Okay, I reread it, and I still don’t see any hint of irony or sarcasm in what **Stoid **wrote. Maybe I’m wrong - it’s easy to miss tone in written form - but to me this:
reads like actual agreement, not sarcastic rebuttal.
You know what would make it even classier? A mash-up with the Mel Gibson audio!
Read what was purposefully omitted from the quote of Guin’s post and get back to us.
Try again, but this time read it as “You think you’re being sarcastic, but in fact you’re right.”
Hi, Khaki, my name is Stoid. Pleased to meet you. Seeing as how we haven’t met before, you might want to hold off on the Manichean accusation.
The fundamental disconnect you and others are having is pretty clearly defined by this post. It’s not “dancing around like a goof”. You and others appear to be having difficulty seeing the dancing for what it is, instead of what it looks like. “dancing around like a goof”, being silly, for the sake of the silliness itself would be disrespectful. But that’s not what it is. It’s means something very specific, very positive, and very much the reverse of anything even remotely disrespectful.
In other words, you are hung up on appearances, rather than content.
Intention is everything, and if the intention is entirely good and respectful and positive, then ignoring the intention and focusing on the appearance is really the problem of the people who choose to do that, especially since it’s so clear to so many people what the intention is - you might have more of a leg to stand on if the vast majority of people failed to “get it”, but since that’s not the case…
'zackly.
Intention is irrelevant, actually. All that matters is how it looks. It’s not like everyone who sees them dancing on the graves of murdered Jews knows why they’re doing it. It looks tacky and insensitive, and it was ill advised.
Of course they didn’t have any malicious intent, but they succeeded in offending at last some survivors nonetheless.
As if I should have read that.
What do you think I am, your fucking biographer ?
I don’t think you’re anything, because I don’t know you, and I wouldn’t presume that I did know you even after reading hundreds or thousands of your posts, unless they were extremely comprehensive and consistent expressions of your world view across a wide variety of subjects, and even then I’d be unsurprised to learn I was wrong about some things.
Which is an attitude you might find worthy of adopting, at least, insofar as making pronouncements about things like others “Manichean” world views.
(Actually, I can’t fathom how you arrived at that even from this thread - so I’ll assume you’ve just been desperately searching for an opportunity to use the word and, unable to wait any longer, closed your eyes and randomly clicked on a thread with the intention of doing so, perhaps operating on the assumption that enough people actually do have a Manichean world view that it would work.)
Meanwhile my “Up Yours, Khmer Rouge!” video dancing the Macarena at the Killing Fields continues to have zero views.
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Intention is everything. If I mean to give you a high five but I stumble and high five your face instead… are you going to have me arrested for assault? (See, Dio, at least I explain and define the assertions I make, I don’t simply make them as though they are notes that The God of All Things sent to me personally to share with you. You should give it a whirl.)
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Since everyone who sees them dancing is seeing them in the context of being on You Tube or in an article about it, everyone absolutely does understand the context, because it’s clearly explained, as well as the fact that the dancing is accompanied by some text, some audio, T-Shirts labeled “survivor” and the song “I will Survive”. So anyone that misses all that and finds themselves thinking: “Those people are dancing on the graves of murdered jews in total disregard and disrespect!” needs to work on their attention-paying skills, at the very least.
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Since you have demonstrated over and over and over and over again how little you care for possibility that you have offended others, I dismiss your argument that offending others, no matter how, is unacceptable, because I don’t believe that YOU believe it.
So I’m going to stop feeding it.
I use that word often in my language. That you may think it is high-brow or sumthin in yours, well I can’t help that.
That opinion is why Khaki called you “Manichean.” The road to Hell, and all that.
No, but I would expect you to apologize and be more careful.
The people actually at those sites ( the geographical sites in the video, that is, not web sites) didn’t necessarily know what was going on, and the fact remains that other survivors HAVE said that they find the video disrespectful (“disgusting,” one survivor called it). Why do their feelings count less than this guy’s feelings?
Not all offense is worth caring about. Some is, some isn’t. I don’t care someone is offended that I’m an atheist. I do care if I find out that I’m poking at the wounds of an Auschwitz survivor.
Well opinion about the video is fairly divided, both here and on other sites. And just because someone does not share your opinion does not mean that they don’t ‘get it’. I get what they were going for, I just find it kind of misguided and potentially offensive.
That doesn’t really make any sense.
Have you got information that people saw them dancing live and in person and have expressed their dismay? Because if you haven’t, then you are scrambling. And if you have, you need to show me where.
I don’t know that their feelings “count less”, but I do know that since it’s not about them their feelings are their problem.
No one gets to dictate to anyone else how they process the experience of surviving the Holocaust. There is no greater value or weight to someone who chooses to always actively re-experience grief and anger that it happened vs. someone who chooses to be Joyful that its over and their life turned out wonderful. Each is entitled to feel as they do, and each is entitled to express it as they like.
If our video grandpa is filled with the joy of being alive when he goes back and sees the empty monuments, why isn’t it considered uncool of the Bummed Survivors to be weepy and crying and messing up the joyful feeling of Joyful Video Grandpa? Since it’s 65 years later and no one is actively suffering and hasnt’ for decades, why do the people who choose to relive the pain rule? I don’t accept that. When it’s fresh, of course, and for many years afterwards. But three generations later? Sorry, at this point everyone gets to process it their own way and not feel apologetic to anyone about it.
The enormous difference between the two types of survivor is that the Joyful survivor isn’t asking, insisting, judging, bitching, cajoling, demanding, or anything else to anyone else that they feel as he does, that they embrace his point of view, nothing. At most, they might have the expectation to be left alone about it. They chose to share it with whomever wanted to see it on YT and a whole bunch of people (NOT equally divided. Nothing formal, but way more positive or neutral than negative, by a wide margin) were very happy they did. They have nothing to apologize for.
Some people didn’t appreciate it. Those people absolutely DO know the intention, so to expect or require an apology (to use your idea for my face slap analogy) is completely inappropriate. They can feel how they feel, certainly, but they have no right to essentially dictate to everyone else that because they feel how they feel, no one else gets to experience and express something different.
Video grandpa isn’t poking at anyone’s wounds. They are poking their own wounds. He’s showing how well he’s healed, and if others keep picking the scabs so they can bleed some more, that’s not on him.
I agree that not all offense is worth caring about. Evidently we each use different criteria for the type of sensitivity we think should “count”, so to speak. You make your decision, apparently, based on your own opinion and assessment of the would itself, and whether you believe that wound is “legitimate” - we know from recent threads that the wounds of Holocaust survivors and battered women are legitimate, no matter how recent or far away the experience.
My criteria are different, and include an examination of the motives of the person allegedly offending or hurting, and I take into account the amount of time that has passed, because, like you, I look at the behavior of the person who is hurt, I just look at different parts of their behavior. And in my opinion, I think it’s unreasonable and unhealthy to dwell in the grief and pain of any horrible thing that has happened. Not that everyone should just somehow “get over it”, because many things will definitely leave scars for life, being a Holocaust survivor is at the top of the list, certainly. There’s also the death of loved ones by various means, abuse, disease, all kinds of horrible stuff that a person can weather. And you can spend the rest of your life afterwards dragging it around like a ball and chain that casts a pall over everything, or you can work through the pain, learn as much as possible, and be deeply grateful for all the good and happiness and joy and health that life gives you when the trauma is over. These things really are a choice, and I think the people who choose to only feel anger, pain, and sorrow are probably comforted by that in some way, and that’s fine. But they don’t get to use it to bully everyone who doesn’t.
And as I’ve said, I dont’ think that all Holocaust survivors are obligated to be on board with dancing to “I Will Survive” in front of the gates of Auschwitz 65 years after the end of the war. But I don’t think it’s legitimate for them to be outraged and personally wounded by it, either, considering the intention and the people behind it.
And there you have it. Two different ways of viewing the world. Fancy that.
Googling around, every source reporting this video mentions that many people are outraged or insulted by this video. Most of those quoted are survivors or Jewish community leaders. The comments on YouTube and the like don’t really reflect the feelings of those groups, so I’m not surprised that those comments skew towards the positive.
I disagree with the idea that there are two black and white types of survivors. Are there only happy people and sad people in the world? No - most people have a mix of emotions at different times and in response to different events. I think a person can live a joyful life overall but still allow themselves to mourn or act somber on occasion. I think insisting on this dichotomy - that people are either wallowing endlessly in their sorrow or prancing through every event in their life joyfully - is a misleading argument.
Again, who says it is casting a pall over *everything *they do? Who says they *only *feel anger and pain and sorrow? Even people who are the happiest, silliest people around could be reasonably excused for being upset when someone shows up and dances on the graves of their relatives.
I disagree, because I think that’s a completely bullshit and dishonest characterization of what grandpa and his grandkids did, both literally and figuratively. (They did not dance on the physical graves of anyone, they danced outside the gates of Auschwitz and other locations where bodies are NOT buried.)
And anyone who willfully and completely disregards anything except the fact that human beings are standing on the ground where many people suffered and died and react based on those facts only, that’s their choice. They are entitled to it, but it’s not anyone else’s responsibility to cater to it.
I don’t think you understand how offensive this is. People don’t choose to relive pain. Especially not from something like the Holocaust. Some people cannot change how it affected them. And to call people “Bummed Survivors?” That’s sick.
(Ever consider that some may have PTSD? I’m not saying everyone is crying and sobbing and weeping. But hello, at least have some consideration for those around you. Yes, Grandpa’s alive. But perhaps someone else’s child isn’t. And that person may be reliving that. And they feel he’s showing disrespect. Regardless of intent. :rolleyes:)
Or perhaps they just find the people dancing around to be rude and annoying.
Okay, maybe not the exact literal location of the burials, but certainly figuratively a grave site, and one that is normally treated with the respect that most people show towards grave sites in general. Also, those may be the gates to Auschwitz, but the Dachau footage is shot inside the camp, at the Jewish Memorial to the dead - as much a symbolic grave as I can imagine.
Anyways, you’re free to watch and enjoy the video as you see fit, but other people are also allowed to be offended. I can actually see why some people do like the video - as I said before I have no issue with the underlying anti-Nazi message - but I find it a bit unsavoury myself, and apparently I’m far from the only one. I am not judging the people who watched this video and enjoyed it, just questioning the methods employed by those who made it. You are the one saying that people who didn’t like it suck, that they ‘don’t get it’, that they have a ‘fundamental disconnect’, that they ‘need to work on their attention-paying skills’, that ‘their feelings are their problem’, and ultimately that they are Bummers (with a capitol B). Frankly that outright dismissal of the opinions of others seems contrary to the spirit of the Dope.
ETA: Also, I agree with what **Guinastasia **wrote - to say that anyone who is still traumatized or moved by something of the magnitude of the Holocaust, even decades later, is just a big Bummer who is choosing to feel pain is pretty offensive in and of itself.