might be interesting to go, no?…or maybe too sad.

David Schallheim:

I can’t imagine myself being more Jewish when I was a happy-go-lucky college student because I wanted to “show the goyim.” If anything, thoughts of the Holocaust darkness made me more assimilationist, if anything at all.

I would think this is indeed the more common response, and why Holocaust education and the proliferation of Holocaust memorials and related Holocaust force-feeding are mostly a terrible idea. For me, somehow, it worked out differently. I am not sure exactly why.

On the other hand, the link and quote from Chaim G. suggests that perhaps this is not the case. I’ll pick up a little bit on this comment Chaim quoted:

Doesn’t a secular Jew typically believe that being indistinguishable from the non-Jews is the solution to anti-Semitism?

I think many do, even when you demonstrate to them that to a large extent the more assimilation, the more vicious the antisemitic backlash — see Spain and Germany (but not pre-20th-century, and especially pre-colonial, America). The only response to that is if indeed being Jewish does not matter to you, and it is merely a marker for victimhood, then — if you can pass — assimilate away, of course; what is the point? As it is I can’t pass anyway (my pareve name notwithstanding), but I am not sure I appreciated that point earlier in my life!

Even without survivors, sectors of Judaism would have probably have radicalized regardless.

DK: Chaim G. is not a professional polemicist as some of us are, and erred by ceding (implicitly) your “radicalization” premise, which you have not demonstrated and cannot. Besides this, DK, I find your comments insightful and original.

Who cares? I would trade Israel for the Jews who were killed. And anyway, Israel doesn’t look in a particularly great position in terms of viability. Chas v” Shalom, but..it just doesn’t.

As for you claim that I was employing a “blame the victim,” well, it’s different. I don’t blame them for what happened to them! I recognize that sometimes damage…or at least a change…took place because of what they went through.

That’s being a realist, not blaming the victim.

On this I whole-heartedly agree. Could anyone possibly disagree?

Let’s play alternative history. Question: Had there been no Holocaust would there be an Israel? Without Isreal woudl we still be enjoying endless benefits?

BTW I still find your previous comments ugly and informed with a blame-the-victim bias.

It’s hard to understand what youd’ve preferred, no Holocaust or a more efficient one with no survivors.

Oh, Chaim G. I forgot that any criticism of Holocaustism is automatically intentionally misunderstood as pro-genocide or Holocuast denial. Very manipulative.

This is eaxctly what I am talking about, Chaim G.

Maybe then you’d still have your cherished old 50’s era USA-style Judaism in its pristine un-transmogrified incarnation?

If there was no Holocuast, there is no end to the benefits we would enjoy as a people.

Why, do you suppose, were the ex-Bundists able to transmit this message to you but not to so many of their own children? Why don’t we see more “in-your-face” Yiddish speaking anti-assimilationist cultural Jews?

For a short while on occasion. Their otherwise constant internecine warfare has only abetted the survival of the State of Israel.

then:

When the complete possibilities of assimilation were presented to me,

and from comment 4 : “Doesn’t a secular Jew typically believe that being indistinguishable from the non-Jews is the solution to anti-Semitism?”

I think it’s more than a (final) solution to anti-semitism. I think the fork in the road breaks as follows: Whom are you spiting? Who do you blame the Holocaust on? If the Nazis/Goyim are to blame then as their agenda was to erase me I will be as Jewish as I can be. If G-d (chas v’shalom) is to blame then as His agenda was to elect and choose me from among all nations me I will be as indistinguishable and unchosen from those nations as I can be.

I’m not 100% sure of what your saying but it strikes the ear as viscious and ugly. It’s hard to understand what youd’ve preferred, no Holocaust or a more efficient one with no survivors. Maybe then you’d still have your cherished old 50’s era USA-style Judaism in its pristine un-transmogrified incarnation?

http://www.ou.org/index.php/jewish_action/article/41103/

It’s a shame that Ron was not interviewed for it. Spot on Money quote:

“The overwhelming sense that I get from learning with 2Gs is that their parents were generally silent about their experiences. Once they conducted their own Holocaust research and realized the enormity of the murder rate and how miniscule the chance of survival was, they felt a sense of mission, as if to say: ‘If my parents survived and they were incapable of regaining their frumkeit, I’ll be darned if I’m not going to.’ It brings them to a tremendous sense of purpose.”