Where Mel Gibson Will Be Spending His Christmas Vacation?
A friend of mine sent me the story running today in the New York Times about Iran announcing a "conference" of "scholars" to discuss the legitimacy of the Holocaust. Naturally, my friend, who is not Jewish, assumed I'd want to write about it to express my OUTRAGE. I think he was surprised, though, when all I could give him was a tepid "Feh."
It's not that I don't care about anti-Semitism or am convinced that a pre-emptive strike on Iran will be necessary in the near future for the sake of Israel. It's just that I'm not phased by the notion that there are people who hate Jews. There always have been and there always will be. In fact, I'm kind of looking forward to seeing who'll show up at this "conference". It's actually good for these people to be exposed as the imbeciles they are, like when Geraldo used to do his shows with members of the Klan.
Being a Holocaust denier at this point in history, to me, isn't dangerous because I don't think anybody really takes them seriously. It's kind of like being a member of the Flat Earth Society. Ahmadenijad isn't a threat because he tries to goad us with his Holocaust nonsense. He's a threat because he calls for the current destruction of Jews and the State of Israel. I'm more concerned about that.
In addtion, we need to recognize that it's the daily grass-roots anti-Semitism that is the most serious. Like European synagogues being vandalized, or tiresome radio host Don Imus recently referring to CBS' "Jewish managment" as "moneygrubbing", or the Mel Gibson tirade, or some redneck yelling obscenities at Jews from his pickup truck as they walk to shul on a Friday night. To me, THAT stuff is far worse than a handful of idiots who think the Holocaust was one of Aesop's Fables.
