The BBC reports on the European Union being urged to ban the swastika after Prince Harry got caught last week brandishing one on his arm:

The EU has been urged to ban the swastika because of its Nazi associations with hate and racism. But the symbol was around long before Adolf Hitler. The swastika is a cross with its arms bent at right angles to either the right or left. In geometric terms, it is known as an irregular icosagon or 20-sided polygon.

The word is derived from the Sanskrit “svastika” and means “good to be”. In Indo-European culture it was a mark made on people or objects to give them good luck.

It has been around for thousands of years, particularly as a Hindu symbol in the holy texts, to mean luck, Brahma or samsara (rebirth). It can be clockwise or anti-clockwise and the way it points in all four directions suggests stability. Sometimes it features a dot between each arm.

I am not exactly sure what they hope to accomplish by banning the twisted swastika symbol. Won’t that just serve to make it more appealing to the racist fringe groups that use it to separate themselves and pursue an anti-establishment agenda? And what about the non-twisted versions that had another meaning far before the Nazi’s came to power?

Nowadays it is commonly seen in current and ancient Hindu architecture and Indian artwork, including the ruins of the ancient city of Troy. It has also been used in Buddhism and Jainism, plus other Asian, European and Native American cultures.

The British author Rudyard Kipling, who was strongly influenced by Indian culture, had a swastika on the dust jackets of all his books until the rise of Nazism made this inappropriate. It was also a symbol used by the scouts in Britain, although it was taken off Robert Baden-Powell’s 1922 Medal of Merit after complaints in the 1930s.

Probably what is most unsettling to me is what brought on this discussion of a ban. Was the swastika not worthy of being banned until it found itself on the arm of a “Royal?” Only the Sydney Morning Herald seems to look past the picture and examine the deeper issues:

Every so often, something happens – an investigative documentary, a social worker’s report into the murder of a child – that lifts the British carpet to show the stamped-down filth. This is such a moment. While Harry’s costume was shocking, it seems equally astonishing that, in 2005, there is a section of society in which it is not considered odd for a teenager to throw a party with the theme of “colonial or native” and at which, according to some reports, young male guests blacked up their faces. The implication of much coverage is that Harry misjudged the party mood, but perhaps he merely took the nasty theme to its logical conclusion.

Equally perplexing is the revelation [the majority of Nazi uniforms only came in small] of the range available at Maud’s Cotswold Costumes [where Harry rented the costume]. Given that the Nazi kit was presumably not stocked just in case a prince of the realm wished to perpetrate a monstrous moral gaffe, the question arises of just who would hire it in normal circumstances. This calculation is made more complicated by the owner’s quoted claim that the SS outfits “all come in small sizes”.

Unless school theatre clubs or amateur dramatics groups for people of restricted growth are constantly putting on productions of Colditz throughout Gloucestershire, then it must be assumed that fancy-dress parties at which people wear Nazi uniforms are common in middle England, and that the chaps favouring this rig tend to be quite little. (This would be historically consistent, as few of the leading figures in the actual Nazi party were at risk of banging their heads on the ceiling.)