What Should I Have Said? Re: Holocaust

[TowerRavenSeven]

Recently dh and I attended an acquaintances party. The host’s wife recently moved from Germany. Our son was supposed to do an internship there (ended up changing plans) so naturally we were speaking about Germany. Out of the blue, she says ‘you know, it’s been 80 some years, can’t we (meaning Germany) move on from feeling guilty about the Holocaust? We’ve said we’re sorry, can’t we just move on from it?”
My mouth dropped open and I know I gave a deer in the headlights stare. She wasn’t really asking a question it was more of a remark. I know I was being unreasonable not saying anything - I Wanted to say, no we can’t forget, we must remember! But as their guest it made me so extremely uncomfortable, I didn’t want to have a row with the hosts at their home. She already knew how I felt with my mouth dropping open and - but if this ever happens again, what is a good response to such a statement?

Lol. Loving your ability to skirt the issue here

Have you thought about going back in time & applying for a cushy government job ? Perhaps abroad...?

Whereas the majority of British people in the era of the slave trade had little knowledge of anything outside their immediate environment and had a pretty miserable existence themselves, being exploited by the same class of people who were trading slaves. It doesn't make sense for ordinary working class Britons to feel responsible in any way.

This is false. You talk of “the majority of British people” as though they were peasants in medieval times. Not so. There was continual, contemporaneous (as far as “technology” permitted) accounts of what colonists were doing. There was debate in parliament. The newspapers were full of it. There was a not-so-silent minority against the horrors of it - coming, as it did, more or less simaltaneously with the horrors of the Dutch, Belgian and French colonial efforts - also very vocal in rural and urban regions. It’s a myth to think that only a few aristocratic, landed folk were involved. It was a root and branch endeavour, from farmer to banker to Lord and Lady.

Other countries (UK and USA for example) knew what was going on and didn't allow even allow Jewish people to escape to their country, much less do anything to stop the death camps.

Yes. The Balfour Agreement, at the root of this latest iteration of Middle Eastern strife, was born of an attempt to ensure continental Jews settled somewhere other than Britain. They took from Palestine to create Isreal, the original nimbyism.

And after it's sunk in... what?

The British population of today (now including descendants of peoples oppressed by British colonialism) hold no responsibility for what was done by their ancestors.

You mention that they - I'm not sure who "they" are - "ran anti-Irish sentiments against (British) Anglo-Celts well into the 90's", but so what?

I've lived in the UK since the 70s and, as a Celt, have largely been a supporter of one Irish republicanism even when it was extrememly unpopular due to the actions on mainland UK of the IRA. Am I to be held responsible for the anti-Irish sentiments of "them", even if I was opposed those sentiments?

It's happened... it's gone...

If you can find the people who committed these wrongs at the time, then fine, hold them to account. But don't expect current populations to feel guilt about what their predecessors did.

I don’t understand.

You were chatting about modern day Germany - the internship that wasn’t to be - maybe some of the famous cities and sights? You did not reference WWII and the holocaust at all?

Then the host did raise the holocaust, followed by her outburst?

Or you were chatting about Germany and mentioned the war and then the holocaust?

if the latter, yes you were rude to bring up an atrocity that happened in someone’s country generations ago while a guest of that person and at a dinner party.

If the former, she sounds a bit mad - or perhaps her English isn’t perfect and she misheard or misunderstood someone’s comment.

Either way, put it behind you!

I’ve seen one or two little protests in London! And a whole load of antisemitic attacks as revenge.

The Holocaust wouldn't normally be on anyone's minds as a topic when speaking with Germans.
Especially as those who are alive currently would never have taken part, or been involved in it.

That maybe true. But this post touches on antisemitism and that’s what I’m commenting on. But I think you know that don’t you.

That’s disingenuous of you. You absolutely wanted to derail the thread about the Holocaust by talking about Gaza. That’s what antisemites do.

@TowerRavenSeven "if this ever happens again, what is a good response to such a statement?"
Gosh, I have no idea what it is like to have been in your shoes, tell me more. My instinct is to say "oh wow 'we' must of course remember" but I'm not even sure who the 'we' is here that I'm talking about; I'm interested to hear and learn about your experience.

I did have a lovely woman once bring up the Holocaust.
In 1990's we used to exercise our dogs on local field.

Occasionally we'd see an elderly small lady with a little boy there.

One day, there was a pain in the backside Alsatian dog that was without it's owner , and this dog was terrifying the old lady and the little boy.

They were flying a kite, and the kite probably attracted the GSD, but the woman was clearly terrified.
My two dogs saw, and charged like Exocets and drove the GSD away.

The old lady and her little boy left the field.

A few weeks later, they were there again , and the old lady came up and said ''Your dogs saved me. Thank you. Ever since a child I have been terrified of that type of dog, as they were used to terrorise.

Turned out she had been at a Death Camp and it had been liberated.

She talked of travelling in a train truck, seeing snow through the cracks in the wagon, and {we live near a steam train that whistles} ..she said ''The whistle of the train takes me right back.

Her accent was still strong.

She was lovely.

I hope she is at peace now, as she would be a very elderly lady if alive still.

Did she actually say we should forget it? The quote suggests she said they should move on from feeling guilty which isn't unreasonable IMO if you played no part in it. Obv it's still a weird topic for the dinner table.

I agree with this.

Oh be quiet.

How do you suggest we help exactly?

Yes, that's clear.

She must have read something into what you had said otherwise you’d say “but (her name), no one mentioned the holocaust??”. I have two german friends and neither of them has ever mentioned the wars or the holocaust, just like I don’t talk about how Britain invaded half the world and kept slaves. It’s our history but we are not held personally accountable

People who base their whole personality around their superior nationality and spend their time ranting on the internet about how other nationalities are inferior and should be ashamed of themselves are very sad and bitter.
It always seems to be either people who aren't very bright or who have nothing to be proud of other than where they were randomly born.

This once again conforms my conviction that we need an Etiquette forum, and most of what's in AIBU belongs there.

Never again means never again for anyone.

If she truly brought it up completely out of the blue, just in the general context of what Germany might be like to visit today, or what it might have been like for your British son if he'd been able to spend time there, then .... in your place, I would have asked her what she meant. Why did she suddenly think about the Holocaust? What did she want you to know about what it was like to live in Germany in the postwar years, to be German in Europe and the world? What did she hope for or expect from you in response?

I'm not Jewish, and not of Jewish heritage, but my grandparents were Holocaust survivors. They were "Aryan" Poles who were arrested for resistance activities during the Nazi occupation of Poland and were sent to a concentration camp. They survived.

I was in Berlin in the summer of 2012, when Germany made the quarterfinals in the EUFA football competition brilliantly co-hosted by Poland and Ukraine. Germany lost, but before that - Berliners were rocking the German flag like crazy, and German flag themed stuff really took off - I remember these black-red-yellow MnMs in every vending machine in Berlin! Germans I knew (and even a few I'd just met) seemed a little incredulous; some remarked that they saw and felt something different that summer. There was a new ease with the German flag, a kind of social permission to display it and to celebrate Germany. This was maybe the first time since 1945 that German people widely felt that they could fly Germany's (postwar) flag and have it mostly be about football. Or SEE Germany's flag and be proud and happy, at least for the moment, in the context of football.

No person, no community, no demographic, and no nation can absolve Germany for its crimes under the Nazi regime. They should not and cannot be forgotten. The work that Germany does, remembering and acknowledging the Holocaust - and I remember hearing Angela Merkel make a speech all about this, very explicitly, in the summer of 2012 and it was unremarkable by then - of COURSE she'd say that - is vital, but not only for Germany. What Germans did from 1933-1945, humans did. And as Germany comes to grips with it publicly, all humans can also learn.

There are a couple of shockingly antisemitic posts on this thread. People think that that's somehow OK now. It isn't. My initial impulse is to report these posts, but I also think it's useful to let them stand and be observed.