Auschwitz 835


I was involved in the organisation of the 50th anniversary commemoration of the liberation of Auschwitz, while First Secretary at the British Embassy in Warsaw. The 50th did not receive anything like the media coverage given to the 70th, of which more later.

Senior British visitors to Poland invariably included a concentration camp on their itinerary, and from escorting people around I visited camps a great deal more often than I would have wished. I found the experience appalling and desolate. The first I ever saw was Majdanek and I recall that I just had to sit helpless and shivering for some time. One thing the experience left me with – including meeting survivors and both Polish and German eye-witnesses, and seeing the architects’ plans for camps – was a contempt for those who claim the whole thing did not happen, or was an accident, or was small scale.

It in no way diminishes the genocidal attack on the Jews to remember that a vast number of Poles also died in the camps, as well as gypsies, homosexuals, the disabled and disparate political prisoners. I tried sometimes to diminish the horror I felt at involvement with the camps, with attempts at humour. I was present at a meeting listing the guests of honour; the President of Lithuania was included. I whispered that he was coming to represent the camp guards. That was offensive, and I apologise. But there is a real problem that to this day Eastern Europe – including Poland itself – has not come to terms with historical truth about collaboration with anti-Jewish genocide and other attacks on minorities. I recommend this website, which tackles these issues very honestly and is well worth a lengthy browse.

It requires bigotry not to be able to understand why nationalist resistance movements against Russian occupation became allied with Germany during World War II. That would be reprehensible only in the same sense that allied collaboration with Stalin might be reprehensible, but for the added factor of enthusiastic collaboration with genocidal and master race programmes and fascist ideology. That is what makes the glorification of Eastern European nationalist figures from this period generally inappropriate.

I fear however that the real reason that the 70th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz received so much more coverage than the 50th is a media desire to reinforce the narrative of the War on Terror and Western policy in the Middle East by invoking the spectre of massive anti-Semitism. There have been isolated but deplorable, apparently anti-Semitic attacks of a small-scale terrorist nature in France and Belgium in recent years. But to conflate this into stories of a wave of popular anti-Semitism in Europe is a nonsense. Maureen Lipman’s claim that she may have to leave the UK is not just silly but disingenuous. I do not believe she feels in personal danger of attack – there is absolutely no reason why she should – she is rather making a political point.

There are two factors which could exacerbate anti-Semitism at present. One is the appalling behaviour of Israel and its indefensible action in continually seizing Palestinian land and using its military superiority to dominate and occasionally massacre Palestinians. Regrettably, there are a very small minority of people who wrongly blame Jews in general for the actions of Israel.

The second factor is of course the terrible economic hardship wrought across the whole world by irresponsible banking practices, and the fact that the bankers luxury lifestyles were maintained at the cost of everybody else. There are still a tiny minority of people stuck in the medieval mindset associating banking with the Jewish community. There is in fact a very plausible argument that if any “race” has a disproportionate influence on the development and character of international banking since the mid eighteenth century, it is the Scots! But those who see banking as a racial issue are nutters.

You could construct an argument from these factors, and you could identify that anti-Semitic people do exist. They certainly do. They dominate the very small category of people who get banned even from this free speech blog. But are their opinions intellectually respectable, promoted in the mainstream or able to be expressed openly without fear of either social or legal consequences? No, no and no. Anti-semites are fortunately a tiny and strange minority. I might add that in my numerous and frequent social contacts in the British Muslim community, I have never encountered anti-Semitism (unlike, say, Poland and Russia where I encountered casual anti-Semitism quite frequently).

The final point, is of course, the conflation of anti-zionism with anti-Semitism. That seems to me the fundamental design of the media campaign exaggerating the scale of anti-Semitism at the moment. Yes, we must always remember the terrible warnings from history and it is right to remember those who died in the concentration camps, Jewish, Polish, Romany, Gay, Communist or any other category. But we should be aware of those who wish to manipulate the powerful emotions of horror thus evoked, for present objectives of the powerful.


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835 thoughts on “Auschwitz

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  • glenn

    @JSD: “Why don’t you answer my request? Then I’ll answer yours.

    I don’t think so! I know your sort of old. Send the opponent running around, answering someone else’s questions.

    No, you pretended to be interested in the MMR scandal. I looked, and found, a very digestible starting point for anyone genuinely wanting to research the subject for you. Your response was a hit-piece against the author, from some whacked-out anti-vaccine site.

    Now you expect me to provide you with answers? My answer is this: Screw you. You’re not here in good faith.

  • ------------·´`·.¸¸.¸¸.··.¸¸Node

    typo ^^^

    should read ” . . .not all terrorist incidents . . .”

  • ------------·´`·.¸¸.¸¸.··.¸¸Node

    @Glenn. My unanswered question from 11.03:

    “Wakefield claimed that there is a link between the MRS vaccine and autism. His career was destroyed for doing so. Other doctors have suffered the same fate. Intelligent successful doctors committing career suicide. No financial motive. Why do they do it? What’s your theory?”

  • fred

    “Intelligent successful doctors committing career suicide. No financial motive. Why do they do it? What’s your theory?”

    I expect not everyone sees vaccination as a good thing, historically there have been Darwinists, like Darwin’s son and his nephew Francis Galton who would not see vaccination as a good thing and we can expect there to have been followers ever since.

    As I read through the internet I do find that those who try to cast doubt on vaccination tend to be the same people why try to cast doubt on the Holocaust.

  • CanSpeccy

    @JSD:

    The interesting thing about it [the Apostolic Creed], in this context, is that almost everything in it is to be found in the four canonical Gospels, with the exception, as I mentioned as an aside when replying to CanSpeccy, of the occurrence of “He descended into hell”, which has been replaced in this version with “He descended to the dead”.

    In the context of our discussion, John, the significant thing is that the Apostolic Creed has nothing in it about Jews killing Jesus. And the Gospel of Matthew, which states that Jesus was killed rather than Barrabus at the demand of the Jewish mob, was written by a follower of Jesus, the Jew, who was preaching to Jews on the necessity of the strictest adherence to the Jewish law (i.e., in the Sermon on the Mount). Therefore, it impossible to infer from the Gospel of Matthew that its author was an anti-Semite, or that the gospel of Matthew is anti-Semitic. Matthew was certainly a Jew.

    And Jews often disagree, as they did in Jesus’s time. Jesus hated the Pharisees who he called hypocrites, for preaching the law but not following it.

    There were, incidentally, several hundred years between the writing of Matthew and the formulation of the Apostles’ Creed, during which time, the early, Jewish Christian church died out to be replaced by that of the followers of St Paul, whose teachings are largely the basis of the Apostle’s Creed and which bear little relation to the gospel teachings (which are themselves inconsistent with one another).

    Cheers.

  • CanSpeccy

    Further, Paul, though he claimed to be a Jew, clearly rejected most of the Jewish law, though adhering to the rules against adultery, eating strangled meat and a few other points. It was Paul therefore, who transformed Christianity from a Jewish sect to a non-Jewish and universalist religion.

  • fred

    “Ah Fred, if only you’d support independence!”

    And join the likes of RoS?

    I’d never sink so low.

  • glenn

    @Node: “…@Glenn. My unanswered question from 11.03:“…

    Sorry, I must have missed it. From the looks of this case, it was an overzealous Dr. Wakefield, and an appallingly credulous and hysteria inclined media. His study was selective, dubious in their ethics to say the least, made to fit around the facts, and vastly too limited in scope to draw any large conclusions. Therefore, it should have failed to failed the bar for publication, let alone be blown into a national “Scientists Say!!!” understanding with which the media presented it to the public.

    Wakefield might be inept, a bit shoddy and unethical, and trying to prove a suspicion. That’s not necessarily a terrible thing, but the overall results have been disastrous.

    Why would someone commit “career suicide”? Interesting question. Maybe you can imagine the bunker mentality that can spring up, when you’re called to account, meanwhile a bunch of colourful characters suddenly support your supposed “truth-telling” – they knew it all along! – and it flatters your pet theory. You tend to double-down under such conditions.

    What do you want me to tell you, Node? That unless I can provide an absolutely obvious case for personal motive, he must have been telling the truth, and everyone else in the medical establishment is wrong?

    What do _you_ think the rest of the medical establishment are up to – are all of them acting in bad faith?

  • ------------·´`·.¸¸.¸¸.··.¸¸Node

    Node :
    “Intelligent successful doctors committing career suicide. No financial motive. Why do they do it? What’s your theory?”

    Fred :
    “I expect not everyone sees vaccination as a good thing, historically there have been Darwinists, like Darwin’s son and his nephew Francis Galton who would not see vaccination as a good thing and we can expect there to have been followers ever since.
    As I read through the internet I do find that those who try to cast doubt on vaccination tend to be the same people why try to cast doubt on the Holocaust.”

    So you have conceded that their motives are honourable – that they act out of genuine belief. They have also proved willing to suffer great hardship, without personal gain, to share their beliefs. Then surely, even if they are mistaken in those beliefs, they don’t deserve the sort of character assassination attacks that have been directed at them, for example being compared to a holocaust denier as you have done?

    Speaking for myself, I would prefer to be described as having an open mind on both subjects. However, I take your point about people being predictable in their belief systems. I’ve noticed that those who have an inflexible black and white attitude on one subject tend to be the same on others. Also that they tend to project their binary thinking onto others.

  • CanSpeccy

    And even further…

    The Judaic form of Christianity persisted in Egypt, thus for example, the Copts still keep the sabbath (i.e., Saturday) holy, unlike the Roman Christians whose religion was adapted to suit the need of the empire.

    Judaic Christians had been persecuted in Rome for, among other things, refusing to worship the Emperor as a God, represented by the Sun. By making Sunday the holy day, the Romanized Christians were thus brought to show the required deference to the Emperor.

    Within the Empire Jews were often discriminated against and, therefore, it is understandable that Romanized Christians were inclined to anti-Semitism, since, unlike the author of the Gospel of St. Matthew, they did not consider themselves to be Jews.

    The Egyptian form of Christianity spread around the Western coast of Europe to reach Ireland where it caused surprise among Roman Christians when they reached Ireland in the Seventh century and found that the Irish were essentially Jews who followed the Jewish dietary and purity laws and keeping the Sabbath (Saturday) holy.

  • ------------·´`·.¸¸.¸¸.··.¸¸Node

    Glenn : “What do you want me to tell you, Node? That unless I can provide an absolutely obvious case for personal motive, he must have been telling the truth, and everyone else in the medical establishment is wrong?”

    No, I just wanted you to address the awkward fact that whatever drives Wakefield, it isn’t personal gain, ignorance or stupidity. You’ve done so, thank you. I’m not sure your scenario is very plausible, but it’s possible.

    Glenn : “What do _you_ think the rest of the medical establishment are up to – are all of them acting in bad faith?”

    Are all of them? No I wouldn’t think so.

    Are any of them ? In general, yes, very likely, the medical establishment is driven by big pharma.

    In particular reference to some vaccine conspiracy? Possibly, I might even go so far as probably. Cover-ups, rigging of trials, epidemic hypes, concealment of evidence, media defamation campaigns – I smell rats ! What it all adds up to is where my uncertainty lies. Probably it is effective in some circumstances and of minimal value in others, but the disparity is hidden for profit reasons. Probably there are some serious health problems caused by vaccines that are being underplayed/covered up. Possibly there is a frighteningly sinister agenda hidden amongst genuine medical application.

    I was going to finish with “I wish I had your certainty on these matters, Glenn”, but upon further reflection, no I don’t.

    And so … to bed.

  • Clark

    Why argue about these details? (and yes they are details in the overall context of science).

    Scouse Billy claimed that the principle of vaccination is false. So far as I know, that would require a huge cover-up – the self-delusion of the entire scientific community.

    I’m convinced I could get some lab rats and prove that vaccination works in my garage, just as I can verify the principles of optics or mechanics.

    If you take Scouse Billy’s path, you can chip bits off science here and there until you have such a big pile of chippings that it looks significant. So how come science works at all?

    Scouse Billy, please engage with this fundamental point – I’ve been asking you for days.

    Others, please stop looking at this chip of marble Billy keeps showing you, and get him to discuss what he thinks of the building he’s just chipped it from.

  • Clark

    Vaccination is so fundamental. For centuries people have noticed that you only get some diseases once. That’s it – just observation of facts. Vaccination follows as sets of tests and observation from that.

  • Clark

    Or if you choose, you can follow Scouse Billy’s trail of breadcrumbs. Oh, this one looks tasty. I wonder where they lead? To a whole loaf, perhaps? Or to a trap?

  • fred

    “So you have conceded that their motives are honourable – that they act out of genuine belief.”

    If you consider eugenics to be an honourable belief.

    I don’t and will argue against it.

  • ------------·´`·.¸¸.¸¸.··.¸¸Node

    Scouse Billy : “Node, this should be of interest to you.”

    Thanks, Scouse Billy, I will get round to watching it, this discussion has rekindled my interest in the subject. But first, I’m still only half way through the 2.5 hr Rupert Sheldrake video you linked to yesterday, thank you. I saw an interview with him once before, also the infamous banned TedX talk, but never anything as in-depth as this. I enjoy listening to him in the way I enjoy listening to Richard Feynman, he expresses himself so clearly. Last time I heard him, I don’t think the field of epigenetics was as explored (or even named?) as now, and it chimes with a lot of my own thinking about the way the boundaries of life, consciousness and identity are blurred.

    I also spent quite a while exploring Jimmy Rosenburg the other night. Please don’t post any more links!

  • Scouse Billy

    My pleasure, Node 🙂

    Clark, you cannot compare natural immunity which is for life with vaccines.
    Vaccines are claimed to confer immunity for a few months to a few years.

    Why do you think we are told we need boosters.

    The problem is if you don’t get the childhood diseases naturally, you run the risk of getting the much more dangerous versions as an adult.

    Wallace himself points out the ever increasing lies told in Parliament over the course of the 19th Century – you really could read his work although it is very detailed…

    Glenn, I think the reason so many defend the vaccination program might have something to do with money or had that not occurred to you?

  • Clark

    Node, the scientific method is the only method we have of telling turds from treasure. Remove that, and all that’s left is indoctrination.

    I really think we should find out where Billy is trying to go before accepting lifts from him.

  • fred

    “Are any of them ? In general, yes, very likely, the medical establishment is driven by big pharma.”

    Can’t think why the eradication of diseases would benefit big pharma. Surely it would be in their interests to frighten just enough people into not vaccinating to keep the vaccines and drugs they make necessary.

  • Clark

    Scouse Billy, for every Big Pharma faction that profits from vaccination, there will be other Big Pharma factions that would profit from the diseases vaccination would otherwise have prevented.

    Where are you going. WHERE ARE YOU TRYING TO GET TO? Be honest!

  • Scouse Billy

    Fred, when you look at the graphs showing the decreasing incidence and mortality of the diseases over time, they generally start with the introduction of vaccines. If you can find ones that start 50, 100 or even 200 years prior to their introduction, you will see that the vast bulk of the eradication occurred prior to this – what was reducing prevalence and severity then?

    Most people who have examined this in detail concur that it was advances in sanitation, refridgeration and transportation.

    To see these you can look up Dr Suzanne Humphries, for example.

  • ------------·´`·.¸¸.¸¸.··.¸¸Node

    Clark : “Node, the scientific method is the only method we have of telling turds from treasure. Remove that, and all that’s left is indoctrination.
    I really think we should find out where Billy is trying to go before accepting lifts from him.”

    A broader discussion about scientific scepticism would be interesting, but less informative about vaccines. Right now, I’m interested in vaccines. I don’t have your certainty on this subject, and I welcome information from both ‘sides’. To claim that only one side is using scientific method is to pre-judge the issue. The medical establishment criticise Wakefield’s methodology, the ‘antis’ point out that the US Centre for Disease Control deliberately withheld data from a paper that would have shown a causal connection between vaccines and autism. My jury is still out.

  • ------------·´`·.¸¸.¸¸.··.¸¸Node

    Fred : “Can’t think why the eradication of diseases would benefit big pharma.”

    MSF says the pneumococcal vaccine is a big contributor to the soaring cost of vaccinating a child in the poorest countries – it accounts for 45% of the total. GSK and Pfizer have collectively reported more than $19bn in global sales of the vaccine since it launched.

    The full vaccination schedule which every child should receive includes 12 vaccines. Since 2001, the cost of the full package has risen dramatically, says the report, The Right Shot: bringing down barriers to affordable and adapted vaccines.

    “The price to fully vaccinate a child is 68 times more expensive than it was just over a decade ago, mainly because a handful of big pharmaceutical companies are overcharging donors and developing countries for vaccines that already earn them billions of dollars in wealthy countries,” said Rohit Malpani, director of policy and analysis for the MSF campaign.
    http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2015/jan/20/pharmaceutical-companies-pneumococcal-vaccine

  • fred

    “The medical establishment criticise Wakefield’s methodology, the ‘antis’ point out that the US Centre for Disease Control deliberately withheld data from a paper that would have shown a causal connection between vaccines and autism. My jury is still out.”

    Your jury might consider the evidence that US Centre for Disease Control didn’t actually withhold anything, they did a survey and published the data inviting people to analyse it and submit their conclusions for peer review.

    You can see Dr Hooker’s paper here: http://www.translationalneurodegeneration.com/content/3/1/16 and also a link to the retraction. It states clearly it was a reanalysis of data he freely obtained in 2004, nothing had been withheld.

  • ------------·´`·.¸¸.¸¸.··.¸¸Node

    Fred : “Your jury might consider the evidence that US Centre for Disease Control didn’t actually withhold anything, they did a survey and published the data inviting people to analyse it and submit their conclusions for peer review.”

    And your jury might like to consider this:

    February 2, 2015
    Investigative journalist Sharyl Attkisson has posted a recorded phone call she just had with Dr. Frank DeStefano, the CDC Director of Immunization Safety. Dr. DeStefano was a co-author with CDC whistleblower Dr. William Thompson on a 2004 study that originally was put forward as research showing there was no link between vaccines and autism. Dr. Thompson has come forward and revealed that data was withheld from the public that showed an increased risk of autism in certain populations, specifically African American boys. The CDC has already made a public announcement admitting that they did withhold some data.
    http://healthimpactnews.com/2014/cdc-director-of-immunization-safety-admits-bias-and-withholding-data-linking-vaccines-to-austim/

  • Scouse Billy

    Indeed, Node and from Fred’s own link:

    “This particular analysis was not completed in the original Destefano et al. [14] (CDC) study. Although the previous study considered MMR timing and African Americans in general, no statistically significant effect was observed. This is in contrast to our result for African Americans in general, because the CDC study limited the total African American cohort to include only those individuals who possessed a valid State of Georgia birth certificate which decreased the statistical power of their analysis.”

    Mmmm, nothing witheld, eh? You should perhaps read what you reference, Fred.

    P.S. Glad you explored the fabulous talent of Jimmy Rosenberg, Node!

  • Scouse Billy

    Oh and for anyone who would like to see full timeline graphs of the decline of infectious diseases pre- and post-vaccine introduction and parallel declines for diseases for which no vaccine was introduced there are a good few here:

    http://www.whale.to/vaccines/decline1.html

    One might compare and contrast the (nothing to withold) CDC’s lame attempt to debunk with their solitary US measles graph – timeline staring at 1950, I can’t think why!!! 😉

    http://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/vac-gen/6mishome.htm#hadalready

  • glenn

    @Clark: “Scouse Billy, for every Big Pharma faction that profits from vaccination, there will be other Big Pharma factions that would profit from the diseases vaccination would otherwise have prevented.

    Where are you going. WHERE ARE YOU TRYING TO GET TO? Be honest!

    Seriously, why do you bother? It’s patently obvious that vaccines work. That’s why we don’t have people lurching along in leg-irons anymore, having suffered the ravages of polio. It’s why we get mini-epidemics of measles here and there, because so many blasted morons have decided not to bother vaccinating their own kids. People do not die of smallpox anymore. To deny all this is clearly moronic.

    You might like this:

    Health officials recently announced that an outbreak of measles they believe originated in Disneyland last December has now spread to multiple states, and experts have linked the epidemic to the growing anti-vaccination movement among parents. Here is a timeline of the recent outbreak in California:

    February 28, 1998: British physician Andrew Wakefield publishes the first in a long line of 0 scientific studies that link vaccines to autism
    June 9, 2004: Mother of three Karen Myers tells new mom Ashley Wheeler about a “great new parenting blog”
    April 5, 2011: Group of negligent parents decide to start calling themselves “anti-vaxxers”
    September 7, 2011-2014: Anti-vaccination movement spreads to thousands of other parents through direct online contact
    December 1, 2014: Herd immunity still holding up
    December 15, 2014: Measles outbreak in Southern California reduces San Diego classroom to manageable size
    January 10, 2015: Infected Beckwith family pushes through the pain for a second day at Disneyland because they spent 900 goddamn dollars for five two-day passes
    January 11, 2015: CDC epidemiologists conduct victim surveys in some very weird California homes
    January 18, 2015: Ben’s mom gives Jessa’s mom withering glance in preschool parking lot
    January 26, 2015: CDC angrily changes answer to “Has measles been eliminated in the United States?” on FAQ page of website
    January 27, 2015: Unvaccinated 9-year-old Hunter Warren still fine, so who’s to say who’s right?
    August 12, 2020: 2015 outbreak starting to look really quaint

    http://www.theonion.com/articles/measles-epidemic-2015-a-timeline-of-the-outbreak,37870/

    *

    If Soused Billy wants to believe in whatever nonsense and mumbo-jumbo he likes, more fool him. You are not going to convince a raving lunatic not to behave like a raving lunatic. The Earth is flat, rain is a hoax, Australia doesn’t really exist – it’s never-ending. The goal is to convince hapless, gullible fools that up is down, and only they have the real answers. We’re seeing a wannabe cult leader at work.

    Here’s another cracker:

    http://www.theonion.com/articles/i-dont-vaccinate-my-child-because-its-my-right-to,37839/

    “As a mother, I put my parenting decisions above all else. Nobody knows my son better than me, and the choices I make about how to care for him are no one’s business but my own. So, when other people tell me how they think I should be raising my child, I simply can’t tolerate it. Regardless of what anyone else thinks, I fully stand behind my choices as a mom, including my choice not to vaccinate my son, because it is my fundamental right as a parent to decide which eradicated diseases come roaring back.”

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