Dear Blog-Readers,
Summer Greetings. This is a copy of a Letter to The Editor I sent today to The New York Times. They have published every LTTE I’ve sent them across the years. I hope this one might also find its way onto their pages. With hope, – BLC
The AOC/Omar “Concentration Camp” Error
C.M. Blow Missed A Point Rapper “Ice Cube” Got Clearly
This is in reply to C.M. Blow’s 6/23/19 OpEd supporting Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez’s use of the phrase, “Concentration Camps” to describe American law-enforcement’s containment and processing efforts on illegal-immigration on the American southern border.
A year or so ago, a well-known Caucasian entertainer made the mistake of using the “N-Word” in his act. The torrent of outrage in response was massive; and then, on a late night talk show, rapper Ice Cube showed himself a statesman. He spoke to the offender in direct-address, and said on the air, “Look – you made a mistake: I forgive you; but, you can’t have that word back. That’s our word now. The history of that word denies you (White) people the right to it anymore.” His point was made – gently, and with profound effectiveness.
The history of the phrases, “Concentration Camp” and “Never Again” deny other groups than the Jewish people the moral right to re-task them for their causes. A “Concentration Camp” was a place where Jews were concentrated into one geographic location to make them easier to mass-exterminate by systematically working and starving them to death, and the remainder fed with maximum efficiency into the mass-murder factories gassing them to death and then burning them out of existence.
Hon. Representative Ocasio-Cortez – you made a mistake.We forgive you.But, you can’t have that phrase. That’s our phrase – now and forever.
No one else has the moral right to re-task “concentration camp” unless – God forbid – they are referring to an institution practicing the same kind of intentionally sadistic and murderous behaviors with genocidal goals. Clearly …
… trying however inefficiently to manage the mass-influx of illegal aliens across our southern border is in no way morally parallel to corralling a specific human community for maximally efficient mass-extermination.
Jews – some sixteen million in a world of six billion people, or 0.026 percent of the world’s population – are still the one nation-group ongoingly targeted by much larger constituencies for total annihilation. Jews are, at present, the by-percentage top targets for hate crimes in the entire world; and the climate is worsening in the same manner it did before the Nazi rise to power in Germany less than one lifetime ago. “Concentration Camps” were a tool in the historically most recent, most impactful effort toward the absolute erasure of Jewish people from existence.
Congresswomen Ocasio-Cortez and Omar, and New York Times – please: never again?
With hope,
Bruce L. Cohen
Author • Musician • Director • Clergy