mauser,
As John pointed out, the Luger is not necessarily a Nazi pistol but used by Nazis, among others. While presenting a Luger I do not react to other paraphernalia being present, granted they have a relevance to the pistol itself. What struck me here was the fact that the background was the swastika and nothing else. As such I regard it as a symbol of an oppressive political ideology, not as an historic artefact. A flag or an NSDAP button with the swastika would not raise any of my eyebrows.
That being said, I totally respect that other board members feel differently and choose to display pictures like the ones above. I do not expect our excellent moderators to remove it, nor do I expect JonWalther to delete his post - on the contrary. I just wanted to voice my opinion for whatever it is worth.
Living in a country that was occupied by Nazi-Germany for more than five years, I guess I do have a sore toe or two. My grandfather spent more than a year in a Nazi concentration camp, his brother was tortured to death by the Gestapo, two of my uncles were imprisoned and heavily tortured and the Gestapo did their very best to kill my father - with Lugers and Mausers. My presence here is living proof that they missed. But I still own seven Lugers and several other German guns.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." Voltaire (Fran�§ois-Marie Arouet), 1694 - 1778
Regards,
Balder
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