"Normalizing Hate"

     That's a recent pair of words.

     Last weekend about a dozen high school kids made a large swastika out of Solo party cups,  gathered around it and gave the Nazi salute.   A photo went out on social media.

     It happened not in Nazi Gemany but "right down the street" in Costa Mesa, California, United States of America, and maybe near whereever you are too.

     Peter Levi,  regional director of the Anti-Defamation League of Orange County,  says in yesterday's L.A. Times he hasn't seen any evidence the students in the photos were Nazis or Nazi sympathizers, but said their actions "normalize hate." 

     "They normalized swastikas.  They normalized Nazi Salutes."

     "What starts as jokes then becomes discrimination," Levi said, "No hate crime murder started that day.  That person started years ago peddling in jokes and stereotypes."