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Agnosticsherbet

(11,619 posts) Fri Jun 12, 2015, 09:54 AM Jun 2015

Nazi 'perfect Aryan' poster child was Jewish

Nazi 'perfect Aryan' poster child was Jewish

When Hessy Taft was six months old, she was a poster child for the Nazis. Her photograph was chosen as the image of the ideal Aryan baby, and distributed in party propaganda. But what the Nazis didn’t know was that their perfect baby was really Jewish.

“I can laugh about it now,” the 80-year-old Professor Taft told Germany’s Bild newspaper in an interview. “But if the Nazis had known who I really was, I wouldn’t be alive.”

Prof Taft recently presented the Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial in Israel with a Nazi magazine featuring her baby photograph on the front cover, and told the story of how she became an unlikely poster child for the Third Reich.

The photographer wanted to make the Nazi's look ridiculous, which he did.

This is a great snippet of history.

4 replies

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Nazi 'perfect Aryan' poster child was Jewish (Original Post) Agnosticsherbet Jun 2015 OP

Not the only one. DetlefK Jun 2015 #1

While the photo being used as it was is uncommon, German Jews looking "aryan"/"teutonic" is/was not. stevenleser Jun 2015 #2

There's a marvelous scene in Exodus where Paul Newman asks an antisemite, "I have something in my leveymg Jun 2015 #3

My Wife's parents were holocaust survivors. Agnosticsherbet Jun 2015 #4

DetlefK

(16,423 posts)

1. Not the only one.

Reply to Agnosticsherbet (Original post)

Fri Jun 12, 2015, 10:08 AM

Jun 2015

I read an article about a year ago about a guy who was born as part of the "Lebensborn" breeding-program of the Nazis. Blond, blue-eyed, hailed as a perfect example of an aryan child. Hitler posed with him as a baby for a photo. After the war it turned out that he was partially jewish.

stevenleser

(32,886 posts)

2. While the photo being used as it was is uncommon, German Jews looking "aryan"/"teutonic" is/was not.

Reply to Agnosticsherbet (Original post)

Fri Jun 12, 2015, 10:13 AM

Jun 2015

My father who is a holocaust survivor had to deal with a lot of closeted neo-nazis over the years approaching him upon learning he was from Germany and giving their "world view" and "opinion of Jews" (including that Hitler should have finished the job) because he looked/looks like a blond haired, blue eyed aryan. He was/is so light haired his eyebrows cannot be seen without coloring.

leveymg

(36,418 posts)

3. There's a marvelous scene in Exodus where Paul Newman asks an antisemite, "I have something in my

Reply to Agnosticsherbet (Original post)

Fri Jun 12, 2015, 10:34 AM

Jun 2015

eye, can you see it?", right after the buffoon Major Caldwell has said he can "tell a Jew from a mile away." Caldwell gets closer and closer, while Newman (who is and played a Jew) smiles as his smug superior officer gets the old evil eye.

Agnosticsherbet

(11,619 posts)

4. My Wife's parents were holocaust survivors.

Reply to Agnosticsherbet (Original post)

Fri Jun 12, 2015, 11:17 AM

Jun 2015

I enjoy a story that illustrates how hollow the Nazi belief system was.

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