Tuesday 27 January 2009

Happy Holocaust Day

If you find the title of this post offensive, then so you should. But what else is one supposed to say? The whole thing is as ridiculous as it is revolting. For one thing, why is it on 27th January, the day Auschwitz exchanged mass-murdering Nazi tyranny for mass-murdering Soviet tyranny? Why not 15th April, the day Belsen really was liberated, and that by the British? In some years, that would even coincide usefully with Easter.

That we are prepared to have it today points to the extent to which the anti-British sectarian Left has taken over our public life, and the extent to which it has made peace with its old adversaries, also massively influential, on the anti-British sectarian Right. And that we really insist on having it all points to the extent to which it is so much easier, and even more fun, to concentrate on the wrongdoing of others rather than on that of ourselves.

4 comments:

  1. "the day Auschwitz exchanged mass-murdering Nazi tyranny for mass-murdering Soviet tyranny?"

    Furthermore, as a kind of societal observation, why do the youth find it perfectly acceptable to walk around with shirts and jackets with "CCCP"?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Like that Che Guevara business. But them, I am Old Labour (and therefore ex-Labour), not New.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Auschwitz was the largest of the Nazi concentration camps, was where the techniques of industrial mass killing were first developed, where at least 1 million people were killed, and was thus essentially representative of the entire death camp system. Belsen, while a terrible place in its own right, was merely one among many lesser camps. The Stalinist regime was indeed a brutal tyranny and caused the deaths of millions, but the remaining inmates of the Nazi camp in Auschwitz really were liberated and repatriated when the Russians captured the camp. As such it is entirely logical to make 27 January the date for Holocaust Memorial Day. I don't see what being pro or anti British has to do with this.

    ReplyDelete
  4. But being pro- or anti-Soviet has everything to do with it.

    ReplyDelete