Exploiting the Holocaust

Posted on June 1, 2021 by Joe Grimm

Since comparing mask mandates to the Holocaust, U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor-Greene (R-Georgia) has been receiving a barrage of criticism.

PortraitThe Associated Press reported that Taylor-Greene “excoriated safety protocols adopted by House Democrats, including a requirement that masks be worn on the House floor. She also called House Speaker Nancy Pelosi ‘mentally ill’ and suggested that the rules were comparable to the treatment of Jews during the Holocaust.”

Taylor-Greene went further, the AP wrote, saying, “You know, we can look back in a time and history where people were told to wear a gold star. And they were definitely treated like second-class citizens, so much so that they were put in trains and taken to gas chambers in Nazi Germany.”

Fellow Republicans have objected. House leader Kevin McCarthy, (R-California) was quoted as saying “Marjorie is wrong, and her intentional decision to compare the horrors of the Holocaust with wearing masks is appalling. … The fact that this needs to be stated today is deeply troubling.”

When an actual punishment was not forthcoming, CNN’s Stephen Collinson wrote, “Greene’s apparent escape from serious consequences for her rhetoric cheapens one of history’s worst crimes.”

People have largely learned that the Holocaust was an event without equal. Invoking the Holocaust to elevate criticism of other events such as mask-wearing is seen as such an over-reach that it trivializes the Holocaust. That is where such strong reactions come from.

From the Bias Busters guide “100 Questions About American Jews:” “The Holocaust took place between 1933 and 1945, although the worst part began in 1939. According to the Encyclopedia of the Holocaust, based on research at Yad Vashem, Nazis killed Jews from more than 20 countries in the Holocaust. Most were killed in Europe, particularly Poland, Germany, Ukraine, Lithuania, Hungary, Austria and France. In some countries 90 percent of the Jewish population was killed. All six death camps were in Poland.

… It is estimated that 6 million or more Jews were killed during the Holocaust. An exact number is difficult to know. Reasons for that include the length of the Holocaust and inconsistency and gaps in records. Research is still going on.

“100 Questions and Answers About American Jews” is available from Amazon.

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Remembering Tulsa race massacre

Posted on May 29, 2021 by Joe Grimm

The 100th anniversary of the Tulsa massacre of May 31-June 1, 1921 is being revisited after a century of having been largely buried.

The very few remaining survivors help make that happen because, for a little while longer, are direct connections to the massacre.

According to the Associated Press, “More than 35 city blocks were leveled, an estimated 191 businesses were destroyed, and roughly 10,000 Black residents were displaced from the neighborhood where they’d lived, learned, played, worked and prospered.

“Although the state declared the massacre death toll to be only 36 people, most historians and experts who have studied the event estimate the death toll to be between 75 and 300. Victims were buried in unmarked graves that, to this day, are being sought for proper burial.”

As we lose people whose testimony affirms the story, there is concern that it can be buried again. That is the power of witnessing and of 100-year anniversaries.

National Public Radio reviews three documentaries about the Tulsa massacre.

They are:

“100 Questions and Answers About African Americans” is available from Amazon or the Front Edge Publishing bookstore.

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Memorial Day mistake

Posted on May 28, 2021 by Joe Grimm

With all the best intentions, people will wish veterans a “Happy Memorial Day.”

But those intentions are misdirected.

Headstones at cemetery

Arlington National Cemetery. Photo by Felix Stahlberg licensed under Creative Commons 2.0

Memorial Day recognizes service members who had died.

Veterans Day (Nov. 11) is for the living. That is the time to celebrate living service members and veterans. While veterans often have an important role in Memorial Day celebrations and many participate, the day is not for them.

The Bias Busters guide “100 Questions and Answers About Veterans” explains the distinction:

“The Grand Army of the Republic established May 30 as Decoration Day, a time to decorate the graves of the war dead with flowers. By the end of the century, Memorial Day was being recognized throughout the country. Memorial Day is for mourning those who have died in military service. Saying ‘Happy Memorial Day’ is out of step. Some confuse Memorial Day with Veterans Day, which honors veterans. Originally called Armistice Day, Veterans Day marks the end of World War I fighting at 11 a.m. Nov. 11, 1918: the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month.”

“100 Questions and Answers About Veterans” is available from Amazon or the Front Edge Publishing bookstore.

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Anti-Semitic hate crimes increase

Posted on May 27, 2021 by Joe Grimm

The Anti-Defamtion League reported this week that “During the two weeks of military conflict between Israel and Hamas in May 2021, antisemitic incidents in the U.S. reported to ADL increased by 75% compared to the two weeks before the fighting began, from 127 to 222, according to preliminary data.”

Chart

Anti-Defamation League shows rise in anti-Semitic crimes during conflict between Israel and Palestinians.


The blog said “Many of these incidents appear to have been perpetrated by individuals scapegoating American Jews for the actions of the Israeli government.” It listed several incidents in different cities.

A ceasefire to end 11 days of the worst outbreak of violence there in years conflict was declared May 20. Militants fired rockets from Gaze into Israel, and the Israeli military made strikes into Gaza. The exchange followed an outbreak of violence in Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa Mosque, Islam’s third holiest site, in the waning days of Ramadan.

According to CNN, Hamas health officials said the conflict killed al least 248 Palestinians, including 66 children. Israel’s military and its emergency service said at least 12 people in Israel, including two children, were killed by Palestinian militant fire.

This BBC article gives one perspective on more than 100 years of conflict.

“100 Questions and Answers About American Jews” is available from Amazon or the Front Edge Publishing bookstore.

“100 Questions and Answers About Muslim Americans” is available from Amazon.

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The Rock stands alone

Posted on May 26, 2021 by Joe Grimm

This month’s report from the Annenberg Inclusion Initiative at the University of Southern California surprised me. In examining Asian and Pacific Islanders in 1,300 films (pdf), it found that one actor — one — held a third of all the lead roles held by Asians and Pacific Islanders.

Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson photographed by Jerry Avenaim

The envelope please …

It is The Rock, Dwayne Johnson, photographed here by Jerry Avenaim.

The story is not that The Rock, who is Samoan, played a lot of lead roles in the top-grossing films from 2007 to 2019. He had 14. The trouble is that there were only 30 other APIA people in those 1,300 films to play a leading role.

The people at USC had another fact about the lack of diversity in big films.

White male actors named Ben, Chris, Daniel, James, Jason, John, Josh. Michael Robert, Sean or Tom were all far more likely to be hired as the top actor in a film than any Asian Pacific Islander woman actor by any name.

“100 Questions and Answers About East Asian Cultures” is available from Amazon or the Front Edge Publishing bookstore.

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How did May become APIA Heritage Month?

Posted on May 26, 2021 by Joe Grimm

This May, while attacks against Asian Americans are on the rise, we might ask how May became Asian Pacific Islander Heritage Month?

There are good reasons for that and a great story behind it.

The reasons have to do with the calendar. The story was well told by TIME.

May is significant because the first Japanese immigrant to the United States arrived in May of 1843. Again, in May 1869, the golden spike connecting the First Transcontinental Railroad was driven the railroad was completed largely by Chinese workers.

The drive for an annual designation was driven, in part, by Capitol Hill staffer Jeanie Jew.

According to a TIME story, Jew had deep personal reasons for seeking the designation.

Chinese railroad laborers working in the snow. Public domain

Her great-grandfather, M.Y. Lee, had immigrated to help build the railroad. Later, the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 barred new Chinese laborers from the United States for 10 years. It was later renewed. Violent attacks along the West Coast Lee became widespread. Seventeen people were massacred in Los Angeles. San Jose’s Chinatown was destroyed.

Lee sought refuge in Oregon from the violence, but was killed there.

At first, it was just Asian Pacific American Heritage Week and it had to be reauthorized by the president every year. It is now the full month and embraces Pacific Islanders, as well. Recently, people have included South Asians under the umbrella.

“100 Questions and Answers About East Asian Cultures” is available from Amazon or the Front Edge Publishing bookstore.

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‘Geriatric Millennials’: 4 better ways to say that

Posted on May 17, 2021 by Joe Grimm

Let’s face it. Generations are hard — and hard on each other.

Millennial takes selfie

Photo by Christine Warner via Flickr, licensed under Creative Commons 2.0

The convenient but arbitrary cutoff dates that cleave generations always leave some people on the cutting room floor.

Start with the fact that the labels are usually imposed by other people and add the situation that people at the cusps of generations have more in common with the people who came before them in the previous generation or the one that comes up next.

Word that leading edge Millennials born between 1980 and 1985 (we have two sons in that mini-bracket) are being called “Geriatric Millennials” does not sit well with many of them. Some are cross. Some are meh. And some have alternatives. And you thought Gen X had attitude.

Lizzy Acker, a Millennial who knows when she is being called old, wrote about four alternatives for Oregonian:

The Oregon Trail Generation

The Home Alone Generation

The Book It Generation

Millennial

Check out Acker’s reasons. They make sense. And you can see how she dressed when she and a Millennial co-worker pitched the so-so-Millennial idea of a pop culture blog for KQED radio in 2012.

“100 Questions and Answers About Gen X and 100 Questions About Millennials” is available in one double guide from Amazon or the Front Edge Publishing bookstore.

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Pew on American Jewish identity

Posted on May 16, 2021 by Joe Grimm

A survey of American Jewish adults by the Pew Research Center confirms or updates some of our ideas. ideas about who they are. The results, released this month, come from 4,718 interviews. Here are five top takeaways:

Pew chart on religious affiliation of Jews

Pew chart notes found the youngest Jewish adults, aged 18-29, had larger shares of both Orthodox and people with no denominational identity.

  • 27% did not identify with the Jewish religion. Rather, they call themselves Jewish by ethnicity, culture or by family. They describe their religion as atheist, agnostic or “nothing in particular.” While that proportion is similar to what it is for Americans in general, a key difference for Jews is that they can feel a cultural or ethnic connection to the faith, while other religiously unaffiliated people do not have any connection to a faith group.
  • Three-quarters of American Jews said there was more anti-Semitism than five years previously. Just more than half said they felt less safe than they did five years earlier.
  • Jews aged 18-29 were much more likely to identify as Orthodox, 17%, compared with 3% of Jews 65 and older. Eleven percent of Jewish adults under 30 say they are ultra-Orthodox compared with 1% of Jews 65 and older.
  • Jewish Americans with the exception of Orthodox Jews identified as staunchly liberal. The survey, conducted during the 2020 presidential campaign, found that that 71% of Jewish adults (including 80% of Reform Jews) were Democrats or leaned that way. Of Orthodox Jews, three-quarters said they were Republican or leaned that way. That percentage has been growing. In 2013, 57% of Orthodox Jews said they were Republicans or Republican leaners.
  • 82% of U.S. Jews said caring about Israel is either “essential” or “important” to what it means to them to be Jewish. When the survey was conducted, between Nov. 19, 2019, and June 3, 2020, Jews who were Democrats or leaned that way were were much more likely (29% vs. 5%) than Jewish Republicans and leaners to say the U.S. was too supportive of Israel.

    • “100 Questions and Answers About American Jews” is available from Amazon or the Front Edge Publishing bookstore.

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Buddhists live stream Asian American ancestors ceremony on May 4

Posted on May 4, 2021 by Joe Grimm

Lion’s Roar reports that May We Gather, a national Buddhist memorial ceremony for Asian American ancestors, will be live streamed at 7 p.m. EDT, 4 p.m. PDT on Tuesday.

The day is seven weeks from the day of the Atlanta shootings which claimed the lives of eight people, six of whom were women of Asian descent, including 63-year-old Buddhist Yong Ae Yue.

The event website reads: “In many Buddhist traditions, forty-nine days after death marks an important transition for the bereaved. As we pray for the liberation of those who have come before us, these ancestors will likewise alleviate our community’s pain, for we are interlinked with each other, across generations, in our collective liberation.”

The ceremony will be live streamed from the Higashi Honganji Buddhist Temple in Los Angeles. In Ferbruary, it was vandalized and set on fire.

“100 Questions and Answers About East Asian Cultures” is available from Amazon or the Front Edge Publishing bookstore.

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Asian American students in 6 words

Posted on May 3, 2021 by Joe Grimm

Check out Chalkbeat’s Student Voices project in which Asian American students use six-word stories, artwork, poetry and music to comment on the times they’re experiecning.

Kelly Shi, 15, of Queens, New York, is one student who contributed more than one piece. She shared this artwork and a six-word thought: “Why fit in? Stand out instead.”

Artwork by Kelly Shi, 15, Queens, New York

Artwork by Kelly Shi, 15, Queens, New York

Chalkbeat Editor-in-Chief Nicole Avery Nichols said the students’ work took her back to discrimination she experienced as a fourth grader in Long Island. She told her own story and added, “In just six words, students of Asian descent and allies shared their thoughts about race, racism, culture, and the reparative conversations that are long overdue in America. Their mini-stories … are heartbreaking, powerful, jarring, insightful, thought-provoking, inspiring, poignant, and all too familiar.”

The students ranged in age from 6 to 33. As Nichols said, Their messages ranged from sad to powerful to angry to hopeful.

Nine-year-old Quentin Tai Murphy of Denver wrote, “Teaming up, we can stop racism.”

Their thoughts should touch you.

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