No, he did not. And most certainly he did not even attempt to do so consciously. It was his political symbol and he would be the last one willing to demonize it, he selected it personally for his party. Indeed his party, the NSDAP (National Socialist German Workers’ Party) were in the 1920’s and 1930’s the ones who did more to promote this symbol in Europe than anyone else. Who wants to demonize his own symbol? Even when they were desecrating Jewish tombstones or synagogues, they were rather not painting swastikas on them but the Star of David. Do we ourselves demonize our own symbols, our national emblems and flags? It is the perception of Nazis as enemies that dictates negative attitude to swastikas among us. But Hitler died more that 66.5 years ago, so he is even unable to demonize anything anymore.
Did Stalin “ruin” the five-pointed star? Hardly. And after all, the total number of victims of Communism (not only in the USSR but worldwide) is considered to be a multiplicity of those believed to be killed by Nazis. Nevertheless we do not see even the slightest trace of any “ruination” of the symbol which is still present both in flags and emblems of many countries. The Americans alone have 50 five-pointed-stars on their own national flag, not to mention many of their state flags. Such stars are almost everywhere. To this day Americans sing a song about the “Bonnie Blue Flag that bears a single star”, they did not discard it because someone “ruined” (LOL!) the star.
Even more striking in this connection is the case of the Sickle and Hammer of Communism. Unlike the swastika with its thousands of years of history and multitude of meanings, the sickle and hammer came to being, as a symbol, relatively late and stood only and exclusively for one social and political system. They never stood for any particular religion or philosophy, neither did they symbolize revolutions of celestial beings nor they did represent any stellar constellations. They were also never used as a sign of “good luck”… And yet, contrary to the swastika, they are neither outlawed nor stigmatized the way the swastika is. How can this be if war-crimes alone are supposed to almost guarantee the destruction of a public image of a symbol to an extent that is beyond any possible argument?
The most direct answer to this question is: propaganda and law.
The only respect in which the swastika was “ruined” after WW2 was – and is – it’s prohibition in a number of countries. Because it is precisely that prohibition that made the sign disappear completely from public places. But is it really any kind of “ruination”? By the same token one could maintain that “Hitler ruined Wagner” as Wagner’s music was also prohibited in some countries after WW2. But it did not mean that “everybody” hated that music, did it? One only needs to ask oneself why on Earth would you forbid anything that is so “ruined”?
No, Hitler definitely did not ruin the swastika. He might have at most contributed to making it unpopular but even this unpopularity is not going to last forever.
It is the propaganda perpetrated by OUR media that has tried hard to imprint the negative image and attitudes among us, not the “Völkischer Beobachter” or Dr Goebbels… It was the Czechoslovak special services in 1959 that painted the first swastikas on walls in Western Germany as a sign of “the rise of Nazism”. If now anyone (contrary to the original Nazis) paints them e.g. on tombstones, one could well ask: which sort of bastardized Nazis – or simply anti-Nazis – do such things? And the question is the more justified the more examples of cases solved show us that it is only people from those two groups who do this. And our “free” media grab the opportunity to further slam the symbol itself. No “Hitler” will fine you today in Europe or throw you into jail because of a swastika, but other people will do. And they are certainly not Nazis either, rather anti-Nazis (one could even assume that if any modern “Hitler” had to punish anyone because of this sign, it would rather be for an inappropriate, vile use of it…).
Personally, even if I consider myself tolerant also to Nazi flags, I do not support any use of the symbol for strictly political purpose of any sort, like an emblem of a political party (albeit I do not mind promoting it for cultural reasons, also as a symbol of whole ethnic communities) – no matter on which side of the political spectrum. And I do not support it for ONE and ONLY one reason: in order for us to avoid in future the similarly low, degrading brainwash we are experiencing now. Let us look briefly at one recent example of this silly and furious negative propaganda.
Have you noticed what one of the persons quoted said?
“Let me be clear. It is the most hateful symbol in our culture, and an insult to any civilized person.”
Well then, we are apparently uncivilized, according to him. It is not quite clear to me which culture he referred as “ours”. Because in our culture this symbol exists whole millennia longer than the Bible… (on Polish soil alone the oldest known swastika is approx. 5000 years old, in the Ukraine even 12000 years old). It does not seem to bother that Jewish man that even Jews themselves use swastikas from time to time as this example proves
A few years ago several movie stars lowered themselves to the level of “Inglorious Basterds”, where it was seemingly “correct” to have a fun cutting a swastika onto someone’s forehead or to bash his head with a baseball bat. That was fine and lavish celebrations of that gutter-like trash were prepared for “premieres”. But a couple of ear-clips with a swastika mean “anti-Semitism”. Those 2 different examples themselves can serve as 2 poles of one and the same delirium.
But even such extreme examples bear hope in themselves. Both Nazism and the post-war hysteria in regard to swastikas generated at most a controversy. And controversy itself signals interest in it’s subject. It is especially visible when, after decades, the controversy broadens and intensifies.
Let us be frank: even 100 various “Hitlers” (or rather their propaganda-made version) would not destroy any pre-historic sign that has it’s continuum counted in millennia.
Just look at the internet: it is virtually swarming with swastikas, publications on swastikas and even whole websites devoted to this symbol. And all this takes place at the moment when swastika is supposedly “ruined”? More and more often the ban on swastikas is publicly contested, more and more often they appear despite the ban. All this coupled with the growing desperation of the ban supporters tells us that we are now most likely witnessing the last stage of the ban itself.