TV

Amazon Thought Covering Subway Cars In Nazi-esque Imagery Would Be A Neat Idea For Some Reason

They ban ads for period-friendly underwear, but this is fine, apparently.

by Alex McKinnon  24 November 2015

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The Man in the High Castle is a newly-released Amazon drama that imagines an alternate reality in which Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan won the Second World War, and have divided the United States between them. One might question the need to imagine such a scenario given that an actual, bona fide fascist is the consistent frontrunner of one of the country’s two parties of government in our current reality, but that’s a deeply frightening discussion for another time.

Anyway! To promote the show, Amazon bought some ad space on New York subway trains, before proceeding to cover rows and rows of seats with imagery reminiscent of both the Third Reich and the Empire of Japan. While they mercifully refrained from slapping the swastika all over the place, the eagle insignia in the American flag is very similar to the official emblem of the Nazi Party, the Reichsadler (at least in its Nazi-era configuration).

It’s also worth pointing out that New York’s Metropolitan Transport Authority, the body in charge of the city’s subway system, is pretty rigorous on the old censorship when it comes to things like menstruation. Last month a series of ads for Thinx, a brand of underwear for women on their period, were denied approval for display on the subway because the MTA considered the word “period” too suggestive. Whether the people responsible reached their decision by slapping their hands over their ears and screaming “Ew! Eeeeeww!” like giant five-year-old boys is not known.