On Convincing Grandmother that Hitler is Alive and Well
When I called her to inform her that Hitler was alive and well, and was living on the south coast of England, she was delighted.
My Grandmother had the good luck of being born just a few years before the outbreak of the Second World War in an Allied country which History has proven to be in the right. I only regret that she was not born several years earlier and in Germany, where her moral fortitude might have been tested in some significant way. It is said of those who carried out murder, rape and torture during the war that, had they been born in some other time or place, they would have led respectable lives, or, at the very least, ones free of extreme blemishes. My Grandmother, saturated with British war propaganda from an early and malleable age, was never presented with any significant opportunity to weigh up the arguments of each side so that she might reach the correct conslusion independently.
In many ways, had she decided at the age of seven to ally herself to the National Socialist Party of Germany, I might hold greater respect for her. It would, at least, have signified that she was a principled woman willing to risk her life and that of her family, rather than a guileless citizen disposed to believe anything and everything the State told her. Is this not, after the all, the same credulousness of character which led millions of Germans to accept the systematic persecution of Jews in their home country? When we look closely, there is very little inherent difference between the Blitzkreig Briton, eking out his ration stamps to support the war effort, and the SS guard tearing children from their mothers.
One has to suppose that there exists a morality which suspends itself above historical events, and that, when we pass from this life to the next, we will be judged not on what we did, but what we might have done. Fearing that my Grandmother, having never proven her moral worth, might be destined for eternal damnation, I decided to design a moral test in which she might demonstrate the goodness of her character. The test was facilitated somewhat by her declining mental state, and the little contact which she receives from the outside world. She owns no television, receives no newspapers, and only hears from her family when they telephone her to ask for money. This dependence on the rest of the family for information on current events meant that, when I called her to inform her that Hitler was alive and well, and was living on the south coast of England, she was not only delighted to find that I was not calling her for money, but accepted the news with little skepticism:
— Did Hitler not die a long time ago, Bill?
— No, Grandmother. They discovered that that information was false. In fact, he is alive and well.
— I should think he is very old now.
— Yes, but recent advances in medicine have allowed him to retain his youth and vigour.
I explained that Hitler had sought asylum in Britain towards the end of the war, and had been granted it by the British Government on the condition that he cease his political activities, and did not disclose his true identity for the next seventy years. This, I said, was the reason that his cadaver had never been found following his supposed death.
— But, was he not a very bad man, Bill?
— That is actually a common misconception, Grandmother.
In order to replicate as best I could the conditions of Hitler’s propaganda campaign in Germany, I explained to Grandmother that Hitler’s poor reputation had been fabricated by a group of people called Aglins, and that this group was responsible for all manner of political ills which we were facing today.
Grandmother has a particular dislike for some her neighbours, a family of Liverpudlians who regularly park the cars which they buy, refurbish and sell, in front her her house. In order to provide Grandmother with an object towards which she could direct her hate, I identified these Liverpudlians as pertaining to the Aglin community. Having never travelled north of Leamington Spa, she was willing to accept that these Liverpudlians pertained to the imaginary, peripatetic race which I described.
— I wondered, Bill, why they spoke like that.
Hitler, I said, had become naturalised citizen of the United Kingdom and was running for the next general election. If elected, I said, he would ensure that the Anglin community disappeared. —But where would he put them? asked Grandmother. I told her that it was no concern of ours, and that all that mattered was that they should be gone, and that we should be free of their meddling in our affairs.
In this brief space of around ten minutes, I had successfully exposed my Grandmother’s susceptibility to propaganda. But Hitler, lest we not forget, was raised to power via the democratic process, and my Grandmother would remain free of eternal damnation until she decided to vote for him.
I informed her that the elections had been brought forward, owing to the enormous popularity of Hitler, and that if she wanted to vote him in, she would have to do so immediately. This, I explained, could be done via the new method: Instead of visiting the polling station, she would have to write Hitler’s name on a piece of paper and place it on one of the pigs she keeps in her back garden. At midnight, a government official would come to collect it and her vote would be counted toward the tally. This, I said, would ensure the total elimination of the Agni community from England.
Grandmother informed that she would consider it, but the moral test would remain incomplete without verification of her vote. At 6 o’clock the next morning I leapt the fence of her terraced house and approached the sty.
Aquinas tells us that the chief pleasure of Heaven is observing those who suffer in Hell.