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"La Marseillaise" is the French national anthem. Here are the words in English: "Arise, children of the Fatherland,
The day of glory has arrived!
Against us tyranny's
Bloody banner is raised, (repeat)
Do you hear, in the countryside,
The roar of those ferocious soldiers?
They're coming right into your arms
To cut the throats of your sons, your women! To arms, citizens,
Form your battalions,
Let's march, let's march!
Lest an impure blood
Soak our fields! What does this horde of slaves,
Of traitors and conspiratorial kings want?
For whom are these vile chains,
These long-prepared irons? (repeat)
Frenchmen, for us, ah! What outrage
What fury it must arouse!
It is us they dare plan
To return to the old slavery! To arms, citizens... What! Foreign cohorts
Would make the law in our homes!
What! These mercenary phalanxes
Would strike down our proud warriors! (repeat)
Great God! By chained hands
Our brows would yield under the yoke
Vile despots would have themselves
The masters of our destinies! To arms, citizens... Tremble, tyrants and you traitors
The shame of all parties,
Tremble! Your parricidal schemes
Will finally receive their reward! (repeat)
Everyone is a soldier to combat you
If they fall, our young heroes,
The earth will produce new ones,
Ready to fight against you! To arms, citizens... Frenchmen, as magnanimous warriors,
Bear or hold back your blows!
Spare those sorry victims,
Who arm against us with regret. (repeat)
But not these bloodthirsty despots,
These accomplices of Bouillé,
All these tigers who, mercilessly,
Rip their mother's breast! To arms, citizens... Sacred love of the Fatherland,
Lead, support our avenging arms
Liberty, cherished Liberty,
Fight with thy defenders! (repeat)
Under our flags, may victory
Hurry to thy manly accents,
May thy expiring enemies,
See thy triumph and our glory! To arms, citizens..." It is a patriotic military song about defending France from attackers. It's not fundamentally different from many other such verses in the anthems and patriotic texts of competing nations. The Quran contains similar wording when describing calls for Jihad to defend the fatherland. While the Nazi's were evil, that does not mean we should be brought to tears by any nation which stood against them. Stalin's propagandists also wrote hymns which brought tears to many a Russian's eyes during and after the war. And France was far from perfect at the time of WWII. Hitler is still admired by a large minority of Arabs because the Nazi's helped "liberate" former French colonies! [1] I'm not picking on the French here though. My point is, that we shouldn't be confused in our passions into worshiping "something anything so long as it's against the Nazis". While it is not true that "the enemy of your enemy is your friend". In a broader sense, it is not true that every ally is your friend. And you should not equate a champion with their cause. Flawed reasoning: "Communism is the main force against capitalism, therefore if I want to fight capitalism I should become a communist." More flawed reasoning: "Russia has the most troops fighting against Hitler. Therefore, if I want to fight Nazism I should become a Russian." More flawed reasoning: "Hitler attacked France, therefore, if I lived in France and feel harmed by Nazism, I should love France." (Remember, France was all for getting rid of the Jews [2]. They just didn't like being invaded... ) [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relations_between_Nazi_Germany...
[2] "The evacuation of European Jewry to the island of Madagascar was not a new concept. Henry Hamilton Beamish, Arnold Leese, Lord Moyne, German scholar Paul de Lagarde and the British, French, and Polish governments had all contemplated the idea." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proposals_for_a_Jewish_state#M... |
But it is different. La Marseillaise isn't about how great France is, and why it's worth defending. It's about how our enemies are coming to rape, pillage, and murder everyone, and we need to fight to the end to prevent that from happening. It's also quite notable in that it doesn't specifically insult other countries or lay grandiose claims to land in its lyrics, which were quite common features in national anthems in the 1800s.
One should also point out that the song the Germans are singing is literally about how Germans need to stand on the Rhine to defend Germany from France--it antagonizes France both implicitly and explicitly. So in context, you have Germans singing about how they need to defend themselves from a country they've already defeated which is drowned out by the French singing about how they need to defend themselves from enemies come to destroy them (which, for them, had already happened).