NationStates Jolt Archive

I just read from teletext that according to a BBC survey only 55% of Brits have ever heard of Auschwitz concentration camp. (I'll try to find this in English too)

Now they are going to show a serie of documentaries about the issue so that people wouldn't forget it.

I just read from teletext that according to a BBC survey only 55% of Brits have ever heard of Auschwitz concentration camp. (I'll try to find this in English too)

Now they are going to show a serie of documentaries about the issue so that people wouldn't forget it.
Eh, maybe it's time to start letting go of the past. The WW2 generation is dying out, there's a new world now and the endless revisiting of that era isn't really doing much good.

I've been there. Dachau also.

Those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it in the future.

No, if people forget about it, it may return. This way, people are aware of WW2 and what went on, and because they are more watchful, they are more likely to ensure that it won't happen again.

Those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it in the future.
Exactly!

Eh, maybe it's time to start letting go of the past. The WW2 generation is dying out, there's a new world now and the endless revisiting of that era isn't really doing much good.
Dwelling on it no … remembering it yes

I normally don’t agree with staying buried in the past but there is some truth to “those who don’t know the past are doomed to repeat it”

Hopefully our history is teaching us what to avoid (I have a sad feeling it is not) but I hope it does

6 million dead in one place.

I guess you weren't watching CNN when Rwanda happened. Or, you might have forgotten about Hussein killing 300,000 people, some with gas.

Or, maybe we forgot the whole thing in Serbia and Croatia. You know, where people were put behind barbed wire and shot into hastily dug trenches.

Eh, maybe it's time to start letting go of the past. The WW2 generation is dying out, there's a new world now and the endless revisiting of that era isn't really doing much good.
I think that as far as we manage to remember the horrific events of WW2 we are not as keen to involve in any war. And that's just fine.

I quess Americans are not so strongly against wars because they don't remember (know) what's like (when you're fighting in your own country, not thousands of kilometres away)

6 million dead in one place.
Eh? 45 million dead in one place.

I've been there. Dachau also.
I've never been there. But in Buchenwald.

Those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it in the future.
Erm, the British repeated it in Malaya during the 1950s. We have also had more recent events in Cambodia, North Korea and Indonesia (the latter with the NATO countries picking up the bill), and no doubt the future has many examples to offer us.

We are going to repeat it whether or not we remember, because any time we do something like that, it is 'obviously' going to be 'completely different'. So as morality tales go, the educational value of this one seems pretty limited to me.

King leopold killed 10 million in the Congo and nobody knows about that.

6 million dead in one place.

Eh?

Between 1,100,000 and 1,500,000 dead in one place.

I've been there. Dachau also.

I was there in 1994, and then visited Czestochowa the next day (a huge Catholic shrine with an excellent museum). Talk about seeing the worst and best in humanity back to back...

PS- Props to the person(people?) who mentioned Rwanda/Darfur/Sarajevo. It's BECAUSE we don't teach history (or at least, the *lessons* of history) correctly that things like that happen.

King leopold killed 10 million in the Congo and nobody knows about that.
I know about that.

I quess it's not so important (for many) because it happened in the dark continent and because almost everyone was doing the same thing, just not as massively. And because it happened some 50 years earlier than Auschwitz.

Erm, the British repeated it in Malaya during the 1950s. We have also had more recent events in Cambodia, North Korea and Indonesia (the latter with the NATO countries picking up the bill), and no doubt the future has many examples to offer us.

We are going to repeat it whether or not we remember, because any time we do something like that, it is 'obviously' going to be 'completely different'. So as morality tales go, the educational value of this one seems pretty limited to me.

Whew! I thought I was cynical.

The idea is to learn from the past, and try and not make the same mistakes over and over.

Yeah, I am aware of the crap that has taken place in central Africa, and in particular the US and UK's refusal to fund any kind of UN intervention in Rwanda. Waste of money apparently.

That one is of particular interest to me as Sir David Hannay, the UK's ambassador to the UN SC at the time, who participated in the brushing of the matter under the carpet, went on to speak at the LSE MUN a couple of years ago, bragging of the international community's successes in the Balkans. I thought it deliciously ironic considering his record on the other matter.

Whew! I thought I was cynical.

The idea is to learn from the past, and try and not make the same mistakes over and over.
I will not deny it, I am very cynical in my consideration of history and human nature. It was an admirable thought, I'm sure, the same way the Great War was supposed to be the war to end all wars. But, you see how these things turn out, don't you?

Eh? 45 million dead in one place.

- Your both looney. The total body count for WW2 (military and civilian) is about 55 million. To claim that 45 million of these, or even 6 million died in Auzwhitz is totally ubsurd. 6 million is the total number of jews killed during WW2, not just in Auzwhitz.

And no, im not German, nor a revisionist nutjob, the tourguides at Auzwhitz themselves said that the number of people killed at that particular facility was about 1,2 - 1,3 million, when i visited the place. Nasty stuff by the way. :(

Dwelling on it no … remembering it yes

I normally don’t agree with staying buried in the past but there is some truth to “those who don’t know the past are doomed to repeat it”

Hopefully our history is teaching us what to avoid (I have a sad feeling it is not) but I hope it does

As someone who had relatives go to their deaths there, who had relatives die in incidents of purges, pogroms, ethnic cleansing, settlement, I think it is important to remember, but you are correct, there is a right and wrong way to remember. If all remembering does is make you want to take revenge, then you will do in return the same things that were done to you thus continueing the cycle of torture, death and hate, if you remember what is the cause of this cycle, and work toward eradicating it's causes, then you are remembering in the right way.

And no, im not German, nor a revisionist nutjob, the tourguides at Auzwhitz themselves said that the number of people killed at that particular facility was about 1,2 - 1,3 million, when i visited the place. Nasty stuff by the way. :(

The currently official estimate given by Auschwitz is 1.1-1.5 million, as I posted earlier.

- Your both looney. The total body count for WW2 (military and civilian) is about 55 million. To claim that 45 million of these, or even 6 million died in Auzwhitz is totally ubsurd. 6 million is the total number of jews killes during WW2, not just in Auzwhitz.

And no, im not German, nor a revisionist nutjob, the tourguides at Auzwhitz themselves said that the number of people killed at that particular facility was about 1,2 - 1,3 million, when i visited the place. Nasty stuff by the way. :(
I just realised I wrote "in one place". I meant the whole war. About 1,2 million in Auschwitz camps, as you stated.

Why is it that the US has to fund all interventions, or conduct all interventions? It's odd that the people who decry the US taking action on its own behalf (however rationalized) decry the failure of the US to act on behalf of the UN in every instance.

The UN is not world government. We spent enough time saving the world's butt in WW II. Why can't other nations pick up the tab and send money and soldiers?

There were already soldiers in place in Rwanda. They were Belgian. Their commander said he had enough people to at least stop the violence in the capital. He asked for permission. Kofi Annan himself expressly forbid any action to save anyone, even though it was within his purview to authorize the Belgians to try and stop the violence in the capital.

The UN is useless. And not because the US vetos things, or doesn't act as the UN's military arm. It's because none of the other members (other than the UK and a few other nations) are ever willing to do anything.

Name one genocidal massacre stopped by the UN without US or NATO help.

Name one.

So where the F are all the other nations?

I just read from teletext that according to a BBC survey only 55% of Brits have ever heard of Auschwitz concentration camp. (I'll try to find this in English too)

Now they are going to show a serie of documentaries about the issue so that people wouldn't forget it.

Yes, I have heard of Auschwitz, and I certainly know more than I would like to know about it.

I think there are signs that it is already forgotten here in the United States, at least among younger people. I am 19. I have a fresh memory of middle and high school textbooks, in seven different school districts.

I find the lack of attention in the public school history curriculum to genocides to be disturbing. In my experience:

Only one teacher even mentioned the genocide of Armenian Christians during World War I, and he was straying outside of the 'official' curriculum. He was one of those teachers who never used the textbook because he thought "It is only good for the occasional useful map and pretty picture--it contains nothing of substance." He argued, rather forcefully, that this gave Hitler certain ideas of how to commit genocide and get away with it. I thank God for this teacher for not using the book.

At most, I have seen textbooks devote one long or two short paragraphs and a picture to the Holocaust. That's it. I realize that the books only have so much space, but those same books spend pages and pages on Roosevelt's leadership and the logistics of D-Day, the latter of which is trivial compared to the Holocaust. I could understand the emphasis on Roosevelt in an American history book, however.

Korematsu v. U.S., a SCOTUS decision resulting from World War II, allows the United States to detain people in 'relocation camps' in the event of dire national emergencies, as the U.S. did to the Japanese during World War II. While the Congress apologized to Japanese victims of internment and authorized token reparations during the 1980's, it lacks the legal authority to overturn the actual SCOTUS decision without a constitutional amendment. The legal precedent behind this case has never been completely overturned, though I suppose one could argue that it is being chipped away at by recent SCOTUS skepticism of the way Guantanomo is run. This has, in my experience, only been mentioned by teachers in passing, and at best, receives a couple of sentences in a public school textbook.

Genocides after World War II are never mentioned unless the teacher has time at the end of the school year to go past 1950. American history classes might cut off later, around 1980, before the genocides of Saddam Hussein (committed with chemical weapons that we sold him for use in the Iran-Iraq War, mind you), Milosevic, rivals in Rwanda, etc.

Europeans wonder why Americans come across as st00pid and ignorant (at least when they congregate in large numbers, anyway). I hope this sheds some light on why. :rolleyes:

And it's getting worse with No Child Left Behind, because social science tends to get cut back (even more) when the standardized tests only test for reading, writing, and arithmetic. There isn't time to teach history anymore, because everyone is too busy teaching to the test.

Edit: And learning about genocides committed by European imperial powers attempting to preserve/expand their empires? Forget it.

There was a small suburb just next to Buchenwald camp. Just think about it. Living next door to a museum of incredible human cruelty.

i think most people here would have heard of it , otherwise you obviously arnt very educated.

as someone said before , those who forget the past repeat it in the futury


auschwitz reminds me of chernobyl, the fatcory part of it looks like a power plant : for death and horrific actions

Name one genocidal massacre stopped by the UN without US or NATO help.

Name one.

So where the F are all the other nations?
Erm...let's see...could it be that the vast majority of nations in the UN are too poor to do anything? Come on. :rolleyes: Even a country like Russia is vastly more powerful than much of the world. Does it have the money? Erm...no.

In any case, I wasn't focusing on bashing the UN's record on dealing with genocide, but on the fact that it still happens and the rest of the world is either powerless or unwilling to do anything about it. Which renders the exercise of holding up one particular example as a cautionary tale that everyone has to have shoved down their throat, rather ineffective.

Yeah, I am aware of the crap that has taken place in central Africa, and in particular the US and UK's refusal to fund any kind of UN intervention in Rwanda. Waste of money apparently.

That one is of particular interest to me as Sir David Hannay, the UK's ambassador to the UN SC at the time, who participated in the brushing of the matter under the carpet, went on to speak at the LSE MUN a couple of years ago, bragging of the international community's successes in the Balkans. I thought it deliciously ironic considering his record on the other matter.

1. the intervention in the Balkans isn't really over, there's still a small NATO presence and the EU took over a lot of basic duties this week.
2. that intervention was too late to prevent most of the terrible massacres and attrocities.
3. While I favor humanitarian intervention in principle it's really important to realize that the presence of White people on Black turf has historically worked very badly for the Whites involved and to the total disadvantage of the Blacks involved.
What has happened usually when White people show up and tell Black people what to do?
I think another thing, it is KNOWN that a lot of funding for Osama bin Ladin came from Sudan, absolutely known, and yet who got invaded? The Iraqis who bad as they were had bugger all to do with bin Ladin. I believe it's because there is a genuine and elemental fear of going into Africa on the part of America and Britain. Realistically speaking the invasion of Sudan would have been in many ways, more justified. It does come down to what I meantioned about what happens when White people show up to tell black people what to do. Sudan doesn't have so much oil, or other resources to make it worth their while. Iraq does have all that oil. It's better realestate all around.

There are kids that have never even heard of hitler.

So where the F are all the other nations?
Disagree and agree. Europeans have big mouths but never actually do anything. Like Kosovo. And when Americans finally do something (after Europeans have asked them to do something) we start complaining about what they just did.

But US has been quite keen to intervene all around the globe without anyone asking for their help.

King leopold killed 10 million in the Congo and nobody knows about that.

10 million? Holy s***, that's a lot of people! :eek:

There was a small suburb just next to Buchenwald camp. Just think about it. Living next door to a museum of incredible human cruelty.

Have you ever been to rural NY? It is covered with dozens of little towns where everyone in the town works for the local prison which is filled up with convicts from NY City. Those towns are totally bizzare, I would have to go to them sometimes to go to courts to fight speeding tickets. Once they impounded my car and I had to go pick it up at a garage right next to a prison and the mechanic had a huge confederate flag flying proudly outside his shop. All these little towns have kind of the aura of a little fascist "paradise". Little towns in rural ny even lobby the government to build prisons in their towns because of the jobs they would bring in which is so incredibly sad.

I wonder if Nazi germany was the same way, people would ask to have concentration camps in their town to "boost the local economy" and so the men could have cushy jobs not on the Eastern Front.

Sudan doesn't have so much oil, or other resources to make it worth their while. Iraq does have all that oil. It's better realestate all around.
Agreed mostly, just had to clear this small detail. Sudan has oil. But they sell it only to Chinese. That's why it's China who's using their veto on this issue (hasn't yet, but has threatened to do so)

Normally, I would have masses to say about this, but at the moment, all I want to know is: who are you, Tactical Grace? I was at the LSE MUN and I remember his speech very well. Are you going to WMUN in Edinburgh next year?

do you realy need history to tell you that killing millions of people is wrong?

do you realy need history to tell you that killing millions of people is wrong?
it's not wrong. It's a statistic

I wonder if Nazi germany was the same way, people would ask to have concentration camps in their town to "boost the local economy" and so the men could have cushy jobs not on the Eastern Front.
Never been in American continent...

War is good for business. Until you loose the war. Germans if anyone, should know this.

do you realy need history to tell you that killing millions of people is wrong?

You don't need history to tell you that, Hell you don't even need religion to tell you that, it ought to be obvious in one's gut!
What you need history for is to understand economic and social conditions, which lead to this sort of thing, and to understand how to avoid those circumsatances.

I saw someone say that more than a billion died at Auschwitz, umm...no. Oh yea even 6 million is wrong. Check out this site. http://remember.org/educate/auschwitz.html. If that isn't good enough source try http://whc.unesco.org/sites/31.htm they've found about 1.5 died there, most but not all of which were Jewish. could find a lot more, but that would take more effort just dont want people thinking that 45 million people were killed at one camp ha.

As an aside, I am not, as my comments may suggest to some, against the idea of learning the world's history. Clearly I have a rather better grasp of the history of conflicts than a lot of people leaving today's education system.

My objection is to the idea that forcing the rememberance of one particular event will act as a useful moral lesson to the world. It really will not. Knowing one fact, in isolation, rarely teaches anyone anything of use. The teacher Evil Woody Thoughts mentions had the right idea - a wider awareness of genocide and conflict in a deeper historical context. But few people will ever gain that kind of appreciation of history. The majority, from their one soundbite, will learn little of value.

ha, sorry was watching tv and they were talking about billions of dollars spent on something, that is why I wrote billions in the first line sorry ha.

Normally, I would have masses to say about this, but at the moment, all I want to know is: who are you, Tactical Grace? I was at the LSE MUN and I remember his speech very well. Are you going to WMUN in Edinburgh next year?
I will not have time sadly, but my university, Manchester, is planning to send a delegation.

You don't need history to tell you that, Hell you don't even need religion to tell you that, it ought to be obvious in one's gut!



From whence comes this 'ought'?

I was born and raised in Lodz, Poland. I've been to Oswiecim many times when we were headed to Krakow and Nowy Sacz.

I find it really sad that only 55% had ever heard of Auschwitz, =(

My objection is to the idea that forcing the rememberance of one particular event will act as a useful moral lesson to the world. It really will not. Knowing one fact, in isolation, rarely teaches anyone anything of use. The teacher Evil Woody Thoughts mentions had the right idea - a wider awareness of genocide and conflict in a deeper historical context. But few people will ever gain that kind of appreciation of history. The majority, from their one soundbite, will learn little of value.
Agreed. Of course you have to know why it could happen. And why it did happen. They won't teach it in elementary school, but maybe later. And people just may try to find more information about it when they already know something like that has happened.

I was born and raised in Lodz, Poland. I've been to Oswiecim many times when we were headed to Krakow and Nowy Sacz.

I find it really sad that only 55% had ever heard of Auschwitz, =(
Well 55% of 4000 Brits.

I do believe that e.g. Germans are more familiar with the place and it's history.

I visited this huge Jewish cemetary in Warsaw. I think it was even more "effective" than Buchenwald (which has, pretty much, been burned down)

People simply do not know of auschwitz because they are phillistines, too consumed with thoughts of "wots for dinner?" than for remembering and trying to make a difference. Most people in wales have very little knowledge of history, and absolutly none of politics. The worst thing is they make fun of people who do, symbolic of society's ignorance. If people were made to learn these things, then only 55% of people knowing of auschwitz would be bad, but in today's society is it really surprising?

Agreed mostly, just had to clear this small detail. Sudan has oil. But they sell it only to Chinese. That's why it's China who's using their veto on this issue (hasn't yet, but has threatened to do so)
America (or any other so-called peacekeeping force) wouldn't attack any country without some reimbursement for it's woes. They attacked Afghanistan for the confidence/public morale boost after 9/11, they attacked Iraq for oil under the pretence of searching for weapons and disposing of an evil regime; if they really wanted to uproot regimes and weapons, why haven't they marched on North Korea? It's either because they fear the backlash from the global community for their wars, or they fear the backlash from Kim Jong-Il's nuclear weapons program.

do you really need history to tell you that killing millions of people is wrong?
No, but the history books will still be written and the TV will still show their obsessive factual documentaries....

Have you ever been to rural NY? It is covered with dozens of little towns where everyone in the town works for the local prison which is filled up with convicts from NY City. Those towns are totally bizzare, I would have to go to them sometimes to go to courts to fight speeding tickets. Once they impounded my car and I had to go pick it up at a garage right next to a prison and the mechanic had a huge confederate flag flying proudly outside his shop. All these little towns have kind of the aura of a little fascist "paradise". Little towns in rural ny even lobby the government to build prisons in their towns because of the jobs they would bring in which is so incredibly sad.

I wonder if Nazi germany was the same way, people would ask to have concentration camps in their town to "boost the local economy" and so the men could have cushy jobs not on the Eastern Front.
I doubt your musing about concentration camps, no respectful (non-persecuted) man under Hitler's rule would want to live anywhere near the Jews... forgive me if I'm wrong, but I have been told by numerous sources that the majority (not all... but over 50%) of German citizens at that time (1938-1945ish) and even after were actually in SUPPORT of Hitler's ideals and system. His party wouldn't have been put into power without support, after all.
Your point about the NY prisons is really quite disturbing... it worries me that crime keeps the innocent in legal jobs. Imagine a world without crime: so many jailkeepers, policemen, and emergency services - all legal jobs - would not exist! Whatever would people do? ;)

History is in the past; it's a good resource for showing trends, predicting the future, and telling you what worked then and what probably won't work now.

Well 55% of 4000 Brits.

I do believe that e.g. Germans are more familiar with the place and it's history.

I visited this huge Jewish cemetary in Warsaw. I think it was even more "effective" than Buchenwald (which has, pretty much, been burned down)

I wonder though if only 55% of 4000 Brits know what Auschwitz is, then what would that number be in the states? Or elsewhere for that matter?

And speaking of "effective" cemetaries: There is a Jewish cemetary in Lodz also, which has (I believe) the largest Jewish tombstone in the world. The tombstone was built to honour Izrael and Eleonora Hertz Poznanski, its a huge mausoleum. There are also memorials to those lost in the liquidation of the Lodz Ghetto and the "Pole Gettowa" which has around 43,000 people buried in it in "Jewish Lodz".

Have you ever been to rural NY? It is covered with dozens of little towns where everyone in the town works for the local prison which is filled up with convicts from NY City. Those towns are totally bizzare, I would have to go to them sometimes to go to courts to fight speeding tickets. Once they impounded my car and I had to go pick it up at a garage right next to a prison and the mechanic had a huge confederate flag flying proudly outside his shop. All these little towns have kind of the aura of a little fascist "paradise". Little towns in rural ny even lobby the government to build prisons in their towns because of the jobs they would bring in which is so incredibly sad.

I wonder if Nazi germany was the same way, people would ask to have concentration camps in their town to "boost the local economy" and so the men could have cushy jobs not on the Eastern Front.
I know that a lot of people didn't even know that death camps existed. They knew that the concentration camps did, but not the mass extermination camps.
(At least, that's what my Hebrew School teacher told me)

I wonder though if only 55% of 4000 Brits know what Auschwitz is, then what would that number be in the states? Or elsewhere for that matter?

And speaking of "effective" cemetaries: There is a Jewish cemetary in Lodz also, which has (I believe) the largest Jewish tombstone in the world. The tombstone was built to honour Izrael and Eleonora Hertz Poznanski, its a huge mausoleum. There are also memorials to those lost in the liquidation of the Lodz Ghetto and the "Pole Gettowa" which has around 43,000 people buried in it in "Jewish Lodz".
I know it's quite disturbing.

I was told (by locals) that this cemetary in Warsaw is the biggest Jewish cemetary in the world (due WW2). Never been to Lodz (only Wroclaw and Warsaw) but I'd really like to visit Poland again. I haven't been there since 1997 and I assume it has changed a bit.

Erm...let's see...could it be that the vast majority of nations in the UN are too poor to do anything? Come on. :rolleyes: Even a country like Russia is vastly more powerful than much of the world. Does it have the money? Erm...no.

In any case, I wasn't focusing on bashing the UN's record on dealing with genocide, but on the fact that it still happens and the rest of the world is either powerless or unwilling to do anything about it. Which renders the exercise of holding up one particular example as a cautionary tale that everyone has to have shoved down their throat, rather ineffective.
Awww, cmon, You mean in an international governing body if 33 of the nations in it can't agree on the definition of terrorism that's a bad thing? :cool:

I know it's quite disturbing.

I was told (by locals) that this cemetary in Warsaw is the biggest Jewish cemetary in the world (due WW2). Never been to Lodz (only Wroclaw and Warsaw) but I'd really like to visit Poland again. I haven't been there since 1997 and I assume it has changed a bit.

It very well could be, I know there is a cemetary in Poland that has 180,000+ Jews buried there, I'm not sure in which Polish city it is located.

You should visit Poland again :). I'm heading back there for Christmas in a few weeks, and I'm uber excited to be going home, heh.

It very well could be, I know there is a cemetary in Poland that has 180,000+ Jews buried there, I'm not sure in which Polish city it is located.

You should visit Poland again :). I'm heading back there for Christmas in a few weeks, and I'm uber excited to be going home, heh.
Niemi wie po polsku etc.

I'm going to start learning Polish on January :)

I only know how to order doubledrinks and how to swear in Polish...eager to learn more

Niemi wie po polsku etc.

I'm going to start learning Polish on January :)

I only know how to order doubledrinks and how to swear in Polish...eager to learn more
remember: say "curva" every two or three words

remember: say "curva" every two or three words
kurwa or Qrwa if you want to be posh ;)

Niemi wie po polsku etc.

I'm going to start learning Polish on January :)

I only know how to order doubledrinks and how to swear in Polish...eager to learn more

Learning it just because or for a reason?

Shame on you for just learning curse words, haha.

Although words like "gowno" and "spieprzaj" are fun to say. :)

Learning it just because or for a reason?

Shame on you for just learning curse words, haha.

Although words like "gowno" and "spieprzaj" are fun to say. :)
they have a free course for students who are going to do some courses over there, but they don't have enough people, so I promised to join them (they need 24 students in order to start the course) I just like to learn languages, even just the basics.

spieprzaj was a new one. I've used spierdalaj pretty efficiently :)

they have a free course for students who are going to do some courses over there, but they don't have enough people, so I promised to join them (they need 24 students in order to start the course) I just like to learn languages, even just the basics.

spieprzaj was a new one. I've used spierdalaj pretty efficiently :)

Thats awesome not very many people really learn Polish these days, :).

And its good that you enjoy languages, I'm in a Persian/Farsi class right now, which is really fun, heh.

I heard someone laugh about Auschwitz the other day and it pissed me off. Auschwitz has personal meaning for me. My Grandfather was killed at Auschwitz. He fell out of a guard tower and broke his neck.

:mp5: :sniper:

I heard a joke about Auschwitz the other day and it pissed me off.

My Grandfather was killed at Auschwitz. He fell out of a guard tower and broke his neck.
I’ve heard that one too

Was not terribly funny to me either (though I am surprised for you with all those other idiotic jokes you make)

I’ve heard that one too

Was not terribly funny to me either (though I am surprised for you with all those other idiotic jokes you make)

Another PC correct no sense of humor type. I weep for you.

Hmmmm

After reading all this I find Hitler was right

WHO NOW remembers the Armenians?

How many people here can honestly say they know something of that event?

I didn't till I had one teacher whose grandmother(or was it great-grandmother) went through it.........

Eh, maybe it's time to start letting go of the past. The WW2 generation is dying out, there's a new world now and the endless revisiting of that era isn't really doing much good.

Oh no no no! No way. These crimes should never be forgotten, nor forgiven. Never ever.

Even better, the whole thing makes such a splendid Litmus-test. To be applied in al conditions.

One either accepts Israel's unfettered right to exist, no matter what, as a logical conclusion of the Holocaust, or one stands accused with the Nazi's, and sentenced to summary execution.

There is no need even yet to apply this test in the Middle East, one can start applying it in the West.

Another PC correct no sense of humor type. I weep for you.


Ah yes... I present little miss ESB as proof that this lithmus test is urgently needed.

Why is it that the US has to fund all interventions, or conduct all interventions? It's odd that the people who decry the US taking action on its own behalf (however rationalized) decry the failure of the US to act on behalf of the UN in every instance.

<<snip>>

So where the F are all the other nations?
Promoting communism. The common cry seems to be "well, the USA has more money, so they should do it!" - uh.. no. You can't praise democracy (even if that isn't quite what we have), and then bitch about it using communism as your central theme. One or the other.

I have been a long-time advocate for the USA pulling back and saying "we will send NO MORE than the exact same amount of the lowest UN contributor, and will contribute no more funding than the lowest contributor to this effort.

If the least-supportive member nation sends 4000 troops - so will we. Granted, ours may be better armed, possibly better trained (I wont bet on that, though), but we should do no more than anyone else, period. I want to see how they react when they finally get treated equally by the United States of America.

As it stands now, the UN seems to use the US forces most often, specifically as World Police forces. I'm not attempting to denigrate other nations participation, I know the UK and other regions also toss troops into it, including France (as funny as I find that to be personally), but how often has something come up that "needs to be dealt with", and there isn't a cry for major US support?

Well.. excepting that whole "stop the US terrorists in Iraq" thing.

Hmmmm

After reading all this I find Hitler was right

WHO NOW remembers the Armenians?

How many people here can honestly say they know something of that event?

I didn't till I had one teacher whose grandmother(or was it great-grandmother) went through it.........
Just like with King Leopold II. Armenians are too far away. I've learned about it because the history of Russia and CCCP is very significant for us.

Eh, maybe it's time to start letting go of the past. The WW2 generation is dying out, there's a new world now and the endless revisiting of that era isn't really doing much good.

There's a saying for this. Those who forget their past are doomed to repeat it. We should NEVER forget the evils that went on during the holocaust. We can NEVER forget the suffering and the pain forced upon the innocent. If we do, then the next time it might not be Jews but Catholics or Protestants or people who have an underbite. People thought there was a new world then too, and look what happened.

Oh no no no! No way. These crimes should never be forgotten, nor forgiven. Never ever.

Even better, the whole thing makes such a splendid Litmus-test. To be applied in al conditions.

One either accepts Israel's unfettered right to exist, no matter what, as a logical conclusion of the Holocaust, or one stands accused with the Nazi's, and sentenced to summary execution.

There is no need even yet to apply this test in the Middle East, one can start applying it in the West.

Admitting that one group was horribly wronged is not an automatic excuse for them to wrong others. Cycles of violence such as that must be broken or it will never end. Sarcasm and cynicism are not the ways to break said cycles.

There's a saying for this. Those who forget their past are doomed to repeat it. We should NEVER forget the evils that went on during the holocaust. We can NEVER forget the suffering and the pain forced upon the innocent. If we do, then the next time it might not be Jews but Catholics or Protestants or people who have an underbite. People thought there was a new world then too, and look what happened.
As already mentioned we should not only remember holocaust but study why it could happen and why it did happen. I read a book about history of racism few months ago and it was brilliant. Of course WW2 wasn't only about racism, but this book gave good answers on why they were able to do what they did.

I've been to Dachau.

Admitting that one group was horribly wronged is not an automatic excuse for them to wrong others. Cycles of violence such as that must be broken or it will never end. Sarcasm and cynicism are not the ways to break said cycles.


Cycles do not exist to be broken.


*quotes the Veddas*

I am become Death, the Destroyer of Worlds.


And what wrong?

http://www.jerusalem-archives.org/images/3-25b.jpg

The story of the Holocaust is not complete, without noting arabic colaboration with Hitler.

Another PC correct no sense of humor type. I weep for you.


Its a really, really old joke.

I just read from teletext that according to a BBC survey only 55% of Brits have ever heard of Auschwitz concentration camp. (I'll try to find this in English too)

Now they are going to show a serie of documentaries about the issue so that people wouldn't forget it.

Oh, is it that time again? Time to satisfy someone's idea that people'd forgotten about Auschwitz since the last time someone decided we'd all forgotten about Auschwitz? How time flies.

Yes, terrible things, brutal things, racist things happened there. Happened in similar camps, too. People brutalized. Killed. Uh-huh, I'm getting it. I got it last time, too. And the time before that. And before that. You know what, brain-boys (and girls) of the Beeb? I must not have nearly as short a memory-span as you think I do. Or at least not as short as yours. 'Cause I've been getting it since I was in elementary school. Now please get off my back. There's modern-day stuff to be concerned about.

Or I might not be quite as desperate to find something potentially controversial or visually grotesque to exploit for ratings. But then again I'm not a television programmer, am I?

I must say the nazi camps lost their emotional significance to me after two things:

Learning about stalin's evil.
Israeli policy.

There's a saying for this. Those who forget their past are doomed to repeat it. We should NEVER forget the evils that went on during the holocaust. We can NEVER forget the suffering and the pain forced upon the innocent. If we do, then the next time it might not be Jews but Catholics or Protestants or people who have an underbite. People thought there was a new world then too, and look what happened.
Uh, how about you read the rest of the thread? I did go on to explain that position at considerable length.

I must say the nazi camps lost their emotional significance to me after two things:

Learning about stalin's evil.
Israeli policy.

IMHO, that should not matter.
Is something not tragic just because it has rivals? Is Romeo & Juliet not tragic even though we also have Hamlet?

Hitler. Stalin. Pol Pot. Etc. Comparing evil is one thing. But to say "oh, he's not as bad as X" to me just isn't right.

IMHO, that should not matter.
Is something not tragic just because it has rivals? Is Romeo & Juliet not tragic even though we also have Hamlet?

Hitler. Stalin. Pol Pot. Etc. Comparing evil is one thing. But to say "oh, he's not as bad as X" to me just isn't right.

Indeed, but one cannot go around lamenting everything.

I do believe that the nazi camps were evil beyond words, but I dont have an emotional reaction to them anymore, they are not unique in their horrors and the world has more pressing and relevant matters to worry about.

Comparing evil is one thing. But to say "oh, he's not as bad as X" to me just isn't right.
International politics and diplomacy is all too often a matter of just those kinds of calculations. Why else sell Iraq chemical weapons to gas Iranians? Because one was judged to be the lesser of two evils.

International politics and diplomacy is all too often a matter of just those kinds of calculations. Why else sell Iraq chemical weapons to gas Iranians? Because one was judged to be the lesser of two evils.

If you're referring to Reagan and the Iran-Iraq War, the U.S. sold weapons to both sides (although Saddam received far more than the Ayatollah Khomeini did).

King leopold killed 10 million in the Congo and nobody knows about that.
Eeeh no. The majority of those died of diseases.

Indeed, but one cannot go around lamenting everything.

I do believe that the nazi camps were evil beyond words, but I dont have an emotional reaction to them anymore, they are not unique in their horrors and the world has more pressing and relevant matters to worry about.

Exactly.

International politics and diplomacy is all too often a matter of just those kinds of calculations. Why else sell Iraq chemical weapons to gas Iranians? Because one was judged to be the lesser of two evils.

IMHO, that normally doesn't matter. In most circumstances, it's all about the Benjamins. The only real exceptions I can think of:

WW2- Possibly the only real ideological struggle in the history of mankind.

Vietnam- Kennedy moves us in to keep France in Nato. Yeah, that worked. :rolleyes:

*has heard of Auschwitz*

Pity we forget the torture, killing and repression of Palestinians by the Israeli's. That's another holocaust.

King leopold killed 10 million in the Congo and nobody knows about that.

10 million people in just the Congo, or throughout Africa?