11 Comments For This Post

1. lognhornpapa (6 comments.) Says:
   May 18th, 2009 at 7:36 pm

   What's wrong?

   Start by looking at home. No sense of Jewish Identity from Mom and Dad.

   Then look at the Temple, where they may see a rabbi or associate rabbi, whose job ought to be teaching children of all ages, doing nothing. Or nothing more than leading Shabbat and Holiday services. And then driving away from the Temple.

   Then look at the religious schools, particularly in the Conservative and Reform congregations (I grew in a conservative congregation and have participated most recently in a Reform congregation), where at most the children are for 2 or 3 hours a week. Many of our Conservative and Reform youth cannot read and certainly cannot understand the Hebrew prayers in our day to day liturgy.

   There's culpability all around. But the bottom line lies with the parents and what our children learn in the home, as to what's important. And I can personally say I've not done a particularly good job. But I also see I'm not alone.

2. Amir Dekel Says:
   May 18th, 2009 at 7:37 pm

   People who think that fighting against holocaust denial is "over-playing and exaggerating" the issue don't understand the problem.

   For anyone interested in the subject head over to Prof. Lipstadt's blog:
   http://lipstadt.blogspot.com/

   Or go read 'Holocaust Denial on Trial':
   http://www.hdot.org/

   That is all.

3. Brian Says:
   May 18th, 2009 at 7:55 pm

   Defiantly the perspective of one individual who has lost touch with the brutal reality of this world. As the number of Holocaust survivors dwindles, it is the responsibilities of their descendants and the Jewish youth to continue to promote love, humility, and understanding in order to avert another mass genocide or onslaught of a people representing a minority culture.

4. vildechaia Says:
   May 18th, 2009 at 9:49 pm

   The reasons commenter # 1 posted are totally valid, IMO. It all must start at home, with that being the basis for further knowledge from the Temple, etc. As for "Timothy," I would suggest he learn more about the Holocaust. There is plenty to read out there – he could start by googling the word "holocaust." Then, he might want to learn how to spell.

5. bcuban Says:
   May 19th, 2009 at 2:55 am

   petophile commented on What's Wrong With Our Jewish Youth? <http://www.briancuban.com/whats-wrong-with-our-je… – THE CUBAN REVOLUTION <http://www.briancuban.com> :

   my grandparents survived the holocaust in Poland. my grandfather was a prisoner of war. he died a few years ago at the age of 92. my grandmother has only recently begun to tell her own stories. I was bat mitzvah-ed and I went through confirmation and post-confirmation. I attended NFTY youth groups and camps. I'm in my twenties now, and I consider the Jewish part of my identity to be one of the most important parts. and I tell anyone who is willing to listen about how my grandparents survived.
   how does this affect me?
   my grandfather was the only one of his family (parents and 7 siblings) to survive.
   my grandmother lost her parents and one of her two brothers in the Majdanek concentration camp.
   my family is incredibly small because most of them were murdered.
   but we are proud, and we are resilient, and we make sure to live every day to its fullest because we ought not to have made it, but we did.
   so Brian, not all Jewish youth are disconnected.

6. Natalie Schroeder Says:
   May 19th, 2009 at 3:16 am

   That Timothy guy (& I use that word sparingly) is an ignorant jerk and that seems to be his best attribute! I am a Protestant Christian, but even I know that I am effected by what occured during one of the worst times in human history. The Holocaust is something that most definitely happened and for anyone to deny it or ignore it, is an absolute outrage. Brian C., whether Jewish or not, has every right to be on a soapbox about it. The subject has been something dear to me since middle school and for anyone to deny it or blow it off shows their lack of humanity, compassion and intelligence! Timothy, anyone who thinks like him and all the Holocaust deniers need to spend a day with a survivor and just a few hours walking through a concentration camp. I bet those obtuse jerks would change their mind. As for the youth ignoring their past, as with many other subjects of disparity where today’s youth are concerned it does fall back on the parents (I definitely agree with ‘longhornpapa’). If our youth is not taught about our past, then what kind of sad future is ahead for us?

7. jedsa (2 comments.) Says:
   May 19th, 2009 at 3:51 am

   The Santayana and Niemöller quotes are good choices, but I'd like to suggest a third. The wicked child asks, "What does all of this holiday mean to you." By using the word, "you", he excludes himself from the community, so you answer, "With a strong hand, hashem took ME out of Egypt. For had you been there, you would not have been redeemed."

   Timothy doesn't seem to understand what the holocaust means to the Jewish community and the harm that holocaust denial causes to the community. And yet had Timothy been in Nazi-controlled territory in the 1940s, he would not have been spared. And he would not have been redeemed.

   Personally, I agree with what petophile said… I'm in my twenties and my Jewish identity is extremely important to me. My family heritage, including the holocaust, is important to me.

   My Dad's side of the family is small because many of my ancestors were murdered. Like many Jewish families, my parents have a shoebox of photographs of relatives in the attic. Nobody knows who they are, but we know they were relatives.

   My Great Uncle Siegfried was the director of the Israelitisches Blindeninstitut-Vienna's institute for blind Jewish children. Towards the beginning of Nazi rule, my Great Uncle was able to get the children in his care to safety in Palestine and the United States, before emigrating to the United States himself. He did not abandon his fellow Jews, however-among the Leo Baeck Institute's collections is a series of letters between my Great Uncle and the International Red Cross where he tells them what he knows of the concentration camps.

   My grandfather, a lawyer in Vienna and a Lieutenant in the Kaiser's army in World War I, fled Austria during World War II after being held by the SS. In a cruel fit of irony, his wife and one of his daughters escaped to London, only to be killed during the Blitz. My grandfather made his way across Europe and eventually got to the United States. Not speaking very good English, he never practiced law again. Instead, he worked a series of jobs, ranging from a cook to a part-owner/operator of the Star Hotel in the Catskills. He met another Austrian Jew, remarried, and had my Dad. He died before I was born. And yet today, I follow in his footsteps as a Jewish lawyer. His law license, in German, hangs in my apartment, near my own.

   The holocaust happened. It MATTERS that it happened. And if we allow people to forget, or allow holocaust deniers to muddy the waters with disinformation, lies, and hatred, it only serves to further the Nazi's aims of destroying the Jewish people and culture.

   Timothy will need to make a choice-he is part of the Jewish community or he isn't. To think that you can claim a Jewish identity but be unaffected by the holocaust is not only folly, it's wicked.

8. jonolan (1 comments.) Says:
   May 19th, 2009 at 11:46 am

   Just because the writer of the email calls himself a Jew doesn't mean he is a Jew in any meaningful way. Many of the young have been brainwashed by the Secular Left in the course of their schooling and have stopped self-Identifying themselves in terms of religion, cultural, or even nationality. With that displacement comes a separation from the past.

9. anonynony Says:
   May 19th, 2009 at 6:47 pm

   "Many of the young have been brainwashed by the Secular Left in the course of their schooling and have stopped self-Identifying themselves in terms of religion," – As opposed to self-identifying as a member of a religion because a few thousand years ago some of my ancestors that had no scientific training or technology made up a history of the world? No thanks. The truth is YOU are the one that has been brainwashed. Unless of course you can show me one shred of proof that "God" exists, AND is the Jewish God.

   Those of us that stopped believing in our silly little tribes recognize that free speech is only free if objectionable speech is allowed.

10. IanG (9 comments.) Says:
    May 19th, 2009 at 9:00 pm

    Although I am Russian & Ukrainian Jewish my family was fortunate enough to have arrived before the Holocaust, fleeing the pogroms. Many in my grandparents' generation belonged to a particular subset of Jews that were Leftists (if not Marxists) and vocally atheistic. They belonged to the intelligentsia in this country. My grandfather, Lawrence "Larry" Greenleigh was a prominent psychoanalyst in Hollywood, and he counseled many of the day's top celebrities. Larry's brother Art anglicized his surname from Greenberg to Greenleigh to get around UCLA's quota on Jews, and subsequently all the brothers but one did so as well. Would a proud Jew do that? I don't know, I wasn't in his shoes and I cannot judge. What is interesting, however, is that my grandmother, as fiercely opposed to religion as she is, has always been an ardent and hawkish Israel supporter. It has nothing to do with religion, in her eyes. It is, and always has been, about persecution of her people. So it is, and I fear, so it will always be.

11. David (6 comments.) Says:
    June 4th, 2009 at 3:48 pm

    i think it is wrong to judge all of Jewish youth based upon one ignorant email

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