Hitler's Cross in Bombay or Mumbai, whatever you wanna call it

The 4500 Jews who live in Bombay/Mumbai are up in arms metaphorically over a recently opened restaurant bearing the name Hitler's Cross.

When Hitler's Cross restaurant opened four days ago in a Bombay suburb, local politicians and movie industry types were on hand to celebrate beneath the posters of the Nazi leader and swastikas.

Wow, so all those politicians and movie industry types must be anti-Semites right? Well, actually sounds like all of India must be anti-Semitic based on the amused response to the restaurant:

But while India is ordinarily sensitive to causing religious offense — recently taking action to bar "The Da Vinci Code" movie and cartoon drawings of the prophet Muhammad — at least one local leader said the name Hitler didn't bother him.

"People are unnecessarily making this into an issue," said Sudhir Jadhav, a local ruling party leader. "We have no plans to protest outside the restaurant or ask him to change the name."

Diners were also quite happy eating in Hitler's Cross.

Now, one must also remember that the swastika existed long before Hitler, and he certainly didn't buy the rights to it, so of course it's common to see swastikas everywhere in India. But that's not really the point--is it okay to use Hitler's image in this way? I wouldn't do it, but I certainly wouldn't be against other people doing it--whatever attention it attracts them is what they deserve.

The only thing that struck me as a bit ethnoreligiocentric was one Jew's reaction the article quotes:

"It's really made people very upset that a person responsible for the massacre of 6 million Jews can be glorified," Elijah Jacob, one of the community's leaders, told The Associated Press on Wednesday.

Okay... I get not wanting to glorify someone who killed lots of people, but by saying it has made people upset that someone who killed a lot of Jews is being glorified sounds like Jacob is saying that well, if he had killed any other group of people, we wouldn't have a problem with that. The only legit reason to protest is that it's because this man was evil, not just because he focused on one group of people. Following that logic, we'd have to declare el Busho on the Axis of Evil, or maybe he is the Axis of Evil, but I don't think most people are quite ready to do that (give us 10-15 years).

Anyway, one college student sums up the situation nicely:

Engineering student Anand Dhillon sat with friends, sipping soft drinks. "I think the name is quite interesting. Tomorrow if someone keeps a name like Saddam Mutton Shop or George Bush Footwear, there's nothing wrong with that, is there?" he shrugged.

George Bush footwear--I like the sound of that.