{"id":5585,"date":"2022-02-04T01:29:56","date_gmt":"2022-02-03T23:29:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.jonathan-cook.net\/blog\/?p=5585"},"modified":"2022-02-04T01:29:56","modified_gmt":"2022-02-03T23:29:56","slug":"whoopi-goldberg-holocaust-racists","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.jonathan-cook.net\/blog\/2022-02-04\/whoopi-goldberg-holocaust-racists\/","title":{"rendered":"Whoopi Goldberg, the Holocaust and real racists"},"content":{"rendered":"

Her Holocaust comments were misguided and clumsy. But those exploiting the furore are the ones with the truly ugly motives<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Mint Press News – 3 February 2022<\/p>\n

Whoopi Goldberg is not someone I would normally rush to defend. Our politics are too far apart on too many issues. Many will doubtless take delight in the fact that the queen of cancel culture has just found herself cancelled.<\/p>\n

But the pile-on against her for expressing a non-conventional view about the Holocaust needs examination \u2013 less for the content of the furore it has provoked than for what that furore tells us about power relations in our society. And for what the furore says about the things we hold dear and the things we don\u2019t.<\/p>\n

What seems to have done for Goldberg \u2013 leading to her suspension from a popular daytime TV talkshow, The View, even after she apologised \u2013 was her comment that the Holocaust \u201cisn\u2019t about race\u201d. Rather, she said: \u201cIt\u2019s about man\u2019s inhumanity to man, that\u2019s what it\u2019s about. These are two groups of white people\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

We don\u2019t know exactly where she was heading with this particular line of thought because nervous fellow panellists shut it down. But she had a chance to clarify later on the Colbert show, where she appeared to suggest that distinctions of \u201crace\u201d relate chiefly to the colour of one\u2019s skin.<\/p>\n

\u201cRace\u201d, of course, is a socially constructed idea. Her critics are right that calling Jews \u201cwhite\u201d in the context of the Holocaust is not only historically inaccurate but unhelpful to a clearer understanding of what the Holocaust was about. In Nazi Germany, it was the Nazis, not Whoopi Goldberg, who got to decide which groups constituted a \u201crace\u201d.<\/p>\n

Nonetheless, her later apology seemed a good corrective: \u201cOn today\u2019s show, I said the Holocaust \u2018is not about race, but about man\u2019s inhumanity to man\u2019. I should have said it is about both \u2026 I stand corrected.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2018Dangerous\u2019 comment<\/strong><\/p>\n

But that, of course, was not enough. Much of the coverage has subtly implied that Goldberg skated a little too close to Holocaust denial or antisemitism. Kim Godwin, president of ABC News, reinforced that impression with a statement that presumed all Jews had grounds to be offended by Goldberg\u2019s remark: \u201cThe entire ABC News organisation stands in solidarity with our Jewish colleagues, friends, family and communities.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jonathan Greenblatt, of the Anti-Defamation League, went further, labelling Goldberg\u2019s comment \u201cdangerous\u201d. But in what meaningful sense was her remark dangerous rather than na\u00efve, ignorant or misguided?<\/p>\n

Goldberg wasn\u2019t excusing or even minimising the Holocaust. Nothing in her remarks makes a repetition of the Holocaust more likely, or encourages hatred or prejudice towards Jews. She simply reframed the Holocaust in ways that made sense to her given her own experiences of racism. Like many people, she struggled to see clearly enough another person\u2019s viewpoint.<\/p>\n

The point is: So what? Isn\u2019t that what we have TV talkshows for? So people get to talk and exchange ideas, often worthless ones on subjects they know little about.<\/p>\n

Moments after she had made her initial comment, she sought to expand on it in more interesting and helpful ways: \u201cYou\u2019re missing the point \u2026 let\u2019s talk about it for what it really is. It\u2019s about how people treat each other. It\u2019s a problem. It doesn\u2019t matter if you\u2019re black or white, Jews \u2026 everybody eats each other.\u201d<\/p>\n

Within the limits of TV talkshow\u2019s soundbite culture, she appeared to be making a universal point about how each of us is susceptible to being manipulated into hatred and violence against other groups, especially if those groups have been demonised.<\/p>\n

\u2018Reflect and learn\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n

That was a reminder \u2013 one we hear too rarely \u2013 that the Holocaust was not a crime only against Jews. It was equally a crime against the Roma people. Half of each \u201crace\u201d was exterminated. The Nazis also sent other groups to the concentration camps, including socialists, gays and the disabled, none of whom could be described in racial terms.<\/p>\n

With western politicians and the media dehumanising the Russian, Chinese and Iranian peoples by vilifying their leaders \u2013 and thereby driving us towards potentially catastrophic wars \u2013 it is no bad thing to be reminded that Hitler had larger ambitions even than a genocide of the Jewish people.<\/p>\n

It is worth being reminded too that propaganda, and groupthink, occur in every period of history. It is not just one state at one time that has managed to dupe its people into committing crimes against humanity. And similarly, many groups and \u201craces\u201d have been victims of others\u2019 greed and fear. To pretend otherwise is to make the repetition of such crimes more likely.<\/p>\n

It is quite possible for Goldberg\u2019s comment to be unhelpful or simplistic \u2013 this is daytime TV, after all \u2013 without it being especially harmful.<\/p>\n

Nonetheless, not only was she required to apologise but she was barred from the show for two weeks \u201cto reflect and learn\u201d. It seems a black woman is in greater in need of reflecting on her racism than the ABC News organisation and her white colleagues.<\/p>\n

\n

Once again, everyone seems remarkably comfortable telling a prominent black person not only that they don't know enough about racism to speak with any authority on the subject, but that they must be re-educated before they can be allowed to take part in the conversation pic.twitter.com\/9irKImUTlM<\/a><\/p>\n

— Jonathan Cook (@Jonathan_K_Cook) February 2, 2022<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n