The photo you see here was taken in Penang, Malaysia. What is notable about it, of course, is the sticker you see just below the headlights, for that symbol is one of the most maligned and misunderstood symbols in the history of the world.
No, the motorcycle didn't belong to a skinhead or other neo-nazi. At least I very much doubt it. People of that persuasion don't tend to live in places like Penang. Rather, it likely belonged to either a Hindu or a Buddhist, for they are the people most likely to display the swastika, despite what we in the West tend to believe in view of history as we have come to understand it.
I came across the photo earlier today and decided it would make a good subject. Therefore, a bit of the real history of the swastika:
The swastika is an ancient symbol that has been used for over 3,000 years. Artefacts such as pottery and coins from ancient Troy show that the swastika was a commonly used symbol as far back as 1000 BCE. During the following thousand years, the image of the swastika was used by many cultures around the world, including in China, Japan, India, and southern Europe. By the Middle Ages, the swastika was a well known, if not commonly used, symbol but was called by many different names. Today it is primarily knows by the name swastika.
The word "swastika" comes from the Sanskrit svastika - "su" meaning "good," "asti" meaning "to be," and "ka" as a suffix. It is generally considered to be a symbol representing the constant evolution of time and consciousness, and is also used as a good luck symbol.
The symbol was in no way controversial until 1920, when Adolph Hitler decided that the Nazi Party needed its own insignia and flag. For Hitler, the new flag had to be "a symbol of our own struggle" as well as "highly effective as a poster." Before that time, during World War I, the swastika could be found on the shoulder patches of the American 45th Division and was even on the Finnish air force patches until after World War II. Because of the Nazi's flag, the swastika soon became a symbol of hate, anti-semitism, violence, death, and murder.
While this usurping of a symbol is the probably the most startling example, there are many other symbols, and even words, that have taken on new meaning and usage over the years. One example is the peace symbol.
In 1958, British artist Gerald Holtom drew a circle with three lines inside, intending the design to be a symbol for the Direct Action Committee Against Nuclear War (DAC). The design incorporates a circle with the lines within it representing the simplified positions of two semaphore letters (the system of using flags to send information great distances, such as from ship to ship). The letters N and D were used to represent nuclear disarmament.
Less than ten years later the symbol was appropriated by the Hippie movement as a more general symbol of peace and love. Few know the actual origins of the symbol, and the John Birch Society, a hateful, extreme right wing, white supremacist organization in the United States labelled it the foot print of the American chicken.
The appropriation of symbols, however, never seems to draw the ire of the hoi polloi in the way that appropriation of words do. The most immediate example that comes to mind is the word gay, which, until the early '70's was merely an adjective meaning bright and showy, which I suppose is how it came to be used as a word for homosexuals, bright and showy being common stereotypes of gay males.
At about the same time, a new, pejorative use was visible in some parts of the world. In the UK and Australia this connotation, among younger generations of speakers had a non-sexual derisive meaning equivalent to rubbish or stupid (as in "That's so gay."). I encountered this usage in Australia when a friend of my stepdaughter used it frequently at dinner one night. We admonished her about gay bashing, and she was perplexed as to why we were saying those things, to her it had nothing to do with sexual orientation. Live and learn.
