On anti-Semitism. What it is and isn't.

[conuly]

I don't think I'm anti-Semitic. I could be wrong, though. Let's lay out the reasons why I don't think this:

1. I don't think that the world is ruled by some shadowy Jewish alliance.

If this were the case, I think there'd be a lot less anti-Jewish stuff going on in the world, and far fewer people would be talking about how the world is run by the Jews. Unless all this free speech stuff is just a very clever decoy, but.... no, I can't see it. Seems to me that the world is more likely to be currently run by a not-so-shadowy Fundamentalist Christian alliance than by the Jews.

2. I don't think that the Jews are to be held responsible for the death of Jesus.

I don't especially care, either, but even if I did, the sheer illogic of that argument would shut me up fast. Although I suppose it makes sense if you buy into the whole concept of Original Sin... maybe... kinda... no, it still doesn't make sense. In order for it to make sense, every single Jewish person at that time would have had to have wanted Jesus dead, and only Jewish people (not, say, Romans) would have endeavored towards this goal. And I don't see that.

3. I no longer think that all the Chassidic Jewish guys I occasionally see are just a group of 1-3 guys who are stalking me

Yeah, I used to think that when I was little. I honestly thought all Chassidic men were one man, and that since I saw that one man all the time.... I have since learned a lot. I also no longer believe that the people on book covers are plotting my death.

4. I think that Jewish people should not be obligated to work on their holidays/Shabbos (once had a cat with that name....)

This goes for all religious groups, actually. So... yeah.

5. I don't think the Holocaust was faked

And this leads nicely into the next part of my entry.

Despite my obvious not-hating-anybody-ness (and that's not restricted to Jewish people! There are huge numbers of people I simply do not hate! I'd list them, by name, but the list would get too large. I think I dislike Fred Phelps. And Jack Chick. And I suppose Hitler. Oh, and that twit in my computer class senior year who went out of her way to make me miserable.... but that's really about it) I have occasionally been accused of being anti-Semetic, apparently for espousing the radical statement that more than six million people died during the Holocaust.

I don't deny that 6 million Jewish people died. I don't believe that there is any sort of active cover-up of the other 4-6 million deaths, or that Jewish people are actively trying to profit somehow by pretending that other people didn't suffer. I think that to suggest that is abominable. I think that the ignorance many people have about the subject is simply because we can't conceive of the number six million easily, and to increase it makes it harder.

However, I belive that is exactly what we have to do. It isn't right or fair to ignore a large portion of the population for any reason, and certainly not out of neglect. If I thought people were actively trying to ignore most of the victims, you'd have heard harsher words than this about it, long ago.

The Holocaust started with the forced sterilization and deaths of physically and mentally disabled people.
Fully half of all Poles killed during the Holocaust were not Jewish. (Half of the Jews killed were Polish, according to multiple sources).
At least a quarter of the Roma were killed during the Holocaust. They are still being actively persecuted and discriminated against in many areas.
And of course, six million Jews died, as well as many people who tried to save those who were being actively persecuted.

I'm no doubt missing huge numbers of people here, and I'm sorry. Give me a resource, and I'll update my paltry list.

We don't do ourselves any favors by trying to ease our minds when thinking about these tragedies, and we do ourselves a grave disservice to assume that anybody pointing out, say, the other deaths, must have an ulterior motive. I've been told I'm anti-Black for (correctly!) defining "kaffir" as "nigger" in an English class (all right to bandy around the word kaffir, but not to define it?) and told that I "must be gay" for defending gay marriage in that same class. This is nonsense, and it needs to end.

It is a painful thing to live in this world, and know how many people die for stupidity. The Holocaust? Tragic. What about Stalin's Holocaust of famine? What about, as Hitler himself pointed out, the genocide of the Armenians? Or of the Native Americans? Or of countless groups of people for time stretching back before words?

I don't think people are trying to "cover up" all these deaths. I think that we just don't like to think about it. But that's tough. Thinking about it is the only way to make sure we stop being stupid in this world of ours.

*steps of the soapbox*

Sorry about that.

Edit: I'm not sure I was called anti-Semitic by Jewish people, (which is what makes it even more annoying). I'm also somewhat confident that I've never been accused of anti-Semitism by Jewish people for my belief that Israel isn't a shining palace of virtue in the middle east. I'm sorry, but I think *all* groups being violent about Israel are wrong, both on an ethical level (don't kill people) and on a policy-level. It's not getting them what they want. And the situation appears to be more like a multi-faceted gem than a simple yes/no Jews/Palestinians thing anyway.

Just sayin'.

Edit again: Yes, I realize I left out gay people, Jehovah's Witnesses, Communists, and possibly Catholics. I also didn't mention the number of blond children snatched by their parents to be "Germanized". If anybody can provide links on these, or other atrocities, I'd be much obliged.

Comments

[yadfothgildloc.livejournal.com]

Homosexuals were also interned by Hitler (may his name be erased). The Jews were far from the only people killed in the Holocaust, but by far the most numerous.

/is Jewish
//has never seen anything anti-Semetic out of you ever
///also thinks chassids are a little creepy

[conuly]

Yes, I agree. Both the Jews and the Poles seem to make up half the people killed (since there's an overlap in the Jewish and Polish populations, this works).

I don't think the Chassidim are creepy anymore, now that I know that they aren't all stalking me, and are, in fact, more than one person.

[wakasplat.livejournal.com]

Also Jehovah's Witnesses, the nebulous "asozial" category which appeared to contain some combination of criminals and political prisoners and people whose lifestyle was generally disapproved of, and I'm sure there was denomination-based persecution of certain Christian denominations but I'm blanking on what a lot of it was.

[yadfothgildloc.livejournal.com]

They all tend to look alike, but once you get good at it, you can actually tell what sect they are from their dress. That sort of conformity is creepy.

[yadfothgildloc.livejournal.com]

True. It's been a while since my Holocaust history classes.

[fascinoma.livejournal.com]

I'm Jewish - and I agree with you 100%.

IT IS ABSOLUTELY *NECESSARY* THAT PEOPLE BE MADE AWARE THAT NOT ONLY JEWS DIED IN THE HOLOCAUST.

We *NEED* to point out that other people suffered as a result of the Nazi regime, and as a result of the regimes which oppressed Jews. Tsarist Russia wasn't good to *anyone* who wasn't among its rulers, for example.

The kind of system that could support anti-Semitic genocide = the kind of system nobody would want to live under. Haters never just target one group of people. If one person is oppressed, then everybody is. Period.

[fascinoma.livejournal.com]

I can see how a person with face blindness issues, would have a problem with a group of people who dress alike. Other people would look at the faces and other cues about individuality.

[l33tminion]

Wholeheartedly agreed. My mom is the director of our synagogue's holocaust education program. The program attempts to talk about all the groups killed in the Holocaust and to put it in context with other horrors, past and present, so, yeah...

I don't think I've ever seen any anti-semitism out of you...

[leora.livejournal.com]

The Holocaust was a very big deal in my family. My father was born in 1929 and my mother in umm either 1942 or 1943, I always forget. So, they were both somewhat aware of it. My father's side of the family lost 11 of his aunts/uncles and I don't know what other family - we don't know much about that side of the family as only his father and one of his father's brothers remains of that line (and now their descendents). And my father's father only made it because he came to the US long before the Holocaust. My mother's side of the family wasn't directly affected, but my mother was a little girl while she heard things that made her believe her family was working with others to try to get people out. She was very young though.

I grew up knowing about it - it was just one of those things. What I was taught when I was little was that 6 million Jews and many Gypsies were killed. Later I was told about political prisoners. Much later than that I also learned about those with disabilities and homosexuals (I'm not sure if my parents weren't aware or they just didn't want to explain what homosexuality was to me as I didn't know about the existence of homosexuality til much past having learned of the Holocaust). I class those who assisted with the political prisoners. There may have been others who were also targeted. I am glad that I was never taught it as just a Jewish thing and my view of it hasn't been that way, although it obviously was a huge attack on Jews and had a massive effect on Jews around the world, both by killing many of them and by causing many interesting psychological effects simply by happening.

Many others died in World War II, although not in the Holocaust itself. Russia, already devastated by Stalin (if I have my Russian ruler timing right) got about equally devastated by the invasion. Sure, they beat the Germans, but at a huge cost. And Russian peasants burned their own fields and in some cases even salted the Earth to ensure that the German military wouldn't have food. That tactic worked, but think of the cost, including after the war. They burned their own food... destroyed their own fields. I have trouble imagining Americans holding up so well to an invasion. They rode tanks across frozen water to get civilians out and soldiers into a city under seige, even though some of those tanks crashed through into the water and it was a known risk. Countless Russians died, some through horrible cold and starvation.

And my lothario's family, being German and non-Jewish, isn't all that happy about Hitler either (well, who is). Not just for the horrible evil acts, but also because they lost family as soldiers. Good men didn't have a whole lot of choice about what to do, and not all of them knew of how evil the Nazis were at the time. They served their country and went to war as they were told, and their lives were thrown away starving and freezing in Russia. Not so good for them. And while I have less sympathy for the Germans, not all of the German military was evil.

Then you have the countless killed in war in other countries, of course, and the bombing within Germany, and of course, the bombing of Hiroshima and Nygosaki (sp?). They didn't know at the time that the radiation would be a danger. They honestly thought it wouldn't be an issue. But not only were there countless deaths, as expected, but the horrible after effects of radiation, both on those present and the children to come.

Just horrible, all around. And I don't think adding horror on horror minimizes them. I think it's better to know fully what people are capable of and to understand that that just makes vigilence and working to combat these forces more important. Oh, and bankrupting a country after a war so they have runaway inflation and an angry, hungry, restlress populace is a bad idea.

Anyhow, I don't think you're an anti-semite. I think to say that any death is unimportant is, however, something bad for which I don't have a word. Anti-human, I suppose. You're just not anti-humanic.

[conuly]

Thing is, I'm not sure I *am* faceblind. Other than a couple... well, several, I suppose... a few? Whatever. Other than a small number of glaring incidents, I'm not especially prone to confuse people. I think.

[conuly]

Nagasaki. Weird thing, I first heard that three cities were bombed. My mother heard that two. But now I only hear about two cities. Odd, huh?

As for growing up hearing about it, I hear that. I was stunned when Justina-down-the-block, at 8 or 10 still didn't know about the Holocaust. Literally stunned.

[leora.livejournal.com]

9 was my Holocaust phase, where I was reading book after book on the subject. Mostly fictional books about Jews living in Germany trying to avoid being put into camps. Books aimed at children, but still, disturbing. Not as disturbing as some of the stuff I'd learn later, but I knew the basics and had for a long time.

2 with atomic devices. But some cities were bombed with conventional bombs to such a level that the immediate destruction was comparable. I think it was Dresden, but I mix up names/places... if you have a copy of Slaughterhouse 5 handy, it talks about it right at the beginning. So, that may be what was being thought of. While the long term effects of radiation are horrific, I doubt that the people who died from conventional bombs would consider themselves luckier.

The bombings are a particular interest of mine, in part because I was born on the anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima. Not the best event to be linked with, but so it goes.

[dkmnow.livejournal.com]

I take it you were recently ad hominemized.

Tut-tut. What did you do to earn that?

Did you dare to criticize US support for Israel? Did you dare to criticize Israel's virtual-extermination of the Palestinian people? Did you dare to suggest that Israel is among the world's worst representatives of Judaic tradition?

Or did you get caught harboring a sneaking admiration for Rachel Corrie?

Shame on you!

;-p

[conuly]

I just point out that while terrorism isn't the best way to achieve the ends they want, they're dying in greater numbers than Israelis, and live in worse conditions - all of which is underreported in US press. Oh, and that the rest of the Arab world needs to shut up or put up. The Palestinians were everyone's whipping boy long before Israel existed as a modern nation. No fair on the rest of the Arab world to blame soly Israel or soly the US for their current problems, not unless they're willing to help out Palestinians, which doesn't seem to be the case.

[conuly]

Oh, I see what you mean. No, oddly, I wasn't. I have been in the past, and I'd been storing up this post for a long time. Moggymania is actually the one who prompted it, but not in a meannastyhorrible way.

[yuki-onna.livejournal.com]

Dresden, yes, but we don't like to talk about what happened to the rest of Japan. We fire bombed every major city except Kyoto, and some of them, including Yokohama and Tokyo, were almost completely incinerated. Some cities had up to 90% of their area obliterated. The fire bombings killed far more than the two bombs did, and the stories about them are as horrifying as anything else in WWII. Japan was leveled.

[leora.livejournal.com]

*nods* I think the atomic bombings just get attention because of the lingering effects that weren't expected. Just as agent orange is now getting attention for its lasting effects. I think too often the tendency is the other way around, to only focus on the immediate effects and then brush any later developments under the rug and say nothing to see here, move along, war was over long ago.

But with World War II, it does seem to go the other way around. I certainly don't know the details of all the bombings, but certainly conventional bombs are horrific enough for me. And they kill people just as dead. While it was the enemy (from my perspective, at least) and with World War II there is some ability to claim it as a just war, certainly not everyone in Japan who died could be claimed to deserve it. But that is the problem with war, people get stuck with it because they're just there, or because they support their government, but didn't intend their support to be used this way.

This is why I would feel that if I died in a bombing by an Iraqi, it would to some extent be reasonable. My country unjustly invaded, killed, and commited atrocities. I understand the desire to fight back and that uninvolved people get killed in wars. But I'd still rather not be the victim of a bombing. I didn't do it. I didn't want to support it. And I don't even pay taxes because I'm too poor. Although if I had the money, my taxes would go to fund the war, and there isn't much I could do about that easily. So, I could, in theory, have had supported the ability of my country to kill innocent people.

[kibbles.livejournal.com]

I don't have links for the others, but saw in the Holocaust museum in DC. That place is very touching...emotional.

When I was a kid I was called a nazi even though my family fought in WW2. Just because I was German. Got a lot of abuse because of it.

[kibbles.livejournal.com]

Was in the LJ of someone who had a friend who hates all Germans and Germany and wishes they were eradicated from the face of the earth, someone young said this.

I've lived there, its a nice place.

[wodhaund.livejournal.com]

My father and I went there soon after it opened. It was...amazing. Utterly incredible. Someday, I would like to go back, and absorb it in more detail, since it was so busy when we went that I didn't get a chance to.

[wodhaund.livejournal.com]

You're no anti-Semite, I don't think. I've never ever gotten that vibe from you. You just call it like you see it, and sometimes, people get their panties in a twist over that kind of thing, because how you see it directly conflicts with how they want you to see it.

Oh man, run-on sentence. My writing skills are dying. Too many papers.

You know, I had never heard of children being snatched away to be "Germanized". I wonder how I missed that? Must go hunt for information now.

(Another reason I love your journal. You're constantly inspiring me to hunt out information on such a wide variety of topics. It's fantastic. ^^)

[mortaine.livejournal.com]

The Witnesses (not one of whom repudiated their faith, even when doing so would have meant not dying... I thought that interesting)
The Quakers
The Catholics

and homosexuals, of course (it's where the pink triangle came from, Connie).

[morganne13.livejournal.com]

Another *very* small set of Holocaust persecuted that I heard somewhere about is twins, who the Nazis used in experiments.

And other deaths in WWII, the people who died in the invasions of other European countries. Britain got pretty blasted during WWII. I grew up on the stories about it from my grandmother. She and my grandfather were in their teens through the war and while they didn't fight in the military, my grandfather's older brother was in the RAF. After 9/11 when a large part of America was all "Oh my God how could this happen?...here?" I felt like, what's wrong with you people? It could happen anywhere and it does. SHEESH. And this is kind of the same issue. People insulating themselves from certain information and fooling themselves as to what suffering has occured and therefore what suffering could occur.


And you're not anti in a bigoted, prejudiced, or any otherwise hateful way. You're anti-ignorance and anti-self-deception and anti-dumbass. Like someone else said, you tell it like it is and that is the only way people could remotely interpret any of the things you're worried about. And if they were to do so, the issue is theirs, not yours. Because you're right in all you said. I agree completely.

So yeah, basically... AMEN TO THAT! :-D

[conuly]

When it comes to tragedies, that one wasn't nearly as bad as people dying, but it still wasn't good.

[(Anonymous)]

Hey connie need some baby sitin' come morrow please call your brother
i'm home rite now.
thanx