The New Rockstars Need A Lesson In History And Geography

The pretentiously-named geek website, The New Rockstars (“What The Internet Cares About Right ****ing Now!”. By which they mean male internet users in the United States between the ages of sixteen and twenty-six), recently uploaded a video to their YouTube channel examining all of the supposed “Easter eggs” and movie references in the new J.J. Abrams’ reboot, Star Wars: The Force Awakens. Aside from the irritation of an incredibly chirpy American speaking incredibly chirpy Americanese, to the point that I wanted to throw my Surface across the room, what grated the most was a comparison between the fictional imperial state presented in the Star Wars franchise of movies and the Nazis. It’s not that I disagree with the comparison, as facile as it is. No, what made my heart sink was the map accompanying the commentary, one claiming to show the globe after World War II (1939-45), and illustrating the movement of Nazi refugees from Europe to South America in the 1940s. Because the map was actually an invented one, an early 20th century socialist hope that the British Empire would become a “Federation of Workers’ Republics” in the years leading up to World War One (1914-18). The fact that no one in the production team or any of the five million viewers on YouTube spotted the glaring historical and cartographic mistake made me so angry that I actually did throw my Surface across the room (or from one end of the bed to the other where it bounced with rather more force than I was expecting, eliciting a distressed squeaking noise from somewhere in my throat).

All I can say is… Arrrrgh!