Story Archive

Pug Ugly

“My girlfriend is always ranting and raving about how cute and adorable her wee dog is so I thought I would turn him into the least cute thing I could think of,” says Mark Meechan, introducing a video that got millions of views on YouTube. The video shows the pug, known as Buddha, reacting to the phrase “gas the Jews” as if it meant “playtime,” and raising his paw to the command “Sieg Heil.” Meechan, 30, said it was just dark humor to annoy his girlfriend, but a court in Airdrie, Scotland, found it was “grossly offensive to many Jewish people” and convicted him of a hate crime. It’s not the first time a government has been displeased by a mutt doing a Nazi salute. A dog that earned the nickname Hitler in 1941 by raising its paw got the attention of Nazi German authorities, who tried to put its Finnish owner on trial for insulting the Fuhrer. (AC/Newsweek, BBC, Jewish Chronicle) ...Because the Germans understood who is actually demeaned by equating Nazis with silly dogs.