The amount of actual antisemitism on this website is frightening.

It might not be obvious given Tumblr has a new algorithm that only shows you what you want to see, and yes there's maybe a whole discourse about the fighting of antisemitic views and blogs about criticizing antisemitic medias and remembering what genocidal antisemitic political group like the Nazis did. And when you look at this part of Tumblr you think "Alright, it's okay, it's cool."

Problem is that it is a really tiny fragment, and when you look at the other side of Tumblr, at the mass of things Tumblr doesn't show you, you'll find tons of antisemitic posts and tons of blogs praying for all Jews to die. Literaly I saw people here simply write "All Jews must die".

I shouldn't be surprised given the rise, return and multiplication of actual antisemitic political and social movements IRL in numerous countries... But it's still sad to see this website is just as corrupted as any others. I guess it is less visible because often antisemitic views tend to use political, religious or social arguments and subjects as "covers" (the current news is an especially good "shield") but always remember to check deeper and to carefully look at what people are writing - because you need to be able to read between the lines, to see if someone is actually involved in said topics or if they just use a superficial knowledge of it to promote a new genocide of the Jews as a whole.

hello! please feel free to ignore this question if it makes you uncomfortable, i totally respect it if this isn’t something you want to talk about or get into.

i’ve been seeing the sentiment that the ISSTD is “corrupt and not to be trusted,” almost always tied to discussion of asserting that recovery of repressed memories isn’t “real” or that ritual abuse “isn’t real.” i’ve also seen folks tie this into accusations of antisemitism on the part of the ISSTD for validating victims of RAMCOA. (i apologize that i do not have screenshots of nor links to these posts so please feel free to take what i say here with a grain of salt, i understand that it’s on me to substantiate my claims and i don’t have anything on hand to do so.)

may i ask what your thoughts or feelings on this are? i only ask because you are clearly extremely well read on this subject in addition to your lived experiences, and i’ve been having a really difficult time just trying to wrestle with it on my own. i genuinely hope my asking you this isn’t disrespectful, and if it is, then i sincerely and deeply apologize and want to reiterate that i respect your right to not answer this or deal with it. i don’t want to be cruel or intrusive to you at all. i would appreciate your insight if you’re able and willing to give it, but if not then i understand completely, and in either case i hope you’re having a good day and i wish you the best. your blog has been very helpful to me in getting a better understanding of all types of disabilities, not just DID, and i’m deeply appreciative of everything you do here.

This isn't disrespectful at all and is a very good question to ask! My answer will be very long because it's complicated.

Specifically the phrasing of "corrupt" for the ISSTD in regards to memory recall and RA stems in large part from TST and Grey Faction wording who launched multiple harassment campaigns against the ISSTD, specific therapists, and individual survivors. In all honesty TST engages in a lot of shock-value and primarily antitheistic politics (eg the "become a Satanist so you can say you have religious reasons for abortion" thing as if actively pairing abortion = Satanist is At All a good idea in a predominantly Christian society), and their primary reason for proposing this is that decades ago, the term used for ALL forms of RAMCOA was "SRA". It was an umbrella term for all forms of extreme abuse (because the first ones to be noticed by the psych field were cult and religious abuse survivors) and was frequently disclaimered as not necessarily being related to cults or Satanism until the various name changes for the abuse type came into play (RA, RAT, severe sadistic abuse, etc). But mainstream society assumes that RA = Satanic cult, in part because of the original usage of the umbrella term, in part because of Satanic Panic, in part because they misunderstand "ritual" as in the occult definition and not "ritual" as in "methodical" in the same way that OCD is described. Either way, TST and Grey Faction jumped on this. Also, it is just kind of weird to me to associate a research journal as having certain collective thoughts and ideologies. They don't. It's a place to submit, publish, and read research papers, and a place to get CE credits if you want to pay extra for that. There are people who know each other and work together sure, but also a lot of them do not know each other and a lot of them disagree with each other. They aren't really much different from any other research journal like The Astronomical Journal.

Recovered memory discourse began for two reasons: 1) when this issue started, which was around when mandatory reporting of abuse became the law in the states, the psych field did not have a protocol for how to handle missing memories or court abuse cases especially where children were involved. This meant that therapists, investigators, and lawyers often used leading questions or asked directly about certain things, and those types of questions are now known to be able to mess with someone's recall (eg, "what were they wearing" vs "was he wearing a blue sweater"). They did this especially due to the time crunch in court cases where they felt they couldn't afford to wait for the memories to come back on their own. 2) abused children who had become adults started suing their parents (successfully) for their child abuse, and this led to the creation of the mostly parent and nonprofessional group False Memory Syndrome Foundation. They did exactly zero science but were very loud about how unfair it was that they were getting sued by their kids, and it led to this becoming a mainstream thought that ended up being researched by others. There is no evidence that FMS is at all true and recovered memory research shows accuracy is actually very high so long as someone remembers it organically and hasn't been manipulated (by accident or on purpose) into it. (Incidentally also why I deeply hate it when people in trauma circles label others' experiences for them)

As far as the antisemitism. In psychology textbooks and papers and so forth: I really, really need people to understand that a psychologist writing down what their patient believes has nothing to do with whether they actually think that's accurate. Outside of the academic texts: I really, really need people to ask themselves why they think groups of people willing to abuse and torture other people as a collective would have progressive, unproblematic worldviews and believe people should have rights. The type of person that devalues others' lives to the point of being able to torture someone else of their own volition is most likely going to have certain views of who is "worthy" of existence and who is "worthy" of having power over others. They will also feed these ideologies to their victims. Whether because they genuinely believe this OR because they are deliberately making sure that if their victims talk, they will not be believed and will just be perceived as crazy. Again, group that tortures people, lying is not exactly going to be taboo to them. Especially when it comes to preventing victims from running away, saying shit like "oh the entire city/the cops/the govt knows we're doing this, they'll just bring you back if you run" is effective at intimidating, creating despair, and causing submission and simultaneously sounds like a conspiracy when a survivor says "the government and all politicians are in on my abuse." They don't even have to be an organized group to pull that, I've seen people with parents or in DV situations where they'll claim they're buddies with cops/judges so you can't report them or they'll threaten to call the cops on their victim. And honestly also: survivors can simply be bigoted. Doesn't mean they were never abused or that they're lying about their abuse just because they exhibit poor behavior or harmful beliefs. Otherwise a lot of the DID community and a lot of people in trauma spaces in general would magically become trauma free.

My stance on this is that I don't surround myself with people who are engaging in harmful behaviors, regardless of their rhymes or reasons for it or whether I can sympathize. This is not limited to bigoted beliefs, but includes things like paranoid beliefs, lashing out frequently, emotional regulation issues in general, people who have no ability to set boundaries, etc. (I am not trying to say bigotry is equivalent to these other behaviors, simply that I do not stop at avoiding bigotry) The cause of behavior can be understood without being tolerated. It is not conducive to my own recovery to do so, particularly because the things they say are often triggering for me as someone who used to have extremely paranoid beliefs that I was fed, as well as my own group having been white supremacist in nature and much of my abuse having a racialized aspect to it. Whether they improve or not does not affect me. I hope they do change and grow, but I do not tie myself to people in the hopes that they'll change. People will only change if they themselves want to.

I hope this is helpful for you.

oyou know what, fuck it. I’m drunk on a Tuesday night and I’ve been talking about Jews in an old fandom for the last couple of days so I’m going to make my case for Jewish Relius, in full acknowledgement of the fact that it makes no sense in canon

so the maps of the QT world seem to sort of imply that this is a world where Turkey/possibly parts of Iran and Iraq share a land bridge with Africa, cutting out most of the Sinai peninsula including Eretz Yisrael. which would make the existence of Judaism (or Christianity or Islam for that matter).... difficult. but not totally impossible! because Avraham Avinu is said to be from Ur, which historically was on the Persian Gulf which is roughly analogous to the QT great southern ocean. so it’s totally possible to sub one of those Three Cities or Hemet in for a fictional QT Jerusalem.

and it’s then real easy to make a fictional diaspora in the Hephestian Peninsula because of all that imperialism in the Mede region (am I making Immakuk an antisemite in this au? hope not. he can be that fucking dude. what’s his face. Cyrus? the one who ended the babylonian exile), and the Greek Jewish diaspora is one of the oldest in the world, going back a solid 2100 years, well within the QT-equivalent era.

and yknow, by Gen’s time people are pretty lackadaisical towards the gods, which is Good for the Jews, because we tend to do Not Great in times of strong nationalistic  religion and cultural hegemony.

anyway that’s my argument for Jewish QT characters in general

now let’s move on to my boychik Relius

I am aware that this could play into stereotypes given that Relius is a very Suspicious Slippery character who ~Betrays his Country~ and has a voracious sexual appetite but consider this

I Can Do Anything I Want

setting aside the sex stuff because sex is Good actually and all my favorite people are LGBTQ Jews

gross stereotypes very often have their roots in something Real but misconstrued

we see this in QT itself. very, very, very frequently, characters resort to trickery and lies and underhandedness because they are members of an underclass and therefore do not have the luxury of above-board measures--Pheris weaponizes ableism, Irene weaponizes sexism (moreso than Helen, who tends to defy it outright). Relius and Kamet are a bastard and an enslaved person, respectively (and okloi as a matter of course) and that shapes their personalities to a POWERFUL degree

so too the Jews. for a significant portion of European history, Jews were legally okloi as a class, pushed into trade because they were forbidden for owning land. being non-landowners deprived them of most of the legal rights afforded subjects/citizens, but in some ways also was beneficial, in that they were more mobile and had more avenues for success and stability if something like, say, a war or a flood or what-have-you bankrupted farmers and landowners. at various points, various European nations also employed Jews as the enforcers of the state financial apparatus. Christians and Jews alike are forbidden from charging interests to their in-group, but without interest, nobody is fckig giving loans to anyone, and if no one can get a loan, that’s a significant damper on the economy. so, the king puts Jews in charge of banks, because Jews can charge Christians interest. the king puts Jews in charge of collecting taxes. “court Jews” do the bidding of the monarchy because putting themselves under the king’s protection gives them access to wealth and power they would otherwise be barred from, AND ALSO protects them from outbursts of religiously or politically motivated antisemitic violence because fucking No One likes the tax collectors or the bank’s loan officers

which is to say - Shylock was the tragic hero of Merchant of Venice, actually

and Relius can fit a stereotype and still be Good Jewish Representation if he is written with all the love and sensitivity and historical nuance I hold in my heart

side note: all the Tolkien fans who were mad at me for writing Jewish Dwarves because I was ~stereotyping them~ when I was just trying to add nuance to Tolkien’s blatant “they were meant to be Semitic” bullshit can still fuck right off

where was I going with this

okay so

Judaism is matrilineal and Relius is raised by his mother and his father is a steward but doesn’t acknowledge him and he’s sort of three-times stereotyped as a bastard, an okloi, and an Outsider, barely Attolian tbh, doesn’t acknowledge the old gods or the new

and he learns how to manipulate people as a matter of survival and he thrives and there’s some kind of parallel to be made between Mordechai and Esther and Relius and Irene, I’m pretty sure--

Mordechai is the uncle of a young woman who becomes the queen of Babylon or Persia or something and he helps her get there and there’s this whole Thing where an evil advisor is going to kill the Jews and Mordechai is like “perhaps it is for this moment that you have become queen?” and Esther becomes a hero and we have a whole holiday about getting drunk and eating food in the shape of the evil guy’s hat/fingers/ears

the way he guilts Kamet in that Thick as Thieves scene. very Jewish.

the fact that he’s in love with Teleus, who is Extremely Goyish. reminds me of The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, when Sammy falls in love with a blond named Bacon. the Intellectual loves the Jock. shocking.

my god, the fact that he’s always poking his nose into other people’s business. because of national security? no. because he NEEDS to be the most well-informed gossip at Kiddush after Shabbat services. prior to her marriage, all of his reports to Irene were made over a dixie cup of wine, while clutching a plate from the buffet, looking across the room at the people they were talking about

the short velvet cape he affects even in summer? actually a tallit. Costis, too, is the most hopelessly goyishe man who’s ever existed and just forgot to mention the fringes.

he’s into history (Jews fucking love history) and astronomy (because he has that sphere thing--and you know, astronomy is useful for a lunar calendar), and he plays the flute. you know why there are no Jewish piano players? because you can’t flee the country with a piano. but a flute fits the bill.

oh man, his lessons with Pheris could be ripped straight out of any Jewish-American Eastern-European immigrant story about a cheder. Jews Love education and don’t fully give a shit about not scaring children in the process.

that’s the proof, and may I add the headcanons:

Relius enjoying a very long, leisurely meal on Friday evenings for Shabbat, drinking wine, singing/enjoying music, discussing grammar/translation, poetry, and philosophy with his dinner guests (Kamet, Gen, Irene, Pheris. Teleus and Costis mostly there for eye candy.)

Relius in the beginning of his career being more cautious, and then becoming more comfortable in his position and being like actuallyyyyy, I will keep kosher and keep the Sabbath, thanks, and if I’m a workaholic who writes spy reports on Saturdays that’s None of Your Business. I will get mad at people who expect me to work on the sabbath anyway.

got a lil silver hamsa pendant with a sapphire evil eye he wears all the time.

favorite holiday is Pesach. what can I say, Greek Jewish boy loves a symposium.

in conclusion: if you understood this post, the most niche post I have ever created in my life, please dm me so we can be friends. Relius’s Hebrew name is Reuven in honor of the fact that that would be my Hebrew name if I were a man. good night.

The shortcomings of secular leftism become obvious every single time Charlie Hebdo published another fucking piece of hate speech and they refuse to acknowledge it as hate speech even though it’s basically just a nazi-era antisemitic caricature with “PROPHET MUHAMMAD” written underneath it.

And maybe some “anti-racists” or something will pipe in to “defend” us with “oh, it iz against zeir religion to draw ze mahomet” which also makes us look ridiculous because 1. that’s only kind of true, there is a wider discussion of that and 2. people are basically not wrong to say that enforcing that is a police state measure that shouldn’t be acceptable. So all they’re doing is making a straw-man to represent the weakest, most hyperconservative possible take that could come out of a Muslim and is actually genuinely irreconcilable with a lot of the left’s values, values which I, and most Muslims, and most leftists, honestly hold. What’s more is that the position they present is genuinely violent and bad; the reason they shouldn’t draw the Prophet isn’t because it’s “against my religion” but because in the political climate we live in it’s inherently an act of hate speech to do so..

Westerners don’t consider it offensive to make fun of their respected political and religious figures, and this is a genuine cultural difference between them and a lot of Muslims particularly from south asia. I don’t think they should, I think the westerners should be free to “practice their culture” or whatever when they’re not killing my family about it. So when the liberals make this purely an issue of “oh ze iZlAm SaYs zat it iz, ‘ow you say, ‘ArAaAaAaM to draw zeir prophet!” they’re making us look like people who want to violently enforce something based solely on our (real or alleged) cultural values, which still agrees that we’re trying to ~eNfOrCe sHaRiA LaW~ in europe. If all they want to do is draw him, whatever. We can talk about that but it’s a different conversation.

Because when they draw Jesus they’re not drawing him as a hook-nosed banker jew with a suicide vest and a child bride, they’re drawing him in a way that is basically respectful and possibly with maybe a thumbs up if they want to be edgy, like it’s fucking different and if you can’t see that you’re just not engaging in good faith.

Aside from the cartoon itself, which nobody will even see by comparison, the publication of it in the first place, surrounded by a bunch of media fanfare and liberal anticipation, is, itself, a massive piece of performance art with the message that it’s good to #trigger all the angry barbarian peoples from out yonder in order to civilise us to French sophistication and defend freeze peach in contrast to the eastern despotism from which we all eagerly await western liberalism to free us, when we’re not busy migrating to the west in hordes to impose it on them from our positions of extreme political and social influence as refugees of ongoing global conflicts and genocides.

This recent publication comes weeks after Macron outlined new repressive police measures which had the explicit, stated purpose of stopping Muslims in France from developing an independent culture from the mainstream in a country where there’s literally a fucking burka ban that “even” liberals defend as “french culture”.

The basic message is secular fascist newspapers can do whatever it is they want and any voiced objection will be met immediately with a harsh punitive action from both the state and polite society. Again the secular left refuses to acknowledge that this is the situation and that this is a measure meant to humiliate a thoroughly subjugated people. They consider that they should be “respectful” of “our beliefs” but they do not actually criticise the power play against us and even participate in it by proclaiming themselves mediator instead of deferring to Muslims on this issue.

These basic normal foundational cornerstones of French culture, and global liberalism more broadly, tangibly and obviously lead to unthinkable violence against us on a global scale, and it’s good to be radicalised against that. The issue isn’t that it “leads to extremism” as if each of us has an inner terrorist just waiting for us to hulk out when we experience one too many microaggressions, but that Charlie Hebdo is actually a fascist publication and a huge part of the justifying apparatus for the past 20 years of western re-colonisation of the middle east, and, again, everyone should be radicalised against that because it is bad, if we’re radicalised against it and you’re not that’s a you problem and reflects a shortcoming in your analysis or organisation or both.

But even the liberals who think (for whatever reason) that they’re radicals will talk about “preventing radicalisation” among Muslim youth as if radicalism is some brand that belongs to them and them exclusively and we can’t be allowed to get our little terrorist mitts on it. They’re allowed to be radical and we’re not. And that right there is how you can tell they aren’t serious about the whole revolution thing, because revolution as they understand it demands a broad-based coalition of people willing to take direct action and who have a common analysis (that it’s their job to at least inform with their theoretical knowledge) about which actions should be taken and against what. They make no effort whatsoever to reach out to our obviously highly motivated and marginalised community with any of their talk of class solidarity because they’re a part of the same apparatus which keeps us marginalised and cooperate fully with it as far as we are concerned.

And the secular left agrees that the cartoons are racist and agrees that that’s bad and agrees that french liberalism sucks ass and is violent, racist, and nakedly imperialistic, but there has never been an instance of a left organisation to my knowledge that’s gone so far as to actually stand in solidarity with Muslims protesting against liberal Islamophobia. While the secular left may condemn islamophobia on its own terms, it never stands with Muslims and accepts Muslim leadership even when we’re protesting obvious violence and hate speech directed at us. Secular leftism and secular antifa agree that it’s good to be radical against a violent society in which hate speech is a normal accepted and even expected value and in which global leaders openly call for repressive police state measures against Muslims specifically on a good day, they even agree that it’s good and proper to use violence in such situations to prevent authoritarian overreach against persecuted minorities, but the moment we do it, it’s an act of terrorism that all radicals liberals have to Condemn Condemn Condemn or else.

And if we defend ourselves as Muslims, as Hannah Arendt called for when she said that if one is attacked as a Jew one must defend oneself as a Jew, not as a world-citizen or a defender of the rights of man, or some shit, global radliberal leftism will never have a word in support of us.

It claims to be better, and it might actually even be genuinely preferable, but it still lacks any interaction or understanding of Muslim analyses of the violence against us and don’t even think to try to theorise it themselves outside of some shallow acknowledgement of a purely economic “imperialism” or racism, which is only a part of it. And so as a result the global left inevitably ends up with a far-right analysis of one kind or the other on this; either censorship is good if it hurts people (”of colour”)s feelings or it’s bad to protest hate speech by unapproved means.

Another big problem with Farrakhan is that he’s the perfect strawman for conservatives to point to when they say “Look, Black people are racist too!”

At the time I am writing this, I actually have an essay near the top of my queue in which I talk about that timeless tactic of taking one member of a group's terrible behavior and generalizing it to the whole group, and this is a perfect example. Farrakhan is a terrible person who espouses terrible ideas.

In Ashkenazi Jewish culture, there is the concept of a Shonde fir di Goyim, or a shame for the gentiles. This is a Jewish person who has done something terrible that the gentiles can point to and say: "Look, this Jew has done something bad, this is proof that Jews as a group are bad and on the side of Satan." Such a person is not the cause of antisemitism, but they are very useful to antisemites. Louis Farrakhan is a Shonde fir di white people.

There is a response to oppression in which an oppressed person looks around at the world and says inequality is fine, I just want my group on the top. The people who think this way and the movements they form are extremely prone to becoming Shonde fir di oppressor class. Farrakhan's brand of Black Nationalism fits this mold to a tee.

This use of figures like Farrakhan by conservatives fits into a common, shallow conception of social justice, in which the oppressed class=good, oppressor class=bad. In reality of course, both groups are full of people who showcase the full range of human ethics, with oppression caused by power dynamics and structural forces. There are of course a lot of very annoying people who align themselves with social justice causes who view the world this way, you see this a lot in bad, lazy, pop feminism for example, but more importantly, this is how conservatives conceptualize the ideology of social justice.

The assumptions of Christianity and the culturally Christian moral worldview that most in the West have been marinating in their entire lives, plays into this heavily. First of all the idea that suffering ennobles means that if there is a group that is suffering more than another, you would expect them to be better more worthy people than those who suffer less.

Furthermore, Christianity has an extremely black and white moral cosmology set up in the Book of Revelation, in which there is a great war fought between God and Satan, and there is a final judgement in which humans are judged worthy of either heaven or hell. In this context, the Goodness or Evilness of a person is based on which side they take in a great conflict, in which side, or group they belong to. This gives group identification and identity politics an expectation of moral dimension.

Of course conservatives, who in the US are closely associated with the religious right, often strongly identify themselves as the group on the side of God, and the people opposed to them as on the side of Satan. The idea of an oppressed class that has suffered being the noble good class is a direct threat to this identity. Add to this a good healthy dose of the innate human tendency to see your ingroup as better than an outgroup, and it makes sense that they would point to Shonde figures and say "Look at them, they are proof that the oppressed class and their advocates are on the side of Satan."

And the best response to that kind of missing the point of social justice is to say that yeah, Farrakhan is a terrible person. So what? There is no common Black moral identity that he represents and tarnishes. He is one man making the decision to do reprehensible things. So what does the ability to find a terrible person in any given group have to do with anything? Absolutely nothing.

Gandhi and the Holocaust

An odd title, I know. But given the post I’ve seen circling around yesterday and today, a post that has unfortunately gotten the attention of thousands, I feel the need to address several of the points that it brings up. Before we go into some of these points, however, I feel like I need to mention that Gandhi’s way of thing was not anthropocentric in nature; it was theocentric. And right off the bat, that means a lot of you will not really accept to even consider his worldview as valid. Which is fine, whatever. But that is important; the two paths to God that he claimed were higher than any others were Truth and Nonviolence. In the case of the former, this does not necessarily mean factual truth, but rather adherence to an educated, well-formed conscience, and in this way follows a view similar to that of Thomas Aquinas. This adherence to the conscience should be absolute, even if this demands immense suffering or even martyrdom at the hands of those who seek to convince a person to rescind their most sacred convictions. In the words of Gandhi, quoted by Erik Erikson, “To make any progress we must not make speeches and organize mass meetings but be prepared for mountains of suffering” (Gandhi’s Truth, 306). In the case of the latter, nonviolence must be understood in its proper context. Gandhi saw two separate types of nonviolence; the first, “nonviolence of the weak.” This type of nonviolence is that of passivity in the face of evil because one does not have the power to confront that evil, and so this form of nonviolence has no moral value whatsoever. In fact, Gandhi equated such nonviolence with cowardice, and said that it would be better to violently confront evil than to give in to the temptation of this nonviolence. The morally perfect nonviolence, the “nonviolence of the strong,” was essentially the nonviolence taught by Jesus; though you have the ability to fight back, you choose not to. This choice must not be out of fear, or it is actually of the first variety, nor should there be any hatred towards persecutors, or the act of nonviolence is stained with an implicit form of violence. Rather, it should be done out of love of, and recognition of the humanity of, the persecutor. This does not ensure easy victory, of course; as Erik Erikson states, “it is almost a rule that powerful opponents, in their stubborn bewilderment over being faced with this new nonviolent kind of struggle, become more ruthless” (Gandhi’s Truth, 342). But the point of such nonviolence is not necessarily victory within this lifetime, but the purification of the individual through suffering for the Truth. This, of course, invites metaphysics into politics, something that many of even his closest friends did not like. To a certain extent, this even more savage response can be seen as a good thing, because it presents the persecuted with more chances of being witnesses to love and truth, and will hopefully affect the consciences of the persecutors (or, at the very least, the indifferent masses who see these events unfold). Much like the early Christian martyrs, then, Gandhi advocated for upholding truth at whatever the cost, enthusiastically suffering for the truth when given the chance of rescinding their views or being punished, and loving and identifying with the humanity of one’s persecutors. For more information on how this would have worked on a theoretical level, I highly recommend Raghavan Iyer’s The Moral and Political Thought of Mahatma Gandhi. Now, let’s move on to how this influenced Gandhi’s view of the Holocaust : “Criticized the Jews for defending themselves against the Holocaust because he insisted that they should have committed public mass suicide in order to “shame” the Germans instead of fighting back. His exact words were, “But the Jews should have offered themselves to the butcher’s knife. They should have thrown themselves into the sea from the cliffs. As it is, they succumbed anyway in their millions.” Okay. Let’s start with an early letter, dated to late November of 1938. What we see in this letter is an admittance of Hitler’s psychopathy (”The tyrants of old never went so mad as Hitler seems to have gone”). We also see Gandhi exhorting German Jews to organize and fight this oppression nonviolently, and doing this even if individual Jewish people must act alone at first. Gandhi knew that they were dying; and (as the above quote from that insufferable post even shows) it is by virtue of the fact that they were being killed that Gandhi saw the need for them to nonviolently resist. “If one Jew or all the Jews were to accept the prescription here offered, he or they cannot be worse off than now.” In fact, in Gandhi’s mind, it would be better; they would “preserve their self-respect,” and give them “inner strength and joy.” Further, “what has today become a degrading man-hunt can be turned into a calm and determined stand offered by unarmed men and women possessing the strength of suffering given to them by Jehovah. It will be then a truly religious resistance offered against the godless fury of dehumanised man.” This goes back to Gandhi’s conceptions of victimhood and sacrificial love (see Faisal Devji’s The Impossible Indian: Gandhi and the Temptation of Violence, pages 143-146 for more information). In Gandhi’s way of thought, victimhood in and of itself grants no moral dignity to the victimized. This is an admitted divisive statement; some people will argue against it tooth and nail, while others will agree that claiming victim status does not make one morally superior. That’s not a question I want to go into right now (though I suspect the former will never reconcile themselves to Gandhian morals and metaphysical ideals). What makes victimhood a path to moral virtue, then, is one’s willingness to suffer it with love. This course of action has two effects; first, it grants agency to the persecuted. The persecuted is no longer just a victim to circumstance, but an active force that has to power to decide how they are going to die. The human will being equated with the very essence of personhood in Gandhian thought, this is absolutely paramount. The second effect deals with the persecutor; by accepting the humanity of the persecutor and allowing oneself to die, the persecuted gives the persecutor the chance to, in turn, recognize the humanity of the persecuted and change his actions based of off this recognition of a shared humanity. In other words, the persecuted allows himself to become an opportunity for the persecutor’s redemption. This is a radical idea, one on par with the ideas taught by Jesus and the early Church Fathers. Gandhi’s hope was that the persecuted everywhere would come to love their persecutors so radically that it would evoke a change within the persecutors, if not at the moment of persecution than at least in the future, when they had time to reflect on their actions. This is, again, clearly not a particularly humanistic view; Gandhi subordinates the value of human life to what he sees as the ultimate values of Truth and Nonviolence. And, as Faisal Devji points out, given that the Allies were willing to sacrifice millions of lives to defeat the Axis powers, is it really fair to call out Gandhi’s own willingness to sacrifice lives to end the war? Of course, this letter also reveals just how badly Gandhi misunderstood the Nazis’ ultimate goal; Gandhi compares the Indians of South Africa to the Jews of Germany, stating “the Indians occupied precisely the same place that the Jews occupy in Germany.” This is a statement that is extremely ignorant, and unequivocally false, even at this early stage of the war. Gandhi also believed “the persecution had also a religious tinge.” This is also false; the German hostility towards the Jewish people was racial in nature. Here, Gandhi has confused the (not unprecedented, but not yet mainline) racial antisemitism of the Nazis with the theological antisemitism prevalent in Christianity. In other words, Gandhi at this stage believed that the Jewish people were being persecuted because of their beliefs and practices, and not for simply existing. Had Gandhi had realized this earlier, the way he would have wrote about the Jewish persecution in Germany may have been different. In fact, Faisal Devji goes so far as to say “Had he known about it, the Mahatma would undoubtedly have pointed to the Warsaw Ghetto uprising of 1943 as an illustration of his teachings. For this struggle was dedicated not to the victory or even the survival of the Jews trapped in Warsaw who resisted the German armed forces in an unequal battle, but rather to ‘the honor and glory of the Jewish people,’ words the uprising’s motto in defiance of all political calculation” (The Impossible Indian, 144). If you’re interested in seeing a Jewish perspective of victimhood and agency in a German concentration camp, I highly recommend Man’s Search for Meaning, the first half of which is Viktor Frankl’s memoir of his time at Auschwitz death camp (you can find some quotes from it in my Viktor Frankl tag) What we see in Gandhi is a man whose appreciation of suffering, like Mother Teresa’s, is deeply misunderstood by the secular mind. Gandhi believed above all else the supremacy of the twin values of Truth and Nonviolence, and the lengths at which he would talk about them on a theoretical level are enough to make many people uncomfortable. But this was not some cold-hearted disregard for the Jewish people. This was Gandhi’s understanding of the value of suffering, the heroism of martyrdom, and (to a fair extent) his ignorance of the Nazi state of mind. You don’t have to agree with his viewpoint, and it is fair to criticize it, but to label him a monster for it is misguided, at best. @patron-saint-of-smart-asses and @marschattpanosh, I had seen you two reblog the cursed post.™ If you have any comments about this, or want me to address any more questions and concerns about Gandhi, let me know.

About Me

Name: Ronnie (Ron/Ronn or Ronnster is an okay substitute) | I also go by Tequila sometimes. (or Tequi for short). So that would leave ~5 suitable names to address me by! I have no preferences out of them.

Age: in my 20s (probably older than you :P)

Sex+Gender: CisFemale Sexuality: Heteromantic Pansexual (*maybe* more on demiromantic range in romantic-ness... or i’m just super awkward/easily entertained. maybe all of the above, haha) Height: 5′5″ (i don’t rp as myself really so it’s not like this info is relevant. lol. i wish i wasn’t quite as tall.. like being like 4′11 - 5′2 would have been nice... but i’m under 5′6″, albeit just barely, so that’s good at least i s’pose..) Ethnicity: Italian/Eastern European/English/German (+small bit of Turkish) American (basically Caucasian but I have a dark skin tone for a caucasian - olive skin from my Southern Italian and Eastern European (Slavic) [plus that tiny bit of Turkish in me] heritage). I’m technically Jewish as well as my mom’s mom’s mom (my great grandma) was Jewish and so on, but my grandma and mother were raised Catholic, and my dad was raised Catholic so I was raised Catholic (before I left the church as a teen / around 9th grade i left. Shortly after being confirmed in reality, ahaha xD;) Job: Unemployed atm *sobs* but sometimes i help friends or family with odds and ends for money. i used to do colouring commissions (digital). But I usually too to long and would end up feeling guilty about that so i stopped... And now I’m busier than before so I’d like to create content on my own terms with the free time i have. i’m also a student again. Psychology was a mistake. Now going for a International Politics/Studies/Relatioins | Global Peacekeeping degree and my goal is either to do something for state department or work for a non profit or something. I don’t aim to be rich and super successful. Simply being safe, happy, and satisfied is good enough for me. Though perhaps this stunts my motivation towards bettering myself (through good work ethic and stuff. i’m kind of a procrastinating potato person). Likes: G/t (hence having two G/t blogs; G/t is giant/tiny. if you aren’t cool w/ that then idk why you are here??? this blog is for G/t. Not necessarily sfw stuff either. This blog is NC-17+! (so if you are 16 or younger gtfo); I also like everything International - cultures; politics; languages ; architecture; art; FOOD :9 ; places; fauna; I LOVE CELEBRATING THE DIVERSITY OF THIS PLANET  TTvTT ; I’m  a rather liberal person socially, politically and so on. I will never be okay with bigotry of any kind. And I will not tolerate it. Nor bullying. Uhm. Let’s see. i’m kinda sorta socialist and thus kinda have some disdain towards capitalism I’m pro-choice but I hope that you have a good reason for it and not just because “it feels better w/o the condom”; if your all about that, i’d suggest maybe female condoms - though a little wonky at first - they allow for more sensation on both sides. They also can be used as ‘dental dams’. And i’m fairly certain they are free  w/ most insurances. And they can be put in and stay in for hours before use - so you (if female) good go out and have fun and hook up and not ruin the heat of the moment by condom putting on and stuff. Just saying. (hey this IS a nsfw blog, might as well give some nsfw advice haha.) I’m agnostic though I’m sorta leaning towards atheism. I’m just do paranoid/unsure of everything to totally discount religion/a higher being/etc. I just  sorta seriously doubt it. I am not fond of how religion has affected this planet now and throughout the past. But I can’t deny there are benefits to being religious and don’t hold it against people for being religious nor do i blame certain religions for the world’s problems. And Islamophobia, Antisemitism and anything anti-religion in such ways as the two before mentioned things counts as bigotry in my book and if you recall i don’t tolerate bigotry of any kind! I think the world kind sucks because people kinda suck in general, haha. I will never judge anyone personally. I may feel on the inside personal/hurt/angry feels, but I will do my best not to let it cloud my judgement of anyone permanently and it would take a LOT of hate and harassment for me to block anyone. I don’t like blocking people. I feel that is sorta like denying a person’s existence and sorta says ‘you aren’t worthwhile as a person’. And you have to be a total all-encompassing shithead for me to think that. That being said, I know some people with block very easily and my blog just being nsfw content-friendly would lead to blocking. a message stating why you are blocking me - especially if it’s nothing personal - would be nice, however, as I’m a VERY PARANOID person. Speaking of paranoia. I’m mentally ill. This is really  why I write and/or talk a lot. It is a habit out of nerves and awkwardness. And my poor attention span makes long conversation hard - barring if going off into tangets is okay. I will do that a lot. I have one mode and that mode is stream of conciousness. I know my use of many many words can be annoying. Trust me. I know. Please don’t harass me about it. If it truly makes you anxious, reach out to me, and I will try hard to be more concise when reblogging you or if ever addressing you. That is if you’d feel comfortable asking me this. I may not block people easily, but that doesn’t mean won’t. And that’s just a reality that I have to live with. I accept this. But yeah, basically if I upset you in anyway, let me know! I am always trying to better myself. The hardest thing for me would be to not ramble. If it’s something like a certain topic or word bothers you. And I’m currently not tagging it. Let me know. I’m gonna try and be super diligent (and not so rambly) with tags on this particular blog at the very least. though i should do that on every blog tbh...) Anyways, back to being mentally ill. I have Bipolar Disorder Type II (maybe, that is. just switched psychiatrists and my new one things I may just have regular general depressive disorder as my “up” moments are very infrequent and all I really do is be more impulsive/talkative/jittery/etc than usual... and my mood tends to be good when ‘up’.. too bad it comes with the loss of common sense. I don’t do anything physically dangerous though. Worst would be buying something expensive and stupid for no good reason. I’ve done that a few times. 0/10 would recommend, haha. I also have OCD (which is like useless. it gives me extreme focus, but mostly with dumb things - lists, aphabetizing things, researching stuff on the Internet, basically the only good thing is that I can research like a boss, though bad thing is that i end up spending way too much time researching and over do it... I already mentioned my anxiety awhile back, but I’ve been diagnosed with both General Anxiety Disorder and Social Anxiety Disorder (i can practically be agoraphobic sometimes and have reculsive spells both online and off - which is why i probably will disappear at some point. maybe i’d come back. maybe i wouldn’t. and if i come back, it could be years before i do. i don’t know so you definitely wouldn’t know so puh-lease do not get attached to me ;___; G/t stuff: The truth is - I mostly like fluff and nice, kind, sfw stuff. At least as a viewer. As I content creator, I like to experiment and broach all kinds of topics, some sensitive. I will have characters that are genuinely bad people. Often I like dark characters that go through some sort of redemption. But I’ve toyed with doing something that is akin to ‘the making of a villain’ where a character starts out benevlent and than after going through some stuff, becomes malicious, perhaps downright evil even... a loss of self maybe have ocurred. I am not shy in having characters with imperfections, but in a realistic way that isn’t bad. I mean, it’s not ideal, but it happens. like blindness or a missing limb. many scars. mental illnesses are frequent in my characters and sometimes in a criminally insane way. However, I aim to reflect reality in such sort of topics, so of course criminally insane characters would be a very small minority compared to perfectly safe mentally ill characters. But, in any case, as I said, I plan on using extensive tags this blog WILL have (some) VORE. But it is NOT the focus of the blog and I don’t really draw vore - well i haven’t really done so yet... And in writing, I tend to making a horror element. Though I am somewhat fond of  “safe” (platonic or not) vore.. I’m rather confused about it and have a hard time considering plausible within my own content. So in my writing it would be fatal and not with any main characters of anything...mostly just poor SOBs and such... Basically, it would be quality content for the vore community as it would likely portray vore as despicable and wrong. As, in a real life scenario, that would be a correct assumption. These would be worlds w/o safe vore (barring i guess immediate puking, but i’m actually kinda disturbed/freaked by things vomit-related. So I’m not sure i’d be able to write that... Maybe i could. It’s just RL vomit that causes me to panic and cry. Drawn stuff or written stuff, as long as it’s not too descriptive or realistic doesn’t really bother me, though i’m not sure i’d say i like it.). Some vore stuff actually upsets me. But thing with me is, I never know when something is going to upset (aka make me cry/angry/uncomfortable/panicky) or whatever, so I just live with any unfortunate run ins with feels as it happens and then move on. Unless, I feel it is condoning a poor behavior and gives a message that is not in line with what you (the writer) indicates it is, then I’ll just nothing. And if i do say something, it won’t be in a hostile way, it would just be hey, x action actually kinda indicates y because of z. just thought i’d let you know if interpretations of this that reflects what i just by readers would bother you. if not, or if you disagree, than that’s cool too. I was just staying that just in case that would bother you and thus maybe you’d want to change things. but it’s totally your decision and i’m not pushing either way. blah blah some rambling because i’m trying not be offending while likely saying things that may offend. I have a hard time not being blunt and firm with my words. So basically take anything I say with a grain of salt. Sometimes I open my mouth when i shouldn’t. If I made you upset, just let me know what i did and why it upset you and i’ll apologize (within reason. like if you were a jerk and i was just like ‘oh stop that shit already’, i’m not gonna say sorry if you were legitmately being a jerk. but otherwise, i’m quick to say ‘sorry’. i’m always saying sorry. sometimes i’m wanting to say sorry but i’m too anxious too. so keep that in mind as well. Uhm. I like M/f and M/m content the most. F/f is p. cool too. Poly Relations that mixes M/m, M/f and/or F/f are cool too (all types of combos as long as there are no “m” with a “F”...not to knock on that, just isn’t my thing.. So yeah, as I hinted, i’m noot really a fan of F/m.. and I’m not gonna make much content with that (though i do have a canon F/m pairing in one of my worlds/series/story/idk what to call it. don’t expect much of them though.). But in all honest, there’s a lot of F/m stuff out there and my content isn’t mediocre at best so it’s not really a loss to the F/m community that i’m not doing much of that.Also, please don’t request content. I may see on your blog at some point you wish there was ‘x’ and/or ‘y’ content and this may prompt me to write or draw something like that. but it might not either. In a nutshell, I do what I what when I want. I know that’s kinda selfish but that mindset - when in connection with just leisure activities keeps me sane!You can ask any question. I just might not answer. If I’m not gonna answer, I respond with something random. And I’m unlikely to respond with drawings. Too much effort. Sorry.In theory, I’d like to RP. But I’m just not the right kind of person for a serious RP. i’d only want to do a detailed, literate story RP and i’d only be able to do like one respond a day - if that. So it’s kinda a waste of someone’s time to RP with me.  And I think I’d just prefer to write drabbles/one-shots or draw my characters or whatever. I don’t give my characters enough love. They kind just sorta chill in my mind not doing anything a vast majority of the time, haha xD So long story short, I’m not RPing currently. Sorry. And if/when I RP, I am not myself. I separate my interest/fantasy of G/t with my reality. Just trying to keep sane. Not trying to knock on people whom identify as a giant or tiny or whateverIDK what else to say. Probably am missing important stuff, while writing too much frivolous stuff, heh... I’ll probably edit this every now and that ^^

Exactly how Can I Solve My Erection Issue Naturally?

Back then, the concept from a wonderful youngsters' birthday celebration celebration in Cairo would usually cause a visit to McDonalds - and they would certainly be actually over pleased. This write-up laid outs just how the historical planet looked at water, off the deluge beliefs of Assyria and the Scriptures, to the sustainably made water off artesian aquifers in Classical opportunities. In historical opportunities when there were no doctors or even function theaters people used to dealing with stones in their gallbladder or kidneys. Quran is actually a publication of magics and also is one statement that is allowed by many individuals that have actually checked out the Holy Quran and also tried to know that. This is something that was presented by Allah Almighty for the improvement of the mankind. I could claim that the majority of the book will definitely sound along with my audiences because our team have consistently known that there is actually more to life in comparison to the outfit sense of some slight personality or even some pointless political roguishness. This historical burial ground stores some of the planet's earliest proof of canine domestication This also disclosed the respect these ancient animals were actually given in prehistoric communities. Not merely the skeletons as well as their various other physical functions of the historical people are recognized, yet also the attribute as well as degree of growth from all the crafts that may be maintained by funeral. If you have any thoughts about the place and how to use yellow pages uk wiki - click through the up coming web site -, you can get hold of us at the web site. This procedure has been in usage due to the fact that the historical times for great and negative purposes both. 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Pliny the Senior citizen described an Egyptian perfume that preserved its own fragrance after 8 years, as well as the old Greek botanist, Dioscorides, agreed that Egyptian cologne was far superior to that brought in through various other civilisations. The Gnostics related to extremely the historical Greek thinkers to have been actually accountable fit their spiritual identification, as opposed to the intelligences and thoughts from those that have actually resisted their ageless concepts. The ancient thinkers possessed the interesting tip that humans are actually only really ever happy as well as active when they have a specific duplicity from nature as well as individuality regarding all of them. Ancient Classical home furnishings operate marvelously properly for nearly any type of area from your residence. Old wisdom, combined with roots of esoteric and also doctrinal in nature, in addition to the understanding concept of early greek, the bases from an unique religious mind science that simply the Druze Brotherhood can easily declare to be their own. Situation: Archaeologists are aiming to learn more about these historical people by excavating in the damages to locate artefacts. Various other blossoms that were actually well-known in the course of old Egyptian times included the papyrus plant as well as the palm tree. Usual porcelains like glasses and blocks are actually still helped make by ancient operations. As also viewed earlier in old Egypt the Greeks also believed in Divine beings like fairies that inhabited streams and also grottoes. Relationship, like a lot of the transactions in old Rome was actually controlled through arrangements. This Lion symbolism has actually been utilized in landscape water components coming from early opportunities by means of to the here and now day. Our team observe it in films and also often its own illustrated in commercials, as pointed out above, but its own still restricted, at the very least in the United States. Fragrance went to the center of aesthetics as well as rehabs for both men and women in Ancient Egypt. In was actually during the 16th century that the table (originated from the Latin word tabula, which suggests a panel, a plank, or a level piece), definitely entered into its personal, hard dining tables and also other sort of tables have actually been around for virtually ages. If you really want to recognize where some from the legislations our company have today came off, this publication is actually quite useful. Izaac Walton published his publication 'Compleat Fishermen' along with the very first comprehensive writings about fly fishing. But analysts suggest that the genius from the book from Esther is that God performs not must be discussed to become obvious as well as noticeable. The Atlantic Month-to-month; June 2000; The Come back from Ancient Moments - 00.06; Quantity 285, No. 6; webpage 14-18. Baseding on the book of Esther, a determined Antisemite at court angered at her relative Mordecai as well as deceived the master right into signing an edict to eliminate of the Jews. Quran is a manual of magics and that is actually one statement that is actually accepted by lots of people who have checked out the Holy Quran as well as aimed to know that. This is something that was bestowed through Allah Almighty for the best interests from the humanity. I may say that a lot of guide will certainly sound along with my viewers given that our company have always recognized that there is actually more to lifestyle than the gown sense of some small star or some irrelevant political shenanigans. Dowsing - Divining Radiesthesia is a phrase, that was created in 1920 by the French abbot Alexis Bouly and it stems from the Latin term Distance" (radiation) and coming from the Classical phrase Aisthesis" (sensation). The structural logic that molded the thoughts scientific research is actually within the structure from the ancient Greek viewpoint, the theses from Classical Thinkers which assisted form the 5th Science. SAMSON the kid from MANOAH (c) 11OO BC possesses his complete tale said to in the BOOK OF JUDGES in the OLD PROOF asserting he was talented through GOD with massive strength utilized generally to pay a one man war against his foes the PHILISTINES. In the Greek human being, the decadent sex-related free-for all depicted in flicks and many university classrooms was actually certainly not the specification in the times of the free of charge and also democratic Classical society. The old natural philosopher, Pliny the Senior citizen, files floral fragrances such as iris, bitter almond and also lilies in his Nature as being made use of in great quantity. Throughout numerous societies in historical opportunities, the body and also making love was actually both marvelled at and also promoted. Pliny the Elder defined an Egyptian fragrance that maintained its own scent after 8 years, as well as the old Classical botanist, Dioscorides, conceded that Egyptian cologne was actually much above that created by various other civilisations. In the early times, vocals of the sorcery, spell and also witchcraft were commonly had as a weatherglass just before any kind of monarchy or even empire will certainly take any kind of action, deed or admonishments before going into fights, small or primary tasks or maybe daily program of a kingdom. Because components were actually imported even in early times shows the importance of fragrance.

On the one hand I am monstrously sad to be living in a time when the extreme-right and the extreme-left coexist as threats. On the other hand, I am kind of glad, because it allows me to see the exact workings of each of the extremes, and despise them both as much.

I mean, for the extreme-right it is very obvious why they're bad, ever since World War II we know what we're getting. But the extreme-left? It could be a bit harder to see, especially since the left defends the "good" principles like defending minorities, fighting against oppresors, equality for everyone, diversity everywhere... And yet we now have the extreme-left right in our face, showing how it can take those good principles and twist them, abandoning the "equality" and "diversiy" part for hypocritical ersatz.

The most revealing example - which was discussed about and evoked as a threat LONG BEFORE the whole Israel-Hamas conflict reignited itself - is how the extreme-left is known as antisemitic. You start thinking "Heck, why? It makes no sense! The extreme-left defends racial and religious minorities, and the Jews are known as one of the most persecuted and hated minorities in the world's history, so the left couldn't possibly be against them!".

But here's the twist... The left is against the "elite". Real or imaginary. The left is like a Robin Hood defending "the poor, the weak, the helpless", and will as such attack those that look wealthy or seem powerful, even when they're not. Comes in nice Lady Antisemitism, and the extreme-left starts shouting the same conspiracy theory and insane beliefs that the extreme-right used to shout. "There's too much Jews in the finances and the politics" ; "Jews are wealthier than regular folks, everybody knows that!", "Everybody knows the Jews control the media". And so, the extreme-left turns the persecuted minority into yet another elite of wealth and power who secretly controls the media - and decides they are an enemy to be taken down. Resulting in the exteme-left becoming a twin of the extreme-right.

This "We fight against the elite" mindset can explain a lot of what is wrong and awful with the extreme-left, and a lot of its dangers. For example how they actually "pick-and-choose" the minorities they want to defend and that are "worth" taking care of. I already talked about Jewish people, but there's a reason why the extreme-left keeps talking about Black people and Arab people... but almost never talks of Asian minorities and ethnicities. Because they're "too white", because they're "not persecuted enough", because they're too "well-implanted" or come from "too rich, too powerful, too Western countries". And as such, in this same blind and warped, out of reality logic, the extreme-left considers them to be too, part of the "elite" and thus rejects them as a "valid" minority.

And this dangerous anti-elite movement doesn't just have racist repercusions, but also terrible cultural ones. Everybody points out the anti-intellectualism of the extreme-left, but as a literature student who went to a university, I have to support this: yes, the extreme-left has a problem with traditional culture, classic literature, and simply higher-education that isn't about one of their personal topics. They deem that studying Ancient Greece or Ancient Rome for example is a proof of being colonialist, or that by being interested in any classical European author you are inherently racist. Again, it comes from a good and positive logic such as "One should be interested in many cultures, just not their own" or "It isn't because someone is uneducated that they are not a worthy person". But this is twisted into: "Since our candidate was not elected, we will attack the symbol of this hateful elite that obviously rigged the election - like universities, and we will especially destroy precious and rare books from ancient times, or degrade treasured pieces of art, to show that our rightful leaders have been denied their throne". From "You don't need to have an education to be worth something and a good person", we went to "You don't need an education, period. Culture is useless".

Again, the appeal to the masses that believe themselves to be the mass when in fact they are more of a minority. Fucking demagogues who rely on the "blind and mindless mob" to get in power - that's a technique found equally in both extreme-right and extreme-left, and the recent decade has proven us that. When a extreme politician is not elected by a vote, their supporters will start rebelling and rioting and shouting angrily the election is rigged, because "they" are the majority, "they" are the voice of te people, and as such it is impossible for them not to win... And in this blind senseless anger they refuse to admit that, simply, maybe they didn't win the vote because they are not the "majority" they like to think themselves as, but just a loud minority, or a mass of people not as big as the mass of people opposing them.

To return to the extreme-left, I can even extend the topic to genders! This was denounced heavily by the mockeries of the "wokism" movement and its ridiculus excesses, but I will forever recall this incident where someone tried to create a social and working group exclusively for women and "trans people" from which all men were banned - before realizing the problem that, by banning all men, they also banned trans men, and created the paradox of, by accepting trans people denying them any masculinity. It was at the time shared as a ridiculous story to be mocked at, but honestly it was very revealing of the entire warped "goodness" the extreme-left puts into place, and it shows how, as the saying goes, "Hell is paved with good intentions".

The right wants to maintain traditions, a culture, offer peace and security - leading to an extreme-right of xenophobe and racist fascists.

The left wants to put down the elite and care about minorities and open itself to diversity - it becomes an extreme-left of antisemitism, transphobia and book-burners.

I always knew all extremes were bad, but now I actually see in real time how good principles and ideas are warped up into dictatorial and hateful behaviors, and as I said before, it makes me both sad and glad. Sad for the monsters we will have to fight, but glad that I know how the monsters came to be and what their anatomy is.

The Force Awakens: Nazism and Holocaust Imagery, a case study

The language of American cinema is full of Nazi imagery. They have become stock villains, symbolic of tyranny, and a convenient shorthand for evil. Villains who are not Nazis are often draped in Nazi-esque imagery, Nuremberg-style pageantry, or uniforms made to resemble Nazi uniforms. American filmmakers love to say “these people are evil because they are like Nazis.”

This has a cheapening effect on the memory of real Nazi atrocities. This use of Nazis and Nazi-esque villains almost never has any connection to the real evils committed by Nazis. Instead, it’s a reflection of the popular American conception of the Nazis as the “bad guys” that the American “good guys” fought and beat in World War II. The American movie and television industries feed off of, and also feed into this collective view of the Nazis, which flattens them down and glosses over what actually made the Nazis so dangerous and terrible, while allowing American audiences to give themselves a little pat on the back for being against Nazis, making it that little bit easier for them to put themselves in the hero’s shoes, saving the day the same way America saved a helpless and prostrate Europe and the Jewish people. This narrative ignores of course that the Americans were far from noble “good guys” who saved the day, and the Nazis were a very specific kind of evil, that Americans were (and more importantly are) not immune to.

This general American ignorance about Nazis and the Holocaust, and worse, the unawareness of this ignorance, leads to many problems, most commonly a lack of ability to distinguish Nazi-esque ideas when spouted by someone not wearing a Nazi uniform, and vulnerability to different forms of Holocaust denial. The most extreme form of Holocaust denial, the idea that the Holocaust didn’t happen, or happened on a much smaller scale is sadly all too common, but not the only form this general ignorance about Nazism can lead to. One more common form is the deracialization of the Holocaust. From the common, yet completely absurd idea that Nazis hated people with brown hair, often with the corollary that Jews were more likely to die because they were disproportionately brown haired, or that blond haired Jews were spared, (one only needs to look at photographs of the Nazi elite to see plenty of brown hair, and blond hair was anything but protective to the Jewish and Rromani targets of Nazi genocide) to the idea that Jewish people were targeted for “their beliefs”, the American understanding of the Holocaust often leaves out the racial nature of the Nazis’ crimes and ideologies, and ignores the way in which the Nazi regime was built on racist lies that scapegoated the Jewish and Rromani people as the ones to blame for Germany’s ills, and as inferior and decietful races, not as a matter of religious belief or even culture, but as a matter of blood.

Related to the deracialization of the Holocaust is the idea that the Nazi ideology arose from out of nowhere and “took over” an otherwise civilized Germany, ignoring the old and extremely well-established European tradition of antisemitic and anti-Rromani violence and mass-murder, and the thoroughly entrenched antisemitic and anti-Rromani ideas in European cultures and societies, including Germany, that Hitler and the Nazis fed off of. This makes it so much easier to view the Nazis as interlopers and corruptors than as an understandable and potentially reoccurring political ideology that can adapt itself to local bigotries.

Contrary to what might be expected, the overt us vs. them, good guys vs. bad guys, Good Americans (and allies, just remember the Americans are the important ones) against the Nazis narrative of World War II and the Holocaust also exacerbates the most extreme form of Holocaust denial that I mentioned above, the denial that it happened or was as large as every credible historian accepts. This is because at some point, a significant number of people run across the hard truth that the United States is nowhere near as virtuous as our grade school American history textbooks would have us believe, or as dedicated to living up to our ideals.  For some people, raised on this good guys vs. bad guys view of the war, it’s easier to flip the narrative to make the Americans the bad guys (and therefore the Nazis the good ones) than to do away with the narrative entirely.  Still others take the normal, even natural path of assuming that good and evil is some kind of zero sum game, so if America is less virtuous than they were taught, the Nazis must be more so.  Sadly this isn’t true, the fact that the Americans were far from flawless doesn’t mean that the Nazis didn’t industrialize mass murder while acting out an ideology that mandates genocide.

I don’t hold Hollywood responsible for the popular American misconceptions about the Nazis and the Holocaust.  I lay those primarily at the feet of the appalling state of history education in the United States, including the history of the Holocaust.  Instead, American film reflects the viewpoints of filmmakers who have themselves absorbed these misconceptions, and produce movies that reinforce them.

This is the film-making tradition that gave birth to the Star Wars original trilogy, and as much as I love Star Wars, it does epitomize this approach to depicting Nazi symbolism in film.  The Empire are bathed in Nazi aesthetic, from their uniforms, to the name of the stormtroopers, to imperial officers with strongly Germanic names.  Yet while the empire is undeniably evil, it isn’t really evil in the same way as the Nazis.  Although the EU took the Nazi symbolism, as well as the lack of visible women or non-humans in the imperial ranks, and extrapolated discriminatory policies towards nonhumans, and even their enslavement and exploitation, as well as rampant sexism in the imperial ranks, this is nowhere to be found in the movie itself, an we have no evidence to suggest that these bigotries are in any way foundational to the empire and to imperial philosophy the way Nazi bigotries were to their ideology.

Interestingly, we do see a genocide depicted onscreen in the original trilogy, when Alderaan is blown up.  However, the destruction of Alderaan is again in no way foundational to imperial ideology.  The Emperor didn’t come to power on the force of galactic hatred for Alderaanians.  Also, and this is crucial, the destruction of Alderaan has no real emotional weight, except to show us how evil the empire is.  The only Alderaanian the audience knows is Leia, and she survives.  It isn’t mentioned after A New Hope, and it just isn’t meant to be that important to the viewers.  This ties in pretty closely with other portrayals of genocide in film and fiction, including the portrayal of the Holocaust, in which the victims are rarely the focus of these stories, and are almost never meant to be figures the audience can identify with.  These tragedies are turned into a backdrop, and the victims into people for the heroes to either save or fail to save.

The prequel trilogy expands on the story of the empire, showcasing Palpatine’s rise to power and toppling of the Republic.  Again another genocide is shown, that of the Jedi, and this one has more emotional weight.  But Palpatine is no Hitler, although they both once held the title of chancellor.  He plays the long game, coming to power slowly, and slowly, carefully using the pretext of war to sap the protections the Republic had in place against someone like him seizing power.  Hitler did not.  He was almost certainly not emotionally or intellectually capable of that kind of manipulation.  Palpatine also carefully stokes anti-Jedi sentiment.  Unlike Hitler, who drew on existing antisemitism and anti-Rromani bigotry in the German population, and who made it the centerpiece of his ideology, Palpatine knows he has to eliminate the Jedi because they pose a real physical threat to him as a possible Sith Emperor, and works hard to make the subjects of the new empire ignore and forget the slaughter of  the Jedi instead making it central to his purpose.  Again, Nazi imagery in the empire is shown to be only a veneer over a very different kind of evil.

In fact, as I discussed a little here: [Link]. The Galactic Empire and Palpatine’s rise to power are much more reflective of American axieties during and shortly after the Nixon administration, and during the George W. Bush administration respectively. Palpatine’s empire is a dark mirror for what the United States might look like as a totalitarian regime and how it could get there. The use of Nazi (and also Soviet) imagery allows American audiences to project those fears off of themselves and onto an outside enemy. This not only cheapens the popular memory of Nazi evil, it also gives American audiences an out, excusing them from grappling with the Americanness of Palpatine’s empire.

The Force Awakens inherited its Nazi imagery-saturated villains from the earlier Star Wars movies.  The filmmakers involved had several choices as to what to do with this inheritance.  Palpatine’s empire was gone.  They had three choices.  They could ignore the Nazi-esque elements of Star Wars’ past imagery and attempt to forge a new visual language, they could continue with Nazi-esque design elements and villains who aside from aesthetics didn’t actually resemble Nazis much at all.  Or they could take that Nazi imagery and actually do something with it.

The Force Awakens opens with an act of Nazi-inspired mass murder, the Einsatzgruppen style slaughter of the village on Jakku.  To most Americans, the Holocaust was the death camps and their gas chambers.  However, millions of Jewish and Rromani people in Eastern Europe died at the hands of Nazi killing squads called Einsatzgruppen.  These mobile killing squads would go into a village, round up all of the Jewish and Rromani people, take them to a mass grave, line them up at the edge, and shoot them.  It’s this imagery and not the camps that the slaughter on Jakku evokes.

This scene alone is a tremendous break with the movie-making tradition I outlined above.  Not only does it use an actual example of Nazi-like crimes instead of simply Nazi aesthetic, it also shows the villagers fighting back.  They shoot at the stormtroopers, and yet are slaughtered anyway.  During the Holocaust, many Jewish and Rromani victims and survivors fought as resistance fighters, or partisans, or took part in uprisings in the ghettos and camps.  The American narrative of the Holocaust portrays the victims as going meekly to their deaths, but in reality many of them armed themselves and fought to protect themselves and their communities, and died anyway.

This particular narrative, of the victims of the Holocaust and other genocides as helpless victims who did not fight back is so strong that @lj-writes mentioned to me that she completely forgot the villagers had fought back on Jakku until re-watching the scene, something she mentions again here: [Link].

The other extremely unusual thing about this scene is that we see it happening. Usually if this kind of slaughter of a village does take place, the audience finds out about it when the heroes stumble upon the burned out wreckage, as for example Luke does with his aunt and uncle’s farm.  Instead, not only do we see it happen, but two of our heroes are there to participate, one as a captive and survivor, the other as a stormtrooper refusing to kill.  This act of mass murder is shown as emotionally important to these two heroes, as a major part of their story.  Simply put, Finn’s refusal to murder for the First Order, refusal to go along with Nazi-style atrocities, is central to his storyline.

Equally unique is the fact that not only do we see the slaughter itself, but even though there are two central characters present, one of whom has a storyline intimately bound up in this moment, the camera instead shows us the final act of slaughter from the point of view of the people being fired upon.  In this moment, we the audience are asked to identify with the victims, and see through their eyes.  Depictions of the Holocaust and other genocides so rarely ask us to identify with the victims.  It’s uncomfortable.  It’s frightening.  It’s far easier to make them seem passive and somehow less like humans and more like objects, exactly the way their murderers saw them.  Yet, The Force Awakens, at the very start of a sci-fi adventure movie asks us to do exactly this.

The second scene that is critical to understanding the way The Force Awakens uses Nazi imagery for the First Order is the Nuremberg-style rally on Starkiller base.  In this scene, General Hux is transformed from a smug, sinister but bland bureaucratic cog into a thundering, charismatic, foaming terror, screaming out his articulation of the philosophy behind an act of mass murder.  Along with the speech itself, shot in glorious and disturbing tribute to Triumph of the Will, we are given beautiful and also horrible scenes of that mass murder, and the destruction of planets full of people, forced to watch as their death comes for them.  We are given an immediate association between Nazi-style rhetoric, and this act of genocide.  Nazism leads directly to mass death.

It’s significant I believe that the director of The Force Awakens, and all of the scriptwriters are Jewish.  They bring this Jewishness, and their own perspective on the Holocaust, unique, obviously, from that of Gentile America to their roles as filmmakers, and I believe it shows most profoundly in their treatment of Nazi and Holocaust related imagery and the whys of Nazi-esque villainy in the movie.  A huge part of why this movie and this portrayal of the First Order was so refreshing for me as a Jewish woman is that the views it draws on treat Nazi atrocities as something much more real and relevant, and treats Nazis not as monsters that brave Americans fought, but as a real and present danger, and treats its victims as human beings who might have been us.  This perspective comes from belonging to one of the peoples the Nazis tried so hard to eliminate, and from being forced from childhood to imagine ourselves in the victims’ place.

This is Nazi imagery in filmmaking done right, done respectfully and done effectively.  This use doesn’t simply draw on Nazism to code our villains as villains.  It doesn’t simply say without substance that our villains are evil because they are like Nazis.  Instead The Force Awakens says these people are like Nazis, and this is what Nazis do.  And then it shows us what people should do when faced with Nazis and their ilk, fight it, don’t accept it, refuse to participate, and resist no matter the cost.  The Force Awakens turns the one-sided standard use of Nazi imagery in American film back on itself, making a statement about Nazism as well as a statement about the movie’s own villains.  And in doing so, it turns the Nazi imagery draping their villains from a cliche into something that strengthens and enriches the movie’s storytelling.