Tuesday, April 15, 2008

NOTHING PISSES ME OFF MORE

There is probably nothing that pisses me off more than people comparing non-genocidal situation to the Holocaust. On CNN.com, women from the invaded polygamous fundamentalist cult in Texas made the following sick, dementing, and ignorant juxtaposition:

But the women on the YFZ ranch say they're being treated like Jews during the Holocaust.

"We have been persecuted for our religion," Kathleen said. "We are being treated like the Jews were when they were escorted to the German Nazi camps."


Really? Were you sent to a forced labor camp? Are you being starved? Were your children killed in front of your very eyes as you plead for their lives? Are you and your spouses and children being gassed to death or forced to line up naked by a pit so that you can be shot into a mass grave?

No? Then guess the fuck what? You are not being treated like Jews, gypsies, or homosexuals during the Holocaust. You are not in Darfur. If I had even an ounce of sympathy for you (as it is awful to have children taken away), there is nothing left but severe disgust. Fuck you and your false sense of victimization. And even though I disagree with your demented submissive lifestyle, I truly hope that you never know what it feels like to be a victim of genocide.

I've said it once, and I'll say it as often as I have to: statements like this demean the true meaning of genocide. The Holocaust (or any similar situation) should never, under any circumstances, be invoked unless there are actually people being hunted down and killed for their ethnicity/religion.

13 comments:

  1. Maybe they were being skinned alive to make lampshades? No. Probably not. Not genocide then.

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  2. yeah, just re-read eli wiesel's night. doesn't sound so similar.

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  3. I'm trying to think of something that pisses me off more than that and I can't come up with anything.

    Perhaps they said it because they are being used for medical experimentation and end up having their bones used as garden fertiliser. OH wait up, that didn't happen to them...

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  4. Ah, you all bring up such good points. Glad to know I am not the only one who finds this upsetting. And sad to realize how many truly awful instances that we can cite to show how different the situations are.

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  5. And another thing I hate? When men use "raped" in a casual and fun fashion - "Oh, we really raped the Cardinals the other night." "I got raped on this frappucino - it was $4." Oh yeah? RAPED? Assholes.

    Ok great, now I am ALL upset.

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  6. Has anyone ever compared a fashion model to a holocaust camp survivor? Just wondering.

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  7. I was actually thinking when I posted this about how much I hate casual comments about rape, and I decided that I loathe false comparisons to genocide even more. Then I was sad that I was sitting there contemplating if rape comments are as bad as genocide comments.

    Sorry I took you down this path. I was just so angry when I read that comment, I had to vent.

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  8. OK, I have seen extremely skeletal models and said that they look like Holocaust survivors, but I don't think that is the same thing. Some of them really are so skinny that it is disturbing to me. It sexualizes starvation. I hope that no one looks at pictures of starving people and thinks about fashion and sex. Yet that is exactly what designers think of when they cast skeletal models for their shows.

    So in my mind, saying that someone resembles a Holocaust survivor or any other starving person is not the same thing as comparing themselves to going through the experience of starving due to genocide, famine, war, or whatever. And I also think it is different in that such a comment is made not to garner sympathy for the model, but to wonder why anyone would willingly starve themselves or think they look good that way. This woman directly compared her situation to that of being escorted to Nazi camps to garner sympathy and rally people to her side. Not even remotely close.

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  9. OMG, absolutely!

    There's nothing worse than people being so full of self-pity that they can't recognize true suffering from stupidity. BLAH!

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  10. I totally agree with you Suzanne, but, TBF, these women were probably told to say this. I saw some of these freaks on MSNBC the other morning. Nothing but Stepford Wives. This is all Warren Jeffs doing, IMHO.

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