Have Poles blood on their hands? :)

Every Russian knows. We've got even a verb made up: "kolimit" - it's like to "drudge", "toil and moil". One of those places that are notorious for that how many Russian intelligentsia were exterminated there.

What's more important....a good talk on PF or children???? Honestly! ;)

I agree about keeping up awareness, but why don't the Catholics do the same so that the world knows about this and it's never done again?

Abe Foxman might be a racist. He was on the news here in Boston:

Criticism of Mel Gibson
Abe Foxman has received criticism from Jewish and non-Jewish quarters for his antagonist approach to the 2004 film The Passion of the Christ and its director Mel Gibson.[12] In September 2003, during the pre-release controversy, Foxman called Gibson "the portrait of an anti-Semite."[13] The next day he said, "I'm not ready to say he's an anti-Semite," but that Gibson "entertains views that can only be described as anti-Semitic."[14].

[edit] Armenian Genocide
In July 2007, Foxman's opposition to a congressional resolution recognizing the Armenian Genocide drew much criticism. "I don't think congressional action will help reconcile the issue. The resolution takes a position; it comes to a judgment," said Foxman in a statement issued to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.

Is anti-semitism on the rise? I thougt it was on the decline BECAUSE of all the awareness. There will alway be some ********, but that's life. I think there are fewer ignoramouses. Anyway, why don't the Catholics do the same? Why are there still so many 'stupid Polack' jokes? Bring about more awareness and stop this anti-Polanism.

I think that these anti-Poland slurs by Foxman and his followers are racist. I think Poland should do something about it.

Catholics should finally acknowledge that without independent education system (including at home) their values and views wont preserve. Also general level of teaching is always better, this is well known fact. We should not be in relation of dependency from our toxic national states. European political establishment managed nearly to destroy (or make dependent) Catholic schools all over Europe. If this trend wont be stopped, we will struggle with our children until they will become adult "nobodies". Let be honest with ourselves, today master degree means very little. The state destroyed traditional and effective standards because their goal is to produce (on a mass scale) fools who would likely support PO, PIS, SLD, PSL and other useless political parties.

the name of the thread is very aggressive
moderators can we change it for :
have poles ketchup on their hands? :)

Even then...one day they WILL leave home and that special schools and have to face reality! ;)

They would be properly prepared to face reality unlike others. Even my dog don't deserve to be send to public school. :)

Agree...some of them just stink! :(

Dogs or schools?

He slurred Mel Gibson. Is he Polish?


As a foreigner I'm just guessing, but could that be because there were many Poles in the Polish communist party and they still have influence on how history is taught? Won't a public airing of that period make a lot of people in Poland uncomfortable?

yeah

Oh yes, there are whole red dynasties doing extremely well and the key resorts are dominated by those who would be "uncomfortable" to show the past as it really was. The common misconception is the communists went away, and let's put a thick line under that period, so any talk about it is just a witch hunt. It is all interesting and I can give my take on it but I was not only talking about Poland. The subject of education, and in this case murder of huge proportions, is not treated in a balanced way anywhere. Holocaust education is taught in schools in Europe, North America, and certainly in Israel. I understand the focus on this particular genocide, but why exclude the much larger genocide that communists, and in particular Stalinists, unleashed in just as recent times. This knowledge is essential for understanding the nature of hatred, prejudice, and tolerance, which is what I presume holocaust education aimes to achieve. While in Europe and Israel the Holocaust is a grim reminder of what had happened, in US, where many descendants of negro slaves live, some education as part of a curiculum of genocide studies could focus on the Belgian Congo, and the 10 million victims of King Leopold II's genocidal policies. You don't have to be a psychologist to question the usefulness of Holocaust curriculum for Kindergarden age kids in the US either.


Just to return to this. People calling for full disclosure of the communist period are called witch hunters, ultranationalists, fascists, etc. Full disclosure would also follow the trail of money and who ended up with the nation's wealth. The Left is very much against all this, but we understand this. It is a constant battle which, I'm affraid is being lost in the Left dominated Europe and Poland in this case. Holocaust education helps us understand that the return to anything called the Right would be the return to...Nazism, and we know how that ended.(sarcasm).

Sounds familiar. In Israel, the leftist parties tend to demonize the right wing parties, like Likud, by hinting that they are fascist... and we all know how that ended. What nonsense! There's no reason why a party can't be nationalist without being xenophobic and fascist, just like there can be a leftist party that's not stalinist. In the US, the republicans are saying that Obama is a socialist because he nationalized the failing banks and he wants to setup national healthcare. All these accusations, left and right, are simplistic and typical of demagogues.

About educating on the crimes of Communism. You say that


But I think that approach is inaccurate. That's what Nazism was about, but Communism was an evil of its own nature and it should be recognized for what it really was – a utopian scheme gone mad, because it was hijacked by vicious, power-hungry people and blood-thirsty tyrants. People should be educated to be very careful of movements that claim to want to liberate the common man, because they can end up enslaving the common man. Communists enslaved their own people just as much as other nations, so it's not about prejudice and tolerance. Communism and Nazism were two different diseases and it's important to diagnose each one accurately. A wrong diagnosis can fail to prevent an outbreak.

Honestly Yehudi, that's exactly the reasoning I as a German have problems with:


Fact is that most Germans saw the Nazi state as a good thing mainly (till the chicken came home to roost that is).
The majority of the Germans lived well under the Nazis, not feeling opressed at all.
Nazi-Germany managed till to the dying days to be one of the most developed countries on Earth.

Do you see it honestly as a redeeming feature of Communism that it was equally murderous to everybody?

The opressing, and subsequent murdering of the Jews wasn't sold only as "they have to be killed because they are Jews" either.

They were presented to the Germans as deadly enemies, as a group of world wide conspirationalists who suck the life blood out of the german people, and who did this since ages, not at least as being guilty of fabricating the first world war and guilty of the hated Treaty of Versailles, to opress and humiliate Germany.

Germany MUST get rid of them to be able to breath freely again...
Comparable to the "bad bourgeoisie" who had to be murdered before the paradise of the workers and peasants could be build!

I don't see there any difference only that Communism killed more people at home than Nazism who was more murderous against non-Germans.

Maybe that is the reason why Nazism is seen as more dangerous, more hateful, the holocaust worse than everything else...the shown capability of maintaining a highly civilisational, highly developed society and still be extremely murderous against perceived enemies.

Whereas communist Russia was not much more than a backward, third world slaughterhouse eating it's own - not so dangerous?

That's why Nazism is generally seem as something worse than communism. Even though many more people have been victims of communism, the racist side of Nazism is what vilifies it.

Well...at that time racism was well entrenched in the people and even the governments of the world.
It wasn't something the Nazis invented...race segregation and Euthanasia for example was common in the US...anti-semitism also.
Seeing how Churchill justified the british murder of kurds or the belgian genocide in the Congo speaks a different language.

Your reasoning is an easy way out but doubtful!

The difference is that Churchill isn't hailed as a Racist leader...well, by some, yes. But not by most of the people. Anti-semitism has been a common thing in most countries of the worlds and at some point of their history, it was also part of their goverments and political thinking, BUT ,Germany is the only country to carry that endless torch. Why? I think Germans themselves decided to take the blame for anti-semitism until ...G-d knows when.

not enough

Because he belonged to the victors of WWII!
Ask the Kurds what they think of him, ask the congolese survivors of belgian cruelty...but who cares for them since poor, "plucky" Belgium got "raped" by big bad Germany itself, hence becoming a freedom loving goody-two-shoes in european historian narrative.

The history outside of Europe and the WWII prism is often seen surprisingly different. Did you know that the Chinese hail the Nazi John Rabe in Nanking as their hero?

Why do you think Obama send the Churchill bust back to London the moment he took office in Washington? Might have had something to do with his family fate under the hands of the Brits in Togo...

But that's not what I said. I wasn't comparing who was more evil. I was pointing out that each of the two were evil in a different way and that the difference should be recognized in order to educate against them effectively.

If you use the terminology of anti-Nazism (intolerance, prejudice, racism etc) against Communism you end up with a weak argument, because Communism was about enslaving the population (and murdering) regardless of race, color or creed.

Similarly, if you use the terminology of anti-communism (totalitarianism, lack of freedoms etc) against Nazism you end up with a weak argument, because, as you said, the Germans didn't suffer under Nazism. Nazism was about hatred of the enemy, especially Jews, brought to such a pitch that it justified the most horrible crimes.

Therefore a museum about the holocaust is no place to talk about the crimes of the Communists, and a museum about Communist crimes (when someone decides to build one) is no place to talk about prejudice and intolerance.

I couldn't care less about Obama's actions or opinions.

Yep i have read the book "Rape of Nanking".

Then I got you completely wrong and I apologize!

No, sorry, I put those together. In my post, I was showing that he's had controversy. I'm near Boston and the Armenians here were pretty pissed when he said their genocide didn't happen. They Jewis guy in charge of the local ADL in Boston even resigned over it. In another person's post (sorry, I'll have to scroll through and see who) states that he tells school children whom he takes to the camps in Poland that Poles hate Jews, it's a hostile country, etc. It's not true, so these are slurs against Poland.

I know that you know that these slurs are not true. What I'm getting at is that Sheeple like Harry and too many others drink the Cool Aid and DON'T know that these things aren't true.

As far ads your other post about Isreali right wing groups and Israli left wing groups going for the jugular at each other, that's true, too. There's a lot of dissension among Jews.

On the other hand, someone who's in charge of security for a big group of school kids, many of who were never out of Israel and have no experience in the subtleties of Jewish-Polish history, and who have a more blunt way of talking than the average european, is probably right in trying to try and keep them from talking with people in the street – to keep them out of trouble. But it would be a lot better if there were organized opportunities to talk to Poles. I heard of a program where local polish high school kids work together with israeli kids in cleaning up abandoned jewish cemeteries. This is a really good idea. I once spoke to a man who leads Israeli groups to Poland and urged him to more of this, but the problem is that they usually have only one week to cover an entire country and there isn't time for this kind of in-depth contact.

Try getting some 2 - weeks in Poland close to the population itself trips or something! :)

Yes Poles has blood on their hands but not as much as Jews.

Marek11111
Thank you for contributing with your thoughtful insight.

It's factoid.
- Not 1,600 but 200-300.
- Not all Poles but dozen or so criminals and hooligans which provoked a tumult and terrorize part of citizens. It was easier to agitate them since just week or less the Soviets from secret police (all of Jewish origin) arrested and deported to Białystok prison some locals accused of anti-proletarian and capitalist attitude (where they probably were executed during the chaos just before Nazis got the town).

- Not alone but under auspices of German special commando which initiated such pogroms in Radziłów, Jedwabne and Wąsosz in the no-man's land after Russian troops and secret police withdrew and before German troops officially took over and before any police order was established.

- Not unpunished but ringleader were charged and convicted.

But with all these exceptions - you're perfectly right!

Why do you people keep digging up this old, pointless thread? Aren't there enough active threads of this kind?