Never Forget What?

ADVISERS appointed by Tony Blair after the London bombings are proposing to scrap the Jewish Holocaust Memorial Day because it is regarded as offensive to Muslims.

They want to replace it with a Genocide Day that would recognise the mass murder of Muslims in Palestine, Chechnya and Bosnia as well as people of other faiths.
--The Sunday Times

This is the work of cultural vampires, people who would like nothing better than to drain all the meaning out of one of the most meaningful events in modern history -- because when holocaust means everything, then Holocaust means nothing.

Comments

[CraigC]

Grrrrrrrrrrr...........

[Scott P]

We're frickin' doomed.

[gail]

How do YOU spell pusillanimous?

[JWebb]

How many "Memorial Days" would we need to commemorate victims of Muslim mass murder?

[Scott P]

Damn, Gail, I had to look that up.

[Jeff G]

How surprising is this at a time when we're dedicating a memorial to the Flight 93 victims in the shape of the religious symbol of the very murderous religious zealots who caused their deaths?

You know, to promote understanding and healing. Because WE JUST HATE MUSLIMS in the US.

I weep for western civilization, which lacks the balls to stand up for itself against the shouts of the loudest malcontents.

[Scott P]

Yep. You might want to weep a bit for the Rockies too, Jeff.

[gail]

When holocaust means everything, holocaust means nothing. We're dealing with cultural vampires who would like nothing better than to drain all the meaning out of Western civilization.

[JWebb]

Hollow Cost

[Rob B.]

I was thinking of donating a big marble slab to Ground Zero that says:
"Here is where 19 hate filled Islamic Extremist, too stupid to read the Quran themselves and figure out that what they were doing was totally wrong, killed a lot of people in a pointless effort to make America fold and remove it's self from Arab affairs. The result was the total overthorw of 2 middle eastern governments. Needless to say, they failed pitifully, but we are not suprised because Arabs haven't beaten anyone but each other since Isreal regulated all over their candy asses."

I guess now they wouldn't want it, huh?

[Professor Froward]

They don't want "holocaust" to mean everything. They want it to mean one thing: The bit about Israel is the entire point. The other stuff is just window-dressing.

I wonder if somebody will try to get the post-1948 Arab ethnic cleansing of Jews included in the list. I eagerly anticipate the howls of outrage from the "inclusive" crowd over that one.

[Bob]

First of all, I agree with Gail's post. Leave the memorial alone.

But you walk a slippery slope if you take shots at Arabs in the collective. Certainly extremists (however that is defined anymore) and terrorists but a whole race/culture? It's a scary kind of irony/hypocrisy.

[gail]

I agree, Bob. Muslim people in general are not the problem. As Rob said, if the extremists bothered to learn about their own religion, they would have known that what they did was wrong by Muslim standards. I think what irritates people, though, is the pretense of innocent victimhood by the sorts of people who would like to water down our collective memory of the Holocaust. All cultures, including Arab cultures, have done evil as well as good. Nobody gets a free pass when human nature and group dynamics intersect.

[jtb-in-texas]

nice blog; but there is still hope... there are still some of us who see the truth...

Of course there may come a time when we're put to death like the early Christians... but remember the stories of the martyrs: some were so steadfast and devout that they won converts even among their tormentors... And the Christians are still here, long after the Colosseum is a decaying bit of rubble on the tourist track...

We cannot win by using the enemy's weapons, strategy, or tactics. We can win if we become as zealous about spreading democracy and freedom as they are about spreading slavery and death.

What have you, Gentle Reader, done for our cause today?

[mark]

Leave the holocaust memorial day.

I have no problem with another memorial day for Genocide victims the world over - Rwanda, Chechnya, Bosnia etc. God knows there are enough victims to remember..

Also the meaning of the word Holocaust shouldnt be co-opted by anyone or anything. It has a specific, literal meaning which does not detract from the fact that the word conjures up - for me and most people - the vision of gaunt survivors behind barbed wire , mass graves and the whole horrific spectacle that was the Jewish holocaust

Many nations have suffered their own holocausts, muslim, christian, jewish, hindu... - you name it they have been killed for their beliefs.

The dictionary definition of Holocaust is:

hol·o·caust
Pronunciation Key (hl-kôst, hl-)
n.
* Great destruction resulting in the extensive loss of life, especially by fire.
* Holocaust The genocide of European Jews and others by the Nazis during World War II: “Israel emerged from the Holocaust and is defined in relation to that catastrophe” (Emanuel Litvinoff).
* A massive slaughter: “an important document in the so-far sketchy annals of the Cambodian holocaust” (Rod Nordland).
* A sacrificial offering that is consumed entirely by flames.

Just one last comment : I think those who have posted comments where they rattle sabres and express their xenophobistic tendencies have rather missed the point.

The only way 'we' can 'win' is by grasping the nettle and opening our hearts and minds to education, tolerance and change - and no I do not mean that we should all lose our identities.

Peace. Shalom. Salaam.