From: Paul Foster <pfoster@gdi.net>
>We have traded enough jokes over the years that I think you know I am
>not anti-Semitic.
There's another example of a misused term. Semitic does not equal Jewish.
You can be Jewish and not be Semitic. You can be Semitic and not be Jewish.
There are lots of folks in my neighborhood who are Semitic. They are not
Jewish. They are Lebanese Christians. My new son-in-law is German, Polish,
and Lebanese. He likes to buy flatbread at the local Mexican-Lebanese
market.
So are Arabs supposed to be upset if someone calls them "anti-Semitic"? The
whole thing is semantic.
>Some of my best friends are Drewish. ;-)
Yeah, I saw that movie, too. That's why my parts Syncro is called "The
Schwartz".
>If we called them Safety WASPS,
>Safety Yankee Doodle Dandys, or Safety
>Blondies then perhaps I could see the point since this would obviously
>be an attempt to demean or degrade _my_ race. But by calling them
>members of an organization that doesn't even exist anymore,
Well, it unfortunately DOES live on in the hearts of some hateful,
misguided, and often dangerous people.
The point is that people using that small-"n" nazi term that is so common
are NOT calling them members of the National Socialist Party. They are
referring to a perceived characteristic of the German bureaucracy of the
time which is separate from the hate and the racism and the militaristic
nationalism which also characterized the party.
>I don't see
>how this could upset a group that was outrageously violated in the past
>by the same group. I would think they would like the idea that the term
>is still used in a pejorative manner as a means of remembering the past
>atrocities.
>
>As an example, if we used the term "Safety Fascist" or "Safety Commie"
>would we be upsetting the liberals or the conservatives amongst us? What
>if we called them "Safety Iraqis"? Would this be demeaning to the
>Israelis who were the victims of Scud missile attacks???
The problem is that this is a lot bigger than Team.net or autocrossing or
even motorsports. The term is used with the small "n" throughout society to
denote people who are overly officious. It stems not from the evil of an
organization which murdered 12 million non-combatants (that's right, 6
million of them were not Jews), but from the rigid, top-down management
style for which the real Nazis are also remembered and which style is often
parodied by humorists of all stripes.
Since this use of the small-"n" nazi is so pervasive in society, I don't
know that we can kill it. I have been of the opinion that we need not try
to kill this usage, as anyone who didn't know the difference between the
small-"n" nazi and the real National Socialist Party had been living in a
cave somewhere. Maybe my opinion is changing from this discussion.
Well, Don Stremski (my new son-in-law) doesn't use the word "nazi". He
calls every officious person who annoys him a "fascist". Hell, he calls
manufacturers of equipment which annoys him "fascists". Are we still going
to get in trouble with "safety fascist"? I'm just as comfortable being
called that. Either way, I am not about to confuse it with the heart of
evil that threatened the world a half-century ago.
But I am beginning to see the point of those who apparently think that there
are people who DON'T know the difference.
So I hope to make peace with anyone I have offended by defending the term
"safety nazi" I can assure you it was not meant to offend Jews, Semites,
Austrians, Germans, Gypsies, Poles, Bohemians, French, gays, or the
physically handicapped. And it was emphatically not meant to defend Nazis
and their hateful politics, then or now.
Phil Ethier Saint Paul Minnesota USA
Lotus Europa, VW Quantum Syncro, Chev Suburban
LOON, TCVWC, MAC
pethier@isd.net http://www.visi.com/mac/
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