Yom HaShoa
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Law Bringer
Member # 2984
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written Friday, April 28 2006 00:16
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YAP, you messed up the quote attribution there. Slarty didn't write that, he responded to it. :rolleyes: -------------------- Encyclopaedia Ermariana • Forum Archives • Forum Statistics • RSS [Topic / Forum] My Blog • Polaris • I eat novels for breakfast. Polaris is dead, long live Polaris. Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair. Posts: 8752 | Registered: Wednesday, May 14 2003 07:00 |
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Shock Trooper
Member # 3980
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written Friday, April 28 2006 00:51
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Thank you, Aran. I fixed it. Feel free to delete these two posts. -------------------- The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference. The opposite of art is not ugliness, it's indifference. The opposite of faith is not heresy, it's indifference. And the opposite of life is not death, it's indifference. Because of indifference, one dies before one actually dies. (not mine) Posts: 311 | Registered: Friday, February 13 2004 08:00 |
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Lifecrafter
Member # 6388
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written Friday, April 28 2006 00:59
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quote:Zeviz, I assure you that the first thing anyone thinks - at least most Americans, anyway - about when they hear 'concentration camp' is the Holocaust. If anything, it makes less dire concentration camps seem worse than they are. But, of course, Nazis were not the only people who built 'death camps'. Define them the way you do and sure they are, but define them that way and you're doing unnecessary discredit to those industrious souls who just didn't have a racial enemy of nine million souls to deal with. Just because geoncide is conducted by wood trains and plague instead of cattle cars and gas doesn't make it any less terrible. Herein I find the primary problem I have with you and a good number of American Jews (and yes, I'm perfectly aware you're Russian, but you sure don't live in Russia, do you? :P ) - the problem of uniqueness. What the Nazis did to the Jews was not unique, either in nature or in scope. The Gypsies were slaughtered alongside the Jews, for much the same reason. Around the same time, the Japanese were killing the Chinese as casually as we kill livestock - in the hundreds of thousands in individual incidents. A scant few decades before, the Armenians suffered worse than the Jews - Turkey simply stamped them into the dirt, and they remain there today. (The US won't even recognize the stamping happened - almost a century later! Ah, cold war politics.) Every country in the Western Hemisphere ran a fairly brisk trade in slaughtering Indians for substantial parts of their history. Your neighbors certainly didn't arise from Berkeley's native stock - that native stock doesn't exist any more, as a consequence of a nation of millions tearing a nation of thousands into shreds and more or less being allowed to forget about it. The slaughter of the Californian natives, or the Wisconsinian or the Virginian or the Brazilian or whoever, was every bit as much a masterwork of modern efficiency as the Shoah - the only difference is the kind of modern. The Sioux were some of the first people to have the honor of being blown apart by machine-gun; the campaign of dispossession and cold-blooded murder promulgated by the South American Positivist wunderkinden was the sort of thing the crude pansy-romantics to walk in their spiritual footsteps in the 40s could only dream of. And the PR behind Darfur would make Goebbels green with envy. The deft blockade of international humanitarian action, the dissassociation between the government and the 'bad apples' doing the killing - it's devilishly modern. Makes the Dolchstosslegende look like fireside chats - a quaint, outdated way to explain murdering your subjects, a sort of curio. What makes the Shoah unique is that the world cares. A dozen Shoahs have happened without the world standing in memory. A dozen Shoahs may yet happen as the world stands silent - lest we act. Terrible, isn't it? I understand the trauma of the Jewish people, but treating it as unique is a disrespect to those who died in the camps. Treat it as unique and you're writing it off as a fluke; do that and it's bound to happen again. Probably not to you, of course. And if that's what matters - I just don't know what to say. Is disrespect for Israel on the day set aside for memory of the Shoah wrong? Distasteful, maybe. Wrong? Hell no. Israel is a country, and countries are the prime actors in that kind of evil. They've got a native population without any voting rights or self-determination, buttoned up at gunpoint. At the whim of the state, in will come bulldozers to knock down tenements for hundreds of people - for the sake of tracking down a single terrorist; they've shot rock-throwing children and plenty of people guilty of no more than looking suspicious. When that kind of degradation of an entire cultural group happens - especially one perceived as a lesser group, a nemesis, what have you - that is the foundation for genocide. It would take a generation, a war, or an election going the wrong wrong way for there to be camps in Israel. It's a vicious apartheid state. The Israeli people are as much victims of this as the Palestinians; they're dependent for the functions of a state on an essentially inequitous actor. It would be the sort of murderous, black irony history revels in to cast the people of Israel in two instances of ethnic suppression: on the receiving end and on the supplying end. Consider all that - and thank God that there are jackasses willing to protest Israel on Yom Hashoah. If they disappear - if the government of Israel, alongside any other country in such circumstances, isn't made acutely aware they are being watched, and that most terrible thing will not be allowed to happen again - then the tribulations of the Jewish people in one of history's darkest hours could yet be in vain. (Appendices for further consideration. a. Please do not tell me what the Palestinians have done to Israel. The Palestinians are being dealt with as a group, affiliation to PLO or any other organization or no. There was substantial Jewish presence in the German communist party - culpable in a damn revolution shortly after the war - but it's one of the tenets of modern atrocitology that a state has no prevalent need to 'defend itself' against a particular ethnic group. b. Once again, I do not consider Israel and the Israeli people two identical things; the Israeli people are no more responsible for the iniquities perpetuated by their government than the people of LA were for the assault of Rodney King, democracy or no. c. I do not at all deny the reality of the Shoah, or the essential veracity of the accepted historical account. If the numbers of dead conventionally accepted are off, they are off by several orders of magnitude too small to make any realistic difference. d. Neither do I deny the legitimacy of the Jewish settlement in Israel; it is their historical homeland and they are entitled to inhabit it. However, note - and note well - that they are not entitled to *own* whatever they please by virtue of it being their 'historical homeland'. The Palestinians are there too and deserve some freaking respect; they are treated more or less as animals and face an extremely steep citizenship process compared to any given Jew, or even substantial non-Jewish elements. e. The Shoah was notable, but not unique, in scope. That honor would go first to several other instances of mass murder. And comparing genocides to each other to determine who suffered more is supremely and irreconcilably asinine. f. Please don't even begin justifying the current state of Israel in terms of the Holocaust. The implications of genocide entitling you to something are pretty staggering; just because the Russians got mown down like overgrown grass by the Mongols in the 13th and 14th centuries doesn't mean they had the right to turn around and abuse their Jews and sundry minorities for half a millenium.) tl, dr section here The Holocaust was bad. It was not unique. That kind of nonsense happens all the time. Treat the Holocaust as unique and it's liable to happen more. It could well happen in Israel; we'd best to keep our eyes on it just in case. Never again. Posts: 794 | Registered: Tuesday, October 11 2005 07:00 |
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Infiltrator
Member # 5410
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written Friday, April 28 2006 04:22
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quote:Should have left the president out of this. The intention wasn't to be political. What was important to me was the fact that the US, at the strong urging of Bush, was the first nation to declare what was happening in Darfur genocide. To be clear, it was meant as support for someone who took action instead of standing idly by and standing idly by while crimes go on around us is an issue (it is what in part led to the holocaust). To be even more clear, I will stand beside a Jewish person any day and declare the holocaust as true history and as evil and despicable. -------------------- "Dikiyoba ... is demon ... drives people mad and ... do all sorts of strange things." "You Spiderwebbians are mad, mad, mad as March hares." Posts: 687 | Registered: Wednesday, January 19 2005 08:00 |
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...b10010b...
Member # 869
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written Friday, April 28 2006 05:25
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How exactly is acknowledging the situation in Darfur as genocide and then not doing anything to help any better than not acknowledging the situation in Darfur as genocide and then not doing anything to help? -------------------- The Empire Always Loses: This Time For Sure! Posts: 9973 | Registered: Saturday, March 30 2002 08:00 |
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Infiltrator
Member # 5410
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written Friday, April 28 2006 05:30
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I will not comment on darfur in this thread any longer. I willl respectfully limit my comments to holocaust issues. -------------------- "Dikiyoba ... is demon ... drives people mad and ... do all sorts of strange things." "You Spiderwebbians are mad, mad, mad as March hares." Posts: 687 | Registered: Wednesday, January 19 2005 08:00 |
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Shock Trooper
Member # 3980
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written Friday, April 28 2006 05:43
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quote:I do not see any serious controversy over this apart from some rabid attention whores who do not take part in any serious discussion. However, the courage is not just to denounce evil, but also to confront it. EDIT I posted simultaneoulsy with Thuryl there. Se let me give as an extra the following quote by Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel: "Die Wahrheit einer Absicht ist die Tat." The truth of an intent is the action [ Friday, April 28, 2006 09:26: Message edited by: Yet another procrastinator ] -------------------- The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference. The opposite of art is not ugliness, it's indifference. The opposite of faith is not heresy, it's indifference. And the opposite of life is not death, it's indifference. Because of indifference, one dies before one actually dies. (not mine) Posts: 311 | Registered: Friday, February 13 2004 08:00 |
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Apprentice
Member # 7035
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written Friday, April 28 2006 06:27
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It is good to know that I can offload some guilt over here: I missed the service. Our region has 1 overall jewish newsletter which had the orthodox shul's service on the front. It was a day later than my synagogues. I misssed it. I'm guilty. I promise to check in future. It's an important service. I recently became Bat Mitzvah, so it's not my family's fault anymore. See you at Shavout. -------------------- Deedle Doot Doot Dee Dee- Let's all go to cat Town- www.spatch.net/cattown The homepage of insanity http://mrsporkula.piczo.com Step Lightly, Stay Free Posts: 21 | Registered: Saturday, April 15 2006 07:00 |
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Off With Their Heads
Member # 4045
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written Friday, April 28 2006 06:56
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I think the Holocaust may have been exceptional even among genocides because of its scale and speed. Six million Jews and five million others in about six years is quite a lot quite rapidly. The Armenian Genocide, for instance, killed around 1.5 million in about three or four years (as far as I can tell — it looks as though records are not completely clear on the subject). The elimination of the Native Americans killed more people, but it happened over the course of about four hundred years. One million per year for six years is pretty well unparalleled as far as I know. -------------------- Arancaytar: Every time you ask people to compare TM and Kel, you endanger the poor, fluffy kittens. Smoo: Get ready to face the walls! Ephesos: In conclusion, yarr. Kelandon's Pink and Pretty Page!!: the authorized location for all things by me The Archive of all released BoE scenarios ever Posts: 7968 | Registered: Saturday, February 28 2004 08:00 |
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Raven v. Writing Desk
Member # 261
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written Friday, April 28 2006 07:54
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Surely the speed isn't what makes it so morally repugnant, though, is it? I mean, what if the Holocaust had happened over 20 years; would it be any less abominable? Here's an interesting (read: saddening) article about Genocides in history. Anyway, do note the Holdomor, which featured at least 7 million deaths over the course of a year or two; although this did not involve systematic execution, deliberately engineered famine has to amount to something similar. And in Rwanda, nearly 1 million were killed over the course of 100 days in 1994. -------------------- Slarty vs. Desk • Desk vs. Slarty • Timeline of Ermarian • G4 Strategy Central Posts: 3560 | Registered: Wednesday, November 7 2001 08:00 |
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Shock Trooper
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written Friday, April 28 2006 12:13
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Comparing numbers is a distraction and reducing the victims to numbers is reminiscent of the book-keeping and controlling which was one of the things that made the Shoah unique among the genocides performed on an industrial scale. We do not want to get held up in this. I do understand that we are struggling to "understand" the sheer scale of the horror, but every detail will throw us back to square one if we spend our little energy for this "understanding". What we really need to understand are ways how we can prevent OURSELVES from functioning like Eichmanns, or for me as a medical scientist in particular like Rascher who strived for "optimal conditions for experiments on human material." And we need to understand that the functioning of our socialization within our family and community is not sufficient to prevent us from stripping "others" of their human nature. That is painful and humiliating but it is the only way each of us can really start to make a difference. [ Friday, April 28, 2006 12:27: Message edited by: Yet another procrastinator ] -------------------- The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference. The opposite of art is not ugliness, it's indifference. The opposite of faith is not heresy, it's indifference. And the opposite of life is not death, it's indifference. Because of indifference, one dies before one actually dies. (not mine) Posts: 311 | Registered: Friday, February 13 2004 08:00 |
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Off With Their Heads
Member # 4045
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written Friday, April 28 2006 13:15
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Um, I don't know about you, but I'm pretty sure that I'm not going to order the execution of an entire race of people. I thought that the main point of studying the Holocaust was to learn how to prevent others from committing genocide (that is, how to recognize and stop a Hitler early on so that things never reach the point that they reached in Nazi Germany). -------------------- Arancaytar: Every time you ask people to compare TM and Kel, you endanger the poor, fluffy kittens. Smoo: Get ready to face the walls! Ephesos: In conclusion, yarr. Kelandon's Pink and Pretty Page!!: the authorized location for all things by me The Archive of all released BoE scenarios ever Posts: 7968 | Registered: Saturday, February 28 2004 08:00 |
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Lifecrafter
Member # 6388
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written Friday, April 28 2006 14:32
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quote:Surely you've heard of the Milgram Experiment. Posts: 794 | Registered: Tuesday, October 11 2005 07:00 |
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Off With Their Heads
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written Friday, April 28 2006 15:12
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That was my point: the Germans, after the Nazis took power, behaved as any normal human beings would (following orders because they had to). Therefore, the key is preventing anyone like Hitler from taking power again. Once Hitler is in charge, disaster is already inevitable (if not already in progress). [ Friday, April 28, 2006 15:14: Message edited by: Kelandon ] -------------------- Arancaytar: Every time you ask people to compare TM and Kel, you endanger the poor, fluffy kittens. Smoo: Get ready to face the walls! Ephesos: In conclusion, yarr. Kelandon's Pink and Pretty Page!!: the authorized location for all things by me The Archive of all released BoE scenarios ever Posts: 7968 | Registered: Saturday, February 28 2004 08:00 |
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Raven v. Writing Desk
Member # 261
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written Friday, April 28 2006 15:14
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So, how do you propose keeping such people out of power? I'm afraid it's not as simple a task as it sounds like. -------------------- Slarty vs. Desk • Desk vs. Slarty • Timeline of Ermarian • G4 Strategy Central Posts: 3560 | Registered: Wednesday, November 7 2001 08:00 |
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Shock Trooper
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written Friday, April 28 2006 15:24
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quote:The Milgram experiment was indeed worrying, Alec, but there is a wide difference between administrating fake electroshocks to an actor and ordering executions. The latter is far simpler because you do not see the immediate effect of your actions. That is why they use to put hoods on the heads of people who are about to be executed and the lethal injection in Virginia was administered from behind a curtain. -------------------- The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference. The opposite of art is not ugliness, it's indifference. The opposite of faith is not heresy, it's indifference. And the opposite of life is not death, it's indifference. Because of indifference, one dies before one actually dies. (not mine) Posts: 311 | Registered: Friday, February 13 2004 08:00 |
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...b10010b...
Member # 869
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written Friday, April 28 2006 16:16
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quote:Is this in fact the case, though? The only reason anyone had to follow orders was because everyone else was following orders. If nobody is willing to follow an order to punish you for refusing to follow an order to kill innocents, well, Hitler can't personally discipline his entire army. Seems to me that saying "I had to follow orders" is just rationalisation, and the fact that everyone does it is no excuse. -------------------- The Empire Always Loses: This Time For Sure! Posts: 9973 | Registered: Saturday, March 30 2002 08:00 |
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Off With Their Heads
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written Friday, April 28 2006 20:19
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I said they behaved like normal people, not ideally virtuous people. -------------------- Arancaytar: Every time you ask people to compare TM and Kel, you endanger the poor, fluffy kittens. Smoo: Get ready to face the walls! Ephesos: In conclusion, yarr. Kelandon's Pink and Pretty Page!!: the authorized location for all things by me The Archive of all released BoE scenarios ever Posts: 7968 | Registered: Saturday, February 28 2004 08:00 |
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...b10010b...
Member # 869
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written Friday, April 28 2006 21:00
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That's just it. Normal people are the problem. -------------------- The Empire Always Loses: This Time For Sure! Posts: 9973 | Registered: Saturday, March 30 2002 08:00 |
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Shock Trooper
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written Friday, April 28 2006 22:55
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I find it difficult to believe that the Germans would have needed to be exceptional heroes to prevent the IIIrd Reich from happening. In fact there were a few exceptional Germans in more than one ethical direction. I am still struggling with the nightmare that a similar streamlining of the political mainstream with collective victimhood and denial of the human nature of fellow "others" could occur again - any time - no swastika, no H. and (I agree with Alec) not even necessarily Germans or Jews. We are living 70 years after a moral epidemic in Germany that included the "intelligencia". If I could be sure that the virus could be eradicated by a Morgenthau plan I would be all for it. I am afraid, however, that software virusses or cannot be eradicated by smashing the hardware. In fact that appears to have been a - however malicious - "misunderstanding" inherent in the racist Nuremberg laws. The high profile minority that was singled out as a scapegoat for the demise of German overreaching imperial phantasies defined itself by religion and culture rather than certain racial traits. The progrom, however, aimed at a hotchpotch of traits including racist, i.e. genetic hardware, traits. As much as I have tried to analyse, I have given up to find any "sense" in this - any error that I could point out to achieve a cure. It was too simple to make any "sense" - not even wrong but worse. That need not be so next time, it might be a slightly more intelligent virus than nazism next time. [ Saturday, April 29, 2006 03:47: Message edited by: Yet another procrastinator ] -------------------- The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference. The opposite of art is not ugliness, it's indifference. The opposite of faith is not heresy, it's indifference. And the opposite of life is not death, it's indifference. Because of indifference, one dies before one actually dies. (not mine) Posts: 311 | Registered: Friday, February 13 2004 08:00 |
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Infiltrator
Member # 5410
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written Monday, May 1 2006 07:40
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quote:It wasn't an excuse and that is why "ordinary" Germans who committed hate crimes have been subject to international punishment. Unfortunately in law (in most jurisdictions) the failure to act is not legislated on (no crime for refusal to help) and even further, some countries have had to bring in "good samaritan" laws to protect those that act from being sued for acting and subsequently causing harm/failing to prevent further harm. quote:Disaster was not inevitable. There were many opportunities for people to oppose Hitler both before and after he came to power. Hitler was neither elected nor did he use force to obtain power. He was asked by the governing conservative parties to assume Chancellorship, because they thought they could control him and his political inexperience would result in a short political future. After obtaining the chancellorship he used the political system to ban other political partiesand to pass hate laws, and this was only done with the cooperation of others as the Nazi party was a minority in government. He used intimidation and coercion to bully other organizations into putting people in charge who were Nazi suporters. He found support among the econmic elite as his rearmanent process pulled Germany (temporarily) out of the depression, provided jobs and profits. He methodically divided opposition, both within and without Germany, to consolidate power. This was over a period of 6 years. Opposition to Hitler came too little, too late - but there had been the opportunity before war. [ Monday, May 01, 2006 07:56: Message edited by: Strontium ] -------------------- "Dikiyoba ... is demon ... drives people mad and ... do all sorts of strange things." "You Spiderwebbians are mad, mad, mad as March hares." Posts: 687 | Registered: Wednesday, January 19 2005 08:00 |
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Raven v. Writing Desk
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written Monday, May 1 2006 12:33
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quote:This is true, but it's more than a little naive to suggest that any of those were realistic opportunities. Do you honestly think it's a good idea to rely on the good judgment of either (a) mobs of citizens who are desperate to escape from their hardships, or (b) politicians? -------------------- Slarty vs. Desk • Desk vs. Slarty • Timeline of Ermarian • G4 Strategy Central Posts: 3560 | Registered: Wednesday, November 7 2001 08:00 |
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Infiltrator
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written Wednesday, May 3 2006 10:51
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Slarty: quote:IT is a fact that approximately 60 of Germany's highest ranking military officers came up with a credible plan to assassinate Hitler prior to the commencement of WWII. Some historians even gave the plan a reasonable chance of acheiving success, although there is doubt as to how committed the top generals were to the plan (it did have backing from Chamberlain though). I believe the plot is called the Osterman conspiracy or the Oster conspiracy. And yes, I answer yes to both of your questions (the reason for democracy). It is also true that Germany systematically went about defying the Allies, breaking the Treaty of Versailles and rearming, etc for several years and started a war without any real opposition. IT has been argued by some that the Allies were looking to the east as the real threat (Communisim) and were hoping that Germany and Russia would slit each others throats as they stood idly by. Note too that even after the war started, the western border was thinly defended and there was opportunity to invade from France, in support of Poland, but the allies stood by and watched Poland fall. This too was a realistic opportunity to stop Hitler, in the early stages of a war yes, but surely would have prevented many millions of deaths. [ Wednesday, May 03, 2006 10:55: Message edited by: Strontium ] -------------------- "Dikiyoba ... is demon ... drives people mad and ... do all sorts of strange things." "You Spiderwebbians are mad, mad, mad as March hares." Posts: 687 | Registered: Wednesday, January 19 2005 08:00 |
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Infiltrator
Member # 6652
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written Wednesday, May 3 2006 12:52
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We don't have much choice but to rely on politicians. They run the world. -------------------- But I don't want to ride the elevator. Posts: 420 | Registered: Sunday, January 8 2006 08:00 |
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Raven v. Writing Desk
Member # 261
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written Wednesday, May 3 2006 22:28
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quote:*facepalm facepalm facepalm facepalm facepalm facepalm facepalm facepalm facepalm* -------------------- Slarty vs. Desk • Desk vs. Slarty • Timeline of Ermarian • G4 Strategy Central Posts: 3560 | Registered: Wednesday, November 7 2001 08:00 |