Indiana school board candidate under fire for saying “all nazis weren’t bad”

A school board candidate in Indiana is under fire for a Facebook comment saying, "All Nazis weren’t ‘bad.’”

In September, a community member asked candidate Dr Matt Keefer about whether teaching certain subjects like the Tulsa race massacre, or declaring all Nazis were bad, would strike him as indoctrination.

"All Nazis weren’t ‘bad’ as you specify. They did horrible things. They were in a group frenzy in both cases you site,” he responded. "Who is to say if we were both there in the same place and time, that we wouldn’t have done the same thing?"

Dr Keefer, a local anesthesiologist according to LinkedIn, continued and argued that we can’t judge the past by present-day standards, suggesting we might someday see mainstream thinking on Covid the way we understand Nazism now.

“In 10 years, we may look at Covid the same way,” he continued in the Facebook comment. “The people that hated the unvaxxed and hoped they died, the people that lost their jobs because they wouldn’t get vaccinated, the people who thought everyone should stay 6 feet apart, wear masks, and save some unknown 95-year-old from dying by staying locked in their home.”

Community members were outraged by the comments.

"For somebody to say that Nazis were not all bad and historically was represented as one of the worst atrocities of all time, I just couldn’t fathom," Hilary Heffernan, whose children attend Zionsville schools, told WTHR.

"It’s very difficult for us every time we hear that word. It’s very difficult for us to deal with because it brings a lot of painful memories for our family and generations," Marina Nazarov, whose children attended schools in the area and has family members killed in the Holocaust, added in an interview with the station.

“When you hear statements like this, it diminishes The Holocaust, it diminishes the memory,” Jacob Markey, executive director of the Indianapolis Jewish Community Relations Council, told Fox59.

The school board candidate doubled down on his stance in another Facebook post on Thursday.

He clarified that, “I never was, am not now, and never will be a Nazi sympathizer,” but did not apologise.

“It is incumbent on us to seek to understand people that think differently,” he wrote. “Understanding WHY someone thinks differently than I do about a topic is the first step in truly finding common ground to move our community forward.  Therefore, my campaign slogan is ‘Let’s talk.’ I want to understand what people in this community want for the schools and why.  I also want the constituents to know what I envision for the schools and why.”

In interviews about his thinking with local media, Dr Keefer has referred to “mass formation psychosis,” a discredited social theory that millions of people can be hyponitised into believing false ideas.

The theory got additional prominence last year when a guest talked about it on the Joe Rogan podcast in regards to the US public believing in widely accepted public health ideas about Covid.

School boards have emerged as a key battleground in modern culture wars, where conservative parents and candidates have been fighting to ban books and resist Covid measures.