It's funny - I suspect many found the show more cathartic than crass. It showed the Allies as being clever, always on top, while the Germans lacked the ability to control them and were silly to boot. The public had had two decades to digest the events of WWII; the shock had long faded, but the frustration hadn't.
The show never mocked the abuse of prisoners - indeed, never dealt with it at all - and never displayed any vestige of antisemitism or racial superiority. Not every POW facility was a concentration or death camp, and the conditions shown in the show were not all that farfetched.
There are always those who say that humor or satire should not extend to some topic or another - it shows disrespect, it makes people fail to treat the topic seriously, et cetera. Yet it's not as if anyone ever got their impression of Nazi Germany from Hogan's Heroes - there's plenty of real information out there. Even children can watch TV and know they're seeing fiction.
The show never mocked the abuse of prisoners - indeed, never dealt with it at all - and never displayed any vestige of antisemitism or racial superiority. Not every POW facility was a concentration or death camp, and the conditions shown in the show were not all that farfetched.
There are always those who say that humor or satire should not extend to some topic or another - it shows disrespect, it makes people fail to treat the topic seriously, et cetera. Yet it's not as if anyone ever got their impression of Nazi Germany from Hogan's Heroes - there's plenty of real information out there. Even children can watch TV and know they're seeing fiction.