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Most of us have witnessed, in videos, photos and writing, the atrocities of October 7 in Israel. As a Jew, I have grown despondent at times over the incident and the war in Gaza that has followed it. And watching the endless protests in our country supporting Hamas and damning the Israelis and all Jews is disheartening. An NYU professor relates that the tales of the atrocity are not true, and he is joined by many of his colleagues and students. As we’ve witnessed, university presidents are reluctant to speak the truth, too.
So, reviewing these facts has led me to ask myself an important question: How does Holocaust education help the world or the Jews? Does it change anything?
This Saturday is International Holocaust Remembrance Day, marking the date Auschwitz-Birkenau was liberated after WWII. (FDR was slow to acknowledge that mass exterminations were going on during the war; many people believed that it wasn’t possible to massacre millions of people as the Germans did.) And while some will observe the date, pointing out that part of their mission is to educate people who might be Holocaust deniers, the haters continue to exist: an imam in London just spoke to a crowd about the "fake Holocaust." Media websites still have to review their content regarding Holocaust denial and anti-Semitism. Anti-Semitic incidents were up last year , apparently unrelated to the October 7 event. I have had people tell me they are tired of being told about these events of WWII, and others simply don’t care, and want to move on.
Anti-Semitism, and thus the potential of another Holocaust, still exists. People will always need scapegoats. Hatred needs to find victims. And I’m not confident that educating students at any grade level will make Jews feel more secure. We’ve built Holocaust Museums (which I can’t bring myself to visit, although I have visited Dachau); movies that dramatize the events, although they may be seen only as fiction. And I have read many Holocaust-related books. But I truly wonder if re-visiting the Holocaust makes a difference to people and how they feel about Jews. Maybe if the subject comes up, they’d just prefer to “change the channel.” Are we only antagonizing people by having these monuments and educational efforts? Are we making our relationships with non-Jews even worse?
These are the questions I’m contemplating, and there are no easy answers.
I need to adjust to the idea that there may be no safe place.
Anywhere.
Discussion (61)
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"Professor" Amin Husain has been suspended. That's a start. A real university would inform him that his office has been cleared out and his personal effects have been left on the curb with the rest of the trash.
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I'll settle for suspended for now. Thanks for that update, Percival.
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"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."
There are some idiots that not only cannot remember the past, but are determined to rewrite the past: You know what? Haters gonna hate. But let's not make it any easier for them.
And, by the way, I am persuaded there is no safe place anywhere. (Sometimes I read the news.)
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I see at least three things affecting what you are seeing with regard to American public views on Jewish people, anti-Semitism, and the Israel-Gaza conflict. First, views on the Holocaust are affected by the generational changes over time, the young people are far removed from the events, not like us older folks. Second, the progressive/socialist doctrine at work in our culture does not help. And, third, many American Jews support and promote the progressive/socialist doctrine which then divides the Jewish people.
I don't know exactly how these things affect what you are asking.
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As a young boy, I was fascinated by WWII and watched and read everything I could find on the topic. My Parents bought the entire Time-Life photographic history of WWII (an excellent set of books) and being members of the Military Book Club we had lots of books on WWII as well. This is easier to understand since both of my parents were history teachers (my Dad at the University of Georgia, and my Mom at a rural GA high school). I read The Tigers are Burning, the Two Ocean War, Stuka Pilot, The First and the Last, and Iron Coffins as a child. Later I would read more books on the subject (I recommend The Last Stand of the Tin Can Sailors which really should be a movie and Tigers In The Mud which might be the best German memoir of WWII) and still find it a fascinating topic. I watched every WWII movie that was on the TV like The Longest Day, Patton, The Sands of Iwo Jima, Tora! Tora! Tora!, Midway, The Dam Busters, etc.
There was one volume of the Time-Life series on the Holocaust and it didn't pull any punches. I am glad that it didn't because it exposed the casual brutality and dehumanization of the camps. But the pinnacle of my WWII education was the classic series narrated by Sir Laurence Olivier The World at War, even now I can hum that opening song in my head and watch the flames consume all of the people as the opening credits roll. For years, when I heard/saw the Thames opening sequence for a show I assumed I was about to hear that famous song. That episode is incredibly powerful and really brings home the level of brutality and atrocity of the Holocaust. When I saw Schindler's List I appreciated that Spielberg shot it in Black and White because it provided both a feeling of reality that we were watching history a la The World at War, and also allowed for an emotional detachment that allowed the viewer to actually see the movie and not be overwhelmed by the horror of it. The World at War told us what happened in brutal videos and photos. Schindler's List told us stories of real people and the callous brutality of the camps.
There are a few things that are non-starters with me to talk with someone and treat their opinions with respect. I've known 9-11 truthers and even flat-earthers and while I don't listen to those opinions, I will listen, with respect if not belief to other ones they hold...Holocaust deniers do not get that respect. To me, that is a red line that I will exclude from my social and professional circles. It speaks too poorly of their character to allow them any entrance to my life.
I do not understand them, and frankly, I do not want to. People who do not want to learn about the Holocaust bother me, but they are redeemable. It is a level of tragedy that we have not seen before or since, but the key ingredients exist still bubbling under the surface ready to explode at any moment.
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