Holocaust Rememberance Day

[Clint]

This is Holocaust Remembrance Day. Could it happen again? How strong is anti-Semitism?

[Philadelphia Eagle]

Anti-Semitism is a growing problem particularly in Europe according to a TV program I saw recently.

The worst affected countries are France and Britain according to the program's presenters where physical attacks on Jews are becoming a daily occurance.

Authorities in both countries are growing increasingly concerned. and have pledged to take action to try to stop the problem getting out of control.

According to the program both countries have significant racial tensions within their populations brought about by large numbers of both legal and illegal immigrants flooding in.

Frustration at this situation by the general public is leading to some sections of the community to vent their feelings by attacking Jews.

Looks like a potentially unpleasant situation to me.

[Clint]

The fact that the Holocaust ever happened is not known to a large number of people. I fear that ignorance could be a factor in its reoccurrence. I have a relative who hates Jews and doesn’t even realize he has Jewish blood running through his own veins. I don't spend much time talking to him so I don't know why he hates Jews. Chances are that he doesn't know himself.

[gmc]

doesn't just have to be just jews, What do you think it was in Ruanda if not racially motivated, or what is going on in Sudan. Demonise any section of population and leave the door open for justifying hatred of them be it religious, ethnic or any other grounds. Prior to Hitler germany was quite tolerant of jews, all it takes is a few openly racist their views being accepted people turning a blind eye. It was the scale of the holocaust that was appalling anti semitism was not confined to germany and there is not a country on the planet that could not go down that route in the right circumstances. In the US how about the KKK and the civil rights movement, variations on a theme of hate. In Scotland and ireland we have sectarianism., paki bashing etc. The chines think caucasians are inferior the list is endless.

http://www.liv-coll.ac.uk/pa09/europ.../neimoller.htm

to quote Pastor Neimoller in what must be one of the most famous quotes of the period

The quotation with a life of its own

Everbody loves to quote Martin Niemöller’s lines about moral failure in the face of the Holocaust: 'First they came for the Communists, but I was not a Communist, so I said nothing. Then they came for the Social Democrats, but I was not a Social Democrat, so I did nothing. Then came the trade unionists, but I was not a trade unionist. And then they came for the Jews, but I was not a Jew, so I did little. Then when they came for me, there was no one left to stand up for me.'

But interestingly, people use the quotation to imply different meanings – even altering it to suit their purpose. When Time magazine used the quotation, they moved the Jews to the first place and dropped both the communists and the social democrats. American Vice-President Al Gore likes the to quote the lines, but drops the trade unionists for good measure. Gore and Time also added Roman Catholics, who weren't on Niemöller's list at all. In the heavily Catholic city of Boston, Catholics were added to the quotation inscribed on its Holocaust memorial. The US Holocaust Museum drops the Communists but not the Social Democrats; other versions have added homosexuals.

Why history matters, DD Guttenplan, The Guardian, Saturday April 15, 2000:

‘The Nazis did not come first for the Jews, as Peter Novick explains in his brilliant and provocative new book, The Holocaust in American Life, "First they came for the Communists" - a circumstance acknowledged by Niemöller, who continued, "but I was not a Communist - so I said nothing. Then they came for the Social Democrats, but I was not a Social Democrat - so I did nothing. Then came the trade unionists, but I was not a trade unionist. And then they came for the Jews, but I was not a Jew - so I did little. Then when they came for me, there was no one left who could stand up for me." The Holocaust Museum in Washington DC is just one of those who, in Novick's phrase "prudently omits" Communists from Niemöller's homily.

But prudence and political calculation have influenced our knowledge of the Holocaust from the beginning...For a long time after the war, the fate of European Jewry was hardly mentioned, partly because, as the cartoonist Art Spiegelman's father says in Maus, his survivor's tale in cartoon format, "No one wants anyway to hear such stories," and partly because in camps liberated by British and American troops including Dachau, Belsen and Buchenwald, only a minority of the prisoners were Jews. In Ed Murrow's famous 1945 broadcast from Buchenwald the words Jew and Jewish are never spoken.

Doesn't matter what the prejudice or the reason or justification as soon as anyone says I am better than, they are against god's law, I hate catholics, I hate proddies (take your pick of your favourite ) the door is open for hatred and bigotry and it takes little for it to become an acceptable habit and an awful lot to break it.

[Clint]

The Holocaust is and should be taken very seriously by Jews. It should, as you point out, also be taken seriously by everyone. Holocaust Remembrance Day is a good way to make us aware of what can happen when we start singling out groups of people for contempt.

Why is it though, that when people point out that the Holocaust should remind us of more than what happened to Jews, I sense it is sometimes motivated by a dislike for Jews?

[capt_buzzard]

And it will happen all over again

[telaquapacky]

Originally Posted by Clint

Why is it though, that when people point out that the Holocaust should remind us of more than what happened to Jews, I sense it is sometimes motivated by a dislike for Jews?

I think anyone who considers themselves a potential target for persecution will see that threat as a defining part of their existence, as if everything related directly to that, whether is really does or not. I think it's a natural feeling to have.

And there's a famous saying, "Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they're not out to get you." What was so horrible about the holocaust was how institutionalized, coordinated, technologically sophisticated and large scale it was. Anyone who downplays that shows the kind of callous insensitivity that if shared by many, could lead to history repeating itself.

[valerie]

I am currently reading a book called Witness: Voices of the Holocaust.

Very, very powerful. And sad. And somewhat difficult to read. But I
think it's important. So I'm getting through it.

[Uncle Kram]

I have always been greatly moved by the Holocaust, not as a Jew but as a Human being.
My daughter recently met a survivor of Auschwitz and connected with the pain. It's good that kids her age (13) know the score. She is mature enough to realise that when she goes on a school trip to Auschwitz next year she will be affected by its history and not just off on a nice little holiday

[golem]

Originally Posted by Clint

This is Holocaust Remembrance Day. Could it happen again? How strong is anti-Semitism?

Could it happen again? It will.

How strong is anti-Semitism? Let’s start by calling a spade a spade, it’s not anti-Semitism, it’s Jew hating.

Anti-Semitism seems to almost give it a sort of respectability – a ‘name’ rather than a practice.

But how strong? Very strong and gaining strength.

In the UK Scotland seems to be the worst place though the various Islamic settlements in the old industrial towns and especially those in London(istan) are very Jew hating indeed.

I’m an old not-so-frummer Yiddle.

I can remember the years shortly after WW2 when there was German hating and Japanese hating all around but over the years I’ve seen especially the younger people loosing that sentiment as memories faded or died with people, and the new memories that were formed and that created opinions came from reports of what was happening in the Middle East and especially over the last ten to fifteen years how the ‘poor’ ‘Palestinian’ people were being brutalised by the 'wicked Israelis'.

For someone picking up a Newspaper in (say) 1990 and reading about IDF attacks against ‘Refugee’ camps it DID read as if there were terrible things being done, especially if the highly partisan manner in which the journalists wrote was taken into account – journalists who very often didn’t have the slightest idea of what was taking place or more importantly – why.

So is Jew hating in the rise. Yes, it is. Will there be another holocaust? Yes. But the next one will likely include Christians as well.


Er, Isn’t Yom Hashoa April 26th this year?