I don't think it's funny to call a movie about the Holocaust a "snoozefest." I'm sorry, but that's just not a joke.

I don't think it's funny to call a movie about the Holocaust a "snoozefest." I'm sorry, but that's just not a joke.

Not sure how much I care about the story. But why you illustrated it with a photo from Saddam Hussein’s trail is beyond me.

I thought I was looking at a picture of Saddam Hussein as well!

Also ebay, sweetie I don't think The Superficial was implying that the Holocaust is a snoozefest just that the film would be. I watch many a documentary and I can tell you that there are some INCREDIBLY boring ones about all sorts of interesting/horrific/moving things. People should have a licence to operate a video camera.

Oh my f**king god, is he still trying to make up for The Passion!? Who cares? That film wasn't that offensive, we don't need another Holocaust film for people to bemoan into the 21st century. It's been 60 yrs, get the hell over it! 50+ million people have died in wars (after) WWII. A million germans even died in American and Solviet concentration camps, after the war. Unless they resurrect the Duke to be in it, there's nothing left that hasn't been said, over and over and over.

Btw, I wonder if they'd even mention that the 4 million who died in Auschwitz has been reduced in the 90's to a total of 1.3 million, including all nationalities and those who died of starvation and disease. (At least the cast of the production has been dropped by nearly 4 times, that will help save some production costs. You have to think positive Riggs!)

are you sure that's Mel Gibson and not Saddam??

LOL@ Bird on a Wire 2 !! HA HA!

Isn't Mel supposed to be at home conceiving his eighth or ninth brainwashed Catholic pie-eyed zombie child right about now?

Let me get this straight--Mel's father thinks the Holocaust was made up... but believes there's a little man in the sky that talks to him? Got it.

Having faith is one thing, but completely replacing ALL rational thought with faith is another issue altogether. This is how we come up with fabulous ideas like teaching "intelligent design" in public schools.. Soon we'll all be in a big theocracy with Dubya speaking as a Prophet of the Lord Jesus Christ.

I love that Mel's considered this great Christian, when he literally rode Jesus like a camel all the way to the bank. What's better than making money off of a dead martyr?

People are such suckers.

You're calling the Holocaust an old story? What do you consider the story of JESUS?! That's WAY tired. Tired, tired, tired...

ACK people like Mel are the epitome of hypocrisy. They make me sick.

"get the hell over it!"
Oh yeah. Stupid Jews bitching about being detained, starved, and killed on a massive scale. Fucking babies. Oh, and slavery? Get the hell over that. You know you liked it. And Jesus? What!? You people are still talking about that tired old bastard!? That was 2000 years ago, for fuck's sake. If you want some bearded dude that can take an asswhoopin', let's talk about Ted Nugent. That motherfucker wouldn't bitch if you stuck him up on a cross. He'd thank you for every nail you drove into his wrists and kill you with mind bullets. That's what badasses do.

The memoirs of a dutch Jew whose neighbors hide them from the Nazi's? They already did that one. It was called the Diary of Anne Frank.
Oh, but NOT good enough for Mel.

I know mel's almost 50 and all, but why does it look like he's aged 60 years since The Passion...I remember when he was such a cool guy, now he;s just living in obscurity, trying to offend every religion. Soon he'll make some film about buddha actually being a dick.

ki,

I'm going to play the world's smallest violin for you this hanukkah

ki,

I think you missed a dose

i agree with an earlier poster. no wonder saddam isn't appearing in court today, he's busy farting around hollywood doing movies. what a card.

rivercmb, you are scaring me.

You can't compare the Holocaust to any other genocide, war or historical event, because there was nothing else ever like it. The mass, systematic genocide led by a prosperous and in all other regards civilized nation? This is not your ordinary massacre. Nothing compares to it, there were no concentration camps/prisons ever operated on this scale - american concentration camps like this? Nope, it's a Nazi thing.

Six million Jews were killed, and that's no small amount for a people that makes up about 0.001% of the world population.

I have never heard any estimate that 4 million died in Auschwitz. Get your facts straight. Are you some sort of Jew-hating anti-semite? Yikes.

Maybe you and Mel's dad have learned from the same revisionist history textbook.

rivercmb, it's because of ignorant people like you that there is so much hate over religion. "Get over it?" Are you stupid? You don't GET OVER something like that. Have you ever heard the term 'History Repeats Itself?" You are supposed to remember things like that so that they never happen again.

And get your facts straight before you come on here to be anti-semitic and offensive. I'm not going to sit here typing up holocaust facts, but at least read ss23's post. Like he/she said, 6 million is an astronomical amount for such a tiny people.

Well said HollyJ. Religion is for weak-minded fools.

sst23,

“You can't compare the Holocaust to any other genocide, war or historical event, because there was nothing else ever like it” “Nothing compares to it”

Have you ever even read history books? The course of human history is full of mass murder based on everything from race to religion. Just in the last 200 yrs we’ve seen the mass death tolls in Rwanda, of the Armenians, and of the Native Americans. Ask an Indian, if you can find one left. There were countless atrocities during WW2, from the brutality of the Japanese to the Chinese, to the mass slaughter of Russians civilians during the war, to the nuclear bombing of 2 civilian cities in Japan. That’s just some of recent history, not even European history, our histories are full of examples of human atrocities at levels beyond comprehension.

“american concentration camps like this?” Granted they didn’t gas any Germans but they did hold them in concentration camps for years after the war, ultimately approx 1 million died of starvation and disease in these camps. Back in Germany, 1 million German women were raped by the occupying Soviet army.

“I have never heard any estimate that 4 million died in Auschwitz. Get your facts straight.”
This is where you have no credibility. You’ve never heard that 4 million people died at Auschwitz? It was only the accepted number for nearly 50 fucking years! In 1995 the Polish government determined that the actual number of all, not just Jewish, was between 1.1-1.5 million, at most. That’s not Holocaust revisionism, that’s an accepted fact by historians. The sign at Auschwitz has been changed from the 4 million to reflect that. The final numbers of Jews who died range from 4.5-6 million. About 5 million non-jews died in these camps as well.

The Nazi’s did commit atrocities and sought the expulsion or destruction of most every European Jew but it wasn’t just unique to Jews. About half of the people who died in these camps weren’t Jews. Many people died throughout WW2, and throughout history many people have been murdered from religious and racial matters. The Holocaust was a significant event but not something that is unrivalled in history.

ebayfan414,
"it's because of ignorant people like you that there is so much hate over religion"

Where the hell did you get that I was religious or even making an argument for it? There's so much hate over religion because it's based on bullshit. If someone wants to believe in fairy tales, hell, I'll take a hit of crack and join them in delusional town for a while.

I’m sick of hearing about the Holocaust like a religious person talks about God. It’s been discussed to death and there’s nothing new to add.

You shouldn't forget it but it's like going to visit a grave every fucking week, let go and move on.

Sidenote

A film about the Holocaust = Oscar

A film about the Rwandan genocide = an invitation to the Vanity Fair afterparty

to rivercmb, it is interesting that you belittle the holocaust that happened 60 years ago... MILLIONS of jews were not tortured and murdered because they were at war with the nazis. they were dragged from their homes... for no reason... by their neighbors in their country! Maybe you can convince other people that the holocaust was no big whoop, you can gather troops, grow a little mustache, and scream your opinions into a mic with your hair moving wildy in your face, you could call yourself Hitler2

rivercomb= descendent of hitler... he wasn't that bad, right rivrcomb? Only 1.4 millions of men women and childre were killed at that one concentration camp after all... big whoop.

sorry folks, but i'm with rivercomb on this one. there are way too many movies about the holocaust. it has nothing to do with whether or not the nazi's atrocities were truly horrific. of course they were. nobody's arguing that. it's just that it's been overdone in hollywood. way way way overdone. just mel's feeble stab at oscar-hood.

becca11,

You're an ass. So because I refute that it was the most significant atrocity in history by putting it into a historical context, to you that means that I'm justifying and supporting it!?

That you call me a nazi for that speaks for your own ignorance. Many people have suffered extreme atrocities throughout history, before and after WW2.

Go back to playing volleyball bitch

becca11

2 of my grandparents were taken from the English islands and put in concentration camps in Germany for 4 years. So take your Nazi claims and shove them up your prissy ass. A lot of people who weren't jews suffered through that war.

rivercmb,

I don't understand why you are so annoyed by the Holocaust. It's easy to be "annoyed" when you have no connection to what happened other than what you read or hear on TV. Are you Jewish, Indian, or Rwandan, for example? Were your relatives, like mine and Becca's, victims?

And, the context of the holocaust was unique, given the Jews' place in society and socio-economic status at the time. This is not some third-world tribal warfare, or a case where one culture was so much more dominant. The Jews were fully integrated, fully westernized - many even fought in WWI for the Germans and did not identify as Jews!

Find me another comparable event.

P.S. I love how I feel automatically qualified to discuss this being both a Jew and a history major in college...

P.P.S. this banter is enjoyable- thanks for indulging me!

While other people have definitely suffered from the Holocaust, you can not say that "well, it's not only Jews! Other people were in the concentration camps too!" The fact is that the whole point of the extermination camps was just that..to exterminate. Jews. Specifically. It was an agenda targeted against Jewish People. So they threw in gypsies, homosexuals, and other people too, which was horrible, but the fact remains that it was a horror aimed at the Jews.

If Rivercmb is citing neo-nazi texts as sources - be aware! I told you so! Don't believe him!
--------------------------------------------
This is where rivercmb's stat comes from:

Foner's Spotlight article made the following assertions regarding the number of people killed at the camp:

"Like most Americans, since his youth Cole had been instructed in the "irrefutable fact" that homicidal gassings had taken place at Auschwitz. The number of those so executed - also declared irrefutable - was 4.1 million.
Then came the Leuchter Report in 1988. This was followed by a "re-evaluation" of the total deaths at Auschwitz (down to 1.1 million). As a budding historian - and a Jew - Cole was intrigued.

Previous to 1992, anyone who publicly doubted the 4.1 million "gassing" deaths at Auschwitz was labeled an anti-Semite, neo-nazi skinhead (at the very least). Quietly, because of revisionist findings, the official figure was lowered to 1.1 million. No mention of that missing 3 million."
-------------------------------------------

But this Foner's spotlight and Leuchter report are bogus. They deny the holocaust outright and are used as a source by neo-nazis and anti-semites:

Foner's assertions are simply not true; although it is correct to note that the Polish Communist government did claim that four million people were exterminated at Auschwitz, historians (Feig, Reitlinger, Hilberg, et al.) have never supported that figure
-------------------------------------------
And the Leuchter dude is a fraud!

Fred A. Leuchter Jr., a self-styled expert in the machinery of death who parlayed his reputation as a builder of killing equipment into a second career as a proponent of "Holocaust revisionism," has admitted that he is not an engineer.

Made in a consent decree filed with a Massachusetts court last week, his admission should deal a blow to the movement holding that the Nazi extermination of 6 million Jews and others during World War II was a hoax or an exaggeration, according to experts in the field.

The agreement also requires Leuchter to stop disseminating reports in which he purports to be an engineer, most significantly a document known as the "Leuchter Report."

That report, widely circulated by revisionists, asserts that gas chambers at Nazi concentration camps in Auschwitz, Birkenau and Majdanek could not have been used for mass killings because they were not big enough nor well ventilated or sealed. The assertion is based largely on chemical analysis of materials scraped surreptitiously from walls of those chambers by Leuchter during a visit to Poland in February 1988.

Rivercmb: "It was only the accepted number for nearly 50 fucking years! In 1995 the Polish government determined that the actual number of all, not just Jewish, was between 1.1-1.5 million, at most. That’s not Holocaust revisionism, that’s an accepted fact by historians."

Wrong, wrong and wrong. Well, it's right if you are a neo-nazi anti-semite. Please check out this non-profit website dedicated to historical accuracy of the Holocaust: www.nizkor.org.

and on a final note (I'm on a roll)...

rivercmb, show me one source that has not been connected to revisionist history that supports that fact.

Yeah!

Here is rivercmb's source: the President of Iran!
------------------------------------------
TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Thursday expressed doubt the Holocaust took place and suggested the Jewish state of Israel be moved to Europe.

His comments, reported by Iran's official IRNA news agency from a news conference he gave in the Saudi Arabian city of Mecca, follow his call in October for Israel to be "wiped off the map", which sparked widespread international outrage.

-Ahmadinejad was quoted by IRNA as saying: "Some European countries insist on saying that Hitler killed millions of innocent Jews in furnaces and they insist on it to the extent that if anyone proves something contrary to that they condemn that person and throw them in jail."

"Although we don't accept this claim, if we suppose it is true, our question for the Europeans is: is the killing of innocent Jewish people by Hitler the reason for their support to the occupiers of Jerusalem?"

sst23, you go! I love it when people actually post accurate information, for once!

I personally find it so ridiculous that anyone can even doubt the holocaust. There's freaking footage from the Nazis! They wanted to record everything so that they would have footage of an extinguished race. Ohhhhhh, but noooooo...all of that footage is a hoax, right? Because some bored Jews decided to somehow create HOURS and HOURS and HOURS of footage that was fake...for fun! Please, get a life, you pathetic deniers. I'm not going to say anything else about you deniers, because you're not worth my time.

Did they teach you how to debate by creating straw-man arguments and act as though you have proved a point, in school?

“I don't understand why you are so annoyed by the Holocaust. It's easy to be "annoyed" when you have no connection to what happened other than what you read or hear on TV.”

I’ve already stated that two of my grandparents were English citizens in concentration German concentration camps for four years. You obviously didn’t read that, as you have only selectively and disingenuously interpreted my comments as to what you wanted to hear.

What am I bothered about? I’m bothered at the over-exploitation of the Holocaust through the media, films, and for ugly political debates (ie Hitler references). I’m bothered that nearly half the people who died there who were prisoners of war, select foreign citizens, homosexuals, Poles etc, who are virtually ignored in the remembrance of the event in the mindset of the West. I’m bothered that people claim that it is an atrocity vastly superior to any other crime in history, it’s nearly challenged by crimes that occurred in that very war. The selectiveness of it is extreme but it isn’t without precedent. I’ve already listed the American Indian, Armenians, and Rwandan genocides which have taken place in only recent history.

There have been numerous mass murders throughout history on the basis of religion, sexual orientation, and race. “The Jews were fully integrated, fully westernized - many even fought in WWI for the Germans and did not identify as Jews! Find me another comparable event.” So then the Native American genocide was less severe because they weren’t… European? That they weren’t integrated makes their tragedy less significant or extreme?

“:P.S. I love how I feel automatically qualified to discuss this being both a Jew and a history major in college...”

I love how you feel racial ethnicity equates a justifiable argument.

“P.P.S. this banter is enjoyable- thanks for indulging me!”

I’m glad I gave you another opportunity for you to listen to yourself speak, but I’m sure I wasn’t necessary.

“If Rivercmb is citing neo-nazi texts as sources - be aware! I told you so! Don't believe him!”

Ah, here it comes. Remember children, whenever entering into a debate that you are creating, finish off by painting the other person as either, or all of the above, inherently racist, sexist, or a “Neo-nazi anti-Semite”. The last of which should only be used selectively and is not appropriate in all circumstances. ie. Josh refuses to give Sherry some of his popcorn, so she calls him a… ”

Then throw a cherry on top. “Here is rivercmb's source: the President of Iran!”

Slander and then ultimately discredit.

You’re right in one sense though; I did make a mistake and overstate the historian claim. In responding to your statement in having “never heard any estimate that 4 million died in Auschwitz.” I shouldn’t have made a broad sweep, since it wasn’t as generally accepted by historians, and instead made the point that it was accepted in the Nuremburg trials and by the Polish government until the mid 90’s. So you’re right, I did overstate that claim towards historians. But the 4 million claims had existed during that time at the camp and have appeared in some Western materials. I also did point out that I never took that calculation as a form of conspiracy to Holocaust death numbers. Historians didn’t calculate their numbers with that in mind.

So you’ve done a great job at showing people at how to frame a false debate by simply inventing an issue and then sitting back in smug self-righteousness at how beautifully you’ve painted it, ignoring the issue off hand.

Turning an argument about the over-exploitation of the Holocaust into denial of the Holocaust itself takes great skill in intellectual dishonesty. I’m giving you a gold sticker for your next mock history paper.

ebayfan414,

“I personally find it so ridiculous that anyone can even doubt the holocaust.” That’s great. Where did you pull that from though, since I’ve never said it?

You two should sit together and invent false arguments for yourselves to feel self-righteous about. Oh wait, you already have. Good on you.

My intial posts on this thread were sarcastic and insensitive but I was trying to keep in nature with the site. I realize that I shouldn’t have been so with this issue but I still didn't deny it. I have taken issue with the level of exploitation of it.

rivercmb:

“I personally find it so ridiculous that anyone can even doubt the holocaust.” That’s great. Where did you pull that from though, since I’ve never said it?"

I don't know why you think I was even talking about you, just because you are involved in this discussion. I was just saying in general, not you in particular.

rivercmb:

"My intial posts on this thread were sarcastic and insensitive but I was trying to keep in nature with the site. I realize that I shouldn’t have been so with this issue but I still didn't deny it. I have taken issue with the level of exploitation of it."

That is why the whole debate started...because of the remarks you initially made. I see what you mean about the exploitation of the Holocaust...but only to a degree. Yes, I think that there are lots of movies made about it, and it IS talked about a lot, but the point whereupon
I disagree with you is that you seem to think it's a BAD thing that people talk about the Holocaust. Yes it's talked about a lot...but does that BOTHER you? I mean, if you don't want to hear about it, then just don't read about it when you see an article or whatever. No one is forcing you to listen. my point is just that I don't see why you are so irritated that people still care about what happened. And "it was 60 years ago already!" You know what, I hate to break it to you but 60 years ago is nowhere near ancient history.

I started off this debate so badly; I can see why I’ve spent most of it debating other issues. I don’t think that it’s inherently bad to talk about it but I think that it’s been reaching a point where it’s trivializing it (through politicians and some writers) and through films. I think its bad in the sense that it’s mentally unhealthy to talk about something like that so often. It’s probably because neither of my grandparents really ever talked about what happened to them, my grandmother only told my parents when they were older, but being English and Scottish, they weren’t singled out as others so I know that Jewish people have the most significant claim in it. But even some Jewish writers are starting to say that by bringing the Holocaust up so often it’s creating a victimization mentally in not only the survivors but a lingering one in the generations that followed. I can understand why, historically Jews have been mistreated and scapegoated for most of their existence. If the Holocaust encourages empathy towards other people then that’s good, that’s what it should be about and it’s an important message. But it gets used so often now that it’s become a political tool to discredit political opponents and to justify violence in the Middle East, on every side.

As to this film, I don’t like that Gibson is making this film in a pressured attempt to prove that he isn’t prejudice. If the Passion seemed intolerant, that’s because religion is innately intolerant. Unless we accept Jesus or are part of the “chosen people”, we’re thought of as lesser people for it. I remember a recent clip that I downloaded of Star Jones on the View openly stating that she wouldn’t vote for someone who wasn’t religious because she didn’t believe that they were fully capable of being moral. She felt justified in saying on national television that a life without god is a life without morality. Maybe instead of making an anti-dote to The Passion, they should make a 4 hour mini-series on how the Bible and other religions are used to justify prejudice and stupidity. Wouldn’t it be interesting to even see a documentary on the history of the Bible, so much has been spent on the actual material but what about where it came from and what happened after Jesus died. That would make a much more interesting movie than the last 12 hours of Jesus’ death.

Rivercmb - your last point was thorough and articulate - thanks! (I'm not being sarcastic here). I think you have some good points, and I think they came out most coherently in your last message.

First, I didn't realize your grandparents were victims - I wasn't intentionally omitting that. Second, I agree that too much of anything is no good - can't talk about any tragedy too much or it is trivialized, but it's important to "never forget." So that's why talks about the holocaust and other atrocities will never end.

As for my own tear of comments - I was on a roll. I am a lawyer, so you'll always get an argument from me. And if I frame it in a way that stresses the bad (points of your argument) and minimizes the good - hey, that's what I went to law school for!

Based on your later comments, acknowledging your arguments' flaws - I don't think you are like the President of Iran or a neo-nazi - but, you know how things get in the heat of the moment. After all, you insulted me and my intelligence throughout your posts - even when I was trying to be light-hearted about it:

“P.P.S. this banter is enjoyable- thanks for indulging me!”

I’m glad I gave you another opportunity for you to listen to yourself speak, but I’m sure I wasn’t necessary."

AND -

“If Rivercmb is citing neo-nazi texts as sources - be aware! I told you so! Don't believe him!”

Ah, here it comes. Remember children, whenever entering into a debate that you are creating, finish off by painting the other person as either, or all of the above, inherently racist, sexist, or a “Neo-nazi anti-Semite”. The last of which should only be used selectively and is not appropriate in all circumstances. ie. Josh refuses to give Sherry some of his popcorn, so she calls him a… ”

You've got to admit that the source used by you is widespread among neo-nazis and anti-semites. That was all I was saying - calling it like I see it. Of course, now that you've made additional points, it changes the whole picture.

Remember what you said: "Turning an argument about the over-exploitation of the Holocaust into denial of the Holocaust itself takes great skill in intellectual dishonesty. I’m giving you a gold sticker for your next mock history paper."

You didn't really stress the over-exploitation point until your last post. That is why me, Ebay and Becca all construed it the same way - as holocaust denial. I wasn't revising history or anything - just responding to your arguments.

It's been fun.

Wow. Umm. Saddam has been taking on the Jews for many, many years...