anti-German sentiment

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In my own personal life, I have suffered anti-German sentiment. I remember, in elementary school, a couple adults had scolded and taunted me, over and over again, "Many 'American' Soldiers died in the War, Kraut!" All because I am partially German.

If there is something I would very much like to tell them it is as follows: "The correct term for a Soldier in the U.S. Army is a U.S. Soldier not an 'American' Soldier."

They're just idiots. Don't let idiotic people memories ruin your day. Apparently half of my family are German, makes me wanna learn the language. The best they can do is insult you because of silly war crap cause they can't find anything worse to insult you over since you're half something else. From my understanding of boring every day closed minded people - they love to complain and make drama out of nothing cause their life is that boring and if there's anything different it just gives them an excuse to make some more drama to entertain themselves with cause they have nothing better to do than focus on someone elses life.

I dunno why you'd even let people know you're of German heritage if there's a chance for people to bother you about it though.

Are you sure they weren't just teasing you? Almost everyone I know has some German ancestry. I'd be surprised if they weren't part German themselves.

This.

They may have been joking. And at least half of the White population of America has at least some German ancestry including probably the folks saying this stuff to you.

There was descrimination against German Americans during the First World War, but not much during the Second World War (though there was against Japanese Americans then).

I would be surprised if there were still serious anti German sentiment anywhere in the US. In high school had a buddy who was a German from Germany and we would taunt him with stuff "hey! Is it true that the Germans never lost a war?" just talking trash.

Haven't encounter it other than banter.

I only order Freedom Cabbage, never Sauerkraut

Some younger cis-man tried to lay their anti-German sentiment on me, this afternoon. I told him, "You should be worried about yourself and not about what people of various ethnicities wear on their heads." I was laughing silently to my apartment because I got to use my comeback on him.

The modern Germans tend to skew very left-wing. The stereotype that all Germans are raving Nazis is a long way in the past. There's a massive Turkish community in Germany now, amongst other immigrant groups, and there's a lot of mixing between them and the Saxons. Ever wondered where Mehmet Scholl got his first name from?

The Nazis were 70 years ago. Germany not only survived the horrors of the regime but thrived to become one of the most progressive countries in the world today.

My family is very German on both sides, and yes, I had experienced some hurtful words as a kid from schooolmates who thought it would be funny to imply I was a Nazi because of where my ancestors came from. But I was picked on much more growing up for being a weird nerd than for being a Deutscher.
That said, I still sometimes see things on TV critical of Germans and Germany, automatically assuming they are bigoted fascists. And it's hard not to notice how so many villains on TV and in movies have German names. It's not Freddy Brady, or Freddy Adams, or Freddy McGregor, but Freddy Krueger after all.

I worked with an older woman years ago, lovely woman. And then one day we got to talking about the upcoming World Cup, and she asked where it was and I told her it was in Japan and South Korea. And from there I ended up learning if she had the power she would wipe the Japanese off the face of the Earth for what they did in WW2.

I think that is pretty common for those that were part of the WWII generation, a lot of people never forgave the Japanese or Germans for what they did in the war. It's easy for us to separate the barbarity of their fascist regimes from them as a people through the lens of history but it wasn't so easy for people that personally saw their families, their friends, their brothers in arms tortured and murdered by these same people.

If they were around when the wars happened, perhaps they'd have a fair excuse. I know my Granddad to his final day wouldn't stand Germans, but he fought against them, they sure would've killed some of his friends. Perhaps its still not right, but he would have a reason.
I suspect the more likely case is however that these people are using patriotism as a mask for racism and bigotry, as those people about the Navajo Wars, The Banana Wars, in WW1 the Baralong Incident and the use of chemical weapons in the war and the notable amount of US war crimes in WW2 such as in the Moro Rebellion, the incident with the USS Wahoo, the US rapes of Okinawan civilians, the rapes in Europe by US soldiers, including of allied individuals! The dehumanization of German POW, other massacres of civilians, several of which were in Asia.

And obviously, how could we forget the biggest two failures of the US when it comes to foreign policy. The numerous, and often unjustified invasions and interventions of the Middle East, which essentially gave birth to the terrorism we suffer in the modern day and finally, the uncountable injustices by the US in the Vietnam war.


Those sort of people just choose to acknowledge the injustices committed against the US so they can discriminate against foreigners or people who don't fit into the model of a stereotypical US citizen, these are the sort of people who get leaders like George W. Bush, Nixon (to an extent) and Donald Trump...

Ignore. It's the past anyway, so it's better of to forgive and not forget.

Be proud of who you are, you don't choose your ancestry it's just who you are as a person that matters.

I know some German folks when I was in Germany whose ancestors were probably German soldiers or Nazis or whatever... however you'd be surprised that there is a strong anti-Nazi movement in Germany as of today, they even sell many signs with the Nazi cross "forbidden" (similar to the no smoking)... In fact, the only anti Semitism I personally encountered in Germany was from Muslim and Turkish peeps, not Germans.