Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2000/12/07
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]Paul - If I have suggested, or ever suggest, that "the suffering of your group is lesser than the suffering of mine," cuff me upside the head. I think, for instance, that what befell the Hutus recently was one of the all-time appalling blots on civilization, particularly because the U.S. and U.N. stood by and did nothing when it would have taken less to nothing in the way of involvement to have prevented the tragedy. But then those victims were non-white non-Europeans, weren't they? Nuff said. B. D. Paul Chefurka wrote: > Yes, I remember that you pointed out Stalin. Like you, I wasn't pointing fingers at individuals when I said that. > > I agree with you that the Holocaust has a special place in the pantheon of genocide. The thing that concerns me (and this is slightly different from your take on the issue) is that elevating the Holocaust to that kind of pinnacle tends to say to other groups "your suffering wasn't as monumental as ours, your genocide wasn't as significant, the deaths of your people didn't have as much meaning as ours". I think that's unfair to a lot of Cambodians, Hutus, Armenians and Sierra Leonians - just because their leaders didn't aspire to dominate any wider scope than their own country shouldn't make their deaths any less significant. > > Paul > > >-----Original Message----- > >From: B. D. Colen [mailto:bdcolen@earthlink.net] > >Sent: Thursday, December 07, 2000 4:19 PM > >To: leica-users@mejac.palo-alto.ca.us > >Subject: Re: [Leica] Homicide and photography > > > > > >Paul, if you happen to be crazy enough to go back through > >these interminable posts, you'll see that I specifically > >pointed out Stalin, among others. I agree with you that at > >various times various societies have engaged in attempts to > >wipe out various minority groups. However...1.) Hitler's > >Jewish genocide was an integral part of his plan to "rule the > >world." 2.) Far too often people - I'm not pointing fingers at > >any individual here- point to other genocides or murderous > >excesses to suggest that somehow there was nothing special > >about the murder of the Jews. > >Well, there was something special. It was the mid-20th Century > >culmination of a world-wide persecution that has been on going > >since Christianity spread to the European continent. And it > >continues today. > > > >B. D.