattoo one on your arm thinking people are going to interpret it as a symbol of ancient meaning, i.e., of luck and prosperity. The swastika as a symbol is seriously tainted. Big time. 

As an educator and artist, I certainly understand the need for educating and informing others as to its ancient meaning in an attempt to explain why the swastika, in a variety of forms exists in architecture, art, clothing, sports teams logos, as in the case of the Canadian ladies hockey team, "The Edmonton Swastikas," pictured above, or on the chest of a Buddhist statue in modern day Tibet, a country known for promoting peace. These are after all, swastikas that pre-date Nazism.

But to use it anew as a contemporary symbol equals nothing less than emotional controversy. With the internet at our fingertips, the swastika rides a mighty big virtual wave as does its potential to  harm. 

Google: "Swastika" and you'll see what I mean. Granted, there are many sites defending its origin as a peaceful symbol and in so many ways trying to convince us it's ok to continue using it, whether it's clock-wise or counter clock-wise. 

The swastika was used in ancient times and it's fine to study its historical context and subsequent meanings but to revive it for the sake of its ancient history, well, I just have to say, in and of itself that's just not a very productive stance. Nor I might add is it a noble cause. Here's why.

There are other sites, in fact thousands upon thousands of them, that do indeed continue to use the swastika - from the Nazi perspective - as an emblem of hate, serving thusly as a continuum of intolerance, anti-semitism, and racism. Neo-Nazism and its own demented history clearly claim the swastika as their own as seen in the two examples posted below. 

Curtis Allgier, a neo-Nazi from Kansas, currently an inmate in Utah has his face tattooed with many swastikas. I actually find it hard to understand how and why any tattoo parlor personnel would grant this guy so much "hate" ink to begin with. Freedom of expression? Maybe he fell asleep on a Sharpie.

Another neo-Nazi, pictured above, from behind, protesting outside the Holocaust Museum in Skokie, IL. For those of you who may not remember, Skokie, once home to thousands of Holocaust survivors, garnered international attention in the 1970s when neo-Nazis threatened to march in the streets.

The swastika in all its twisted nature as a symbol in contemporary culture, is not always for educational or informative purposes for a productive means, but rather to promote fascist ideologies, which as all educated individuals know, inevitably leads to destruction. The swastika today is regarded as a symbol of the destruction of life rather than its affirmation. Symbols are instruments of thought. And thoughts amount to actions, which are always based on intentions.

A building designed unintentionally to look like a swastika from above is tolerable. it doesn't bother me; why should it? The architect's intentions were productive or at least meant to do good. In fact an architect friend of mine said something to the effects that the "swastika" design is more energy efficient allowing for more light to travel through the space(s). 

On the other hand, an image of a swastika scrawled on the inside of a seat on the Long Island Rail Road is non productive. It's harsh. It's offensive. It's passive aggressive. It's violent. It's cowardly. It carries negative and potentially hurtful connotations.  It's just plain wrong. 

It's about as stupid as this tattoo of "Southern Justice." I mean, c'mon, why? This is just going to provoke anger, possibly violence. No one needs to see it. It doesn't do anyone any good. How can anyone really feel this much pride in hating? 

I've been studying the Holocaust for over ten years and have just come around to understanding to a great degree how Germany and occupied countries could become an industrialized unified state sponsored form of hatred, but I still find it hard to understand how an individual has it in them to just be so insensitive and intolerant. To anyone for any reason. 

So why do it? Why choose to get a hangman's noose tattooed on your body; why choose to draw a swastika on a train seat? Why choose to be that insensitive? Why hate? I know, I know it's easier to hate than to express care or tolerance. 

So, what is it? Intentions. It all comes down to intentions. Intentions matter. In almost everything we do, our intentions provide us with a significant component to our own identity. 

The swastika has its own identity and no matter its history, no matter the varying schools of thought surrounding its meaning and potential resurgence as a positive emblem, it will always remain a very graphic reminder of anti-Semitism, hatred and violence. The swastika was doomed since the Nazis adopted it, and I say, may it rest in...uh, er... peace?

Marc Dennis can be reached here.