The June newsletter for the Hamilton County, Indiana, chapter of Moms for Liberty included Adolf Hitler’s famous quote from a Nazi rally in 1935 on the front page: “He alone who owns the youth gains the future.” Since the group is opposing government indoctrination in the public schools, the substance of the quote was not inappropriate, but never mind: the agents and operatives supporting such indoctrination both freaked out and encouraged the public to freak out as well.
After all, the Southern Poverty Law Center, itself an extremist “hate group” by its own standards except that its hate is directed at conservative organizations and therefore is the acceptable variety, had designated the nonprofit Moms for Liberty as a hate organization in its annual Year in Hate & Extremism report for 2022, claiming that it advocates an “anti-student inclusion agenda.”
The Indianapolis Star pointed to the use of a Hitler quote as confirmation of the SPLC’s diagnosis, so the Moms for Liberty tried to explain, adding to its online version of the newsletter, “The quote from a horrific leader should put parents on alert. If the government has control over our children today they control our country’s future. We The People must be vigilant and protect children from an overreaching government.” When that didn’t calm the controversy, chapter chair Paige Miller posted an apology to Facebook.“We condemn Adolf Hitler’s actions and his dark place in human history. We should not have quoted him in our newsletter and we express our deepest apology,” she groveled.
The damage, of course, had been done.
The ethics botch here is incompetence. It is an unfortunate but frequent circumstance that many activist groups with important missions lack the skill, wit, experience and common sense to avoid undermining their cause with poor choices and foolish missteps. When a powerful propaganda organization like the SPLC has called you a racist hate group and the President of the United States has declared that conservatives are fascists, it would be wise not to quote Adolf Hitler no matter how applicable his words are to the matter at hand. Others who didn’t murder 6 million Jews have made similar statements about the importance of directing the passions and values of the young.
The chapter might have been able to defend its choice if someone in the leadership had the rhetorical skills to explain that the use of Hitler’s quote was reasonable and apt, since it is the current government that is trying to co-opt the role of parents just as Hitler did. Obviously, Moms for Liberty had no leaders with such abilities. As a result, it clumsily managed to link itself to Hitler and Nazis, playing right into their foes’ narrative. The SPLC and its fans may be the real fascists in this struggle, but at least they have the sense not to quote Nazis.
Ethics Alarms 
Oddly enough, that entirely appropriate HITLER QUOTE surfaced not too long ago…
When I saw the headline on my news feed, I didn’t have to click on the article to know what the quote was. It was something like “Moms for Liberty spokesperson quotes Hitler”. Technically true but designed to propagandize.
The quote is apt in context of indoctrinating children. Nevertheless, conservatives must know they have a swastika target on their backs so it would behoove them to stop using this particular quote.
People should be reminded that Nazis were socialists. So any swastika should be emblazoned on their sleeves.
Every one of these is attributable to Vladimir Lenin
“Give me your four year olds, and in a generation I will build a socialist state.
Give me just one generation of youth, and I’ll transform the whole world.
We can and must write in a language which sows among the masses hate, revulsion, and scorn toward those who disagree with us.
The way to crush the bourgeoisie is to grind them between the millstones of taxation and inflation.
Why should freedom of speech and freedom of press be allowed? Why should a government which is doing what it believes to be right allow itself to be criticized? It would not allow opposition by lethal weapons. Ideas are much more fatal things than guns. Why should any man be allowed to buy a printing press and disseminate pernicious opinions calculated to embarrass the government?
One man with a gun can control 100 without one.
The press should be not only a collective propagandist and a collective agitator, but also a collective organizer of the masses.
The best way to destroy the capitalist system is to debauch the currency.
Medicine is the keystone of the arch of socialism.
The establishment of a central bank is 90% of communizing a nation.”
How are these sentiments any different than the Democrat party agenda?
I will point to the Indianapolis Star as an organization that practices Lenin’s quote about the role of the press.
Because neither the Jezebel link nor the Star included any contextual frame of reference, using only the quote is like saying people that drive Volkswagens belong to hate groups.
“How are these sentiments any different than the Democrat party agenda?”
They aren’t Chris, but let us not forget how passive, mealy-mouth, and downright complicit, a large number of traitorous rinos are. No incentive to change because inattentive gullible and oftentimes just plain stupid citizens continue to vote them into office. Isn’t that special.
Isn’t it funny how Democrats and lefties could blithely call Trump Hitler not only with impunity but to the wild applause of their fellows?
Democrats/leftists all subscribe to the Goebbels stratagem, which is: Always accuse others of doing that which you’re actually guilty of doing. It explains why they always accuse others of being Nazis when they themselves embrace so many tenets of Nazism.