Restaurant's Facebook post shows Holocaust education needed more than ever
I don't have a Facebook or Twitter account, and as the stupidity, ignorance and completely insulting and hurtful comments continue to pile up on those and other social media outlets, I'm glad I don't.
One of the latest instances of ignorance showing up on Facebook occurred earlier in July during the recent heat wave, when the Atlantic Sports Bar and Restaurant in Tiverton, R.I., did what so many non-Jewish people seem to feel empowered to do these days: use the Holocaust for an alleged "joke" and-or political talking point.
In this case, the "joke" was not only tasteless, but was indicative of the lack of compassion by the person or persons who posted it.
It featured a photo of Anne Frank --- the same Anne Frank whose diary of her hiding from the Nazis in an Amsterdam apartment inspired millions over the years. Frank was 15 when, after being captured by the Nazis, was killed in a Nazi concentration camp --- one of 6 million Jews and 11 million-plus people in total who were massacred by the Germans at their concentration camps during World War II.
But that didn't stop this restaurant from, in its haste to complain about the heat, showing utter stupidity and callousness by using a black-and-white portrait of Frank as it posted this sentiment: "It's hotter than an oven out there ... And I should know!"
Now, not only was that item devoid of any merit, but it defied taste --- something that thanks to the Wild West nature of Facebook and Twitter, is in extremely short supply around the country and the world.
Predictably, according to an account in a July 28 story in The Boston Globe, the post went viral, with a lot of people using Yelp, the review platform, to lambaste the restaurant.
Naturally, as is the way these things usually go these days when a business or person is caught posting something that is off the charts in the offensive category, the restaurant initially shrugged off or dismissed the complaints about the post before eventually apologizing for the post, and then removing it, along with its entire Facebook account days later, according to the Globe.
This latest incident of people trivializing the Holocaust --- one of the worst examples of humankind's inhumanity to each other --- is one more reason why not only students, but adults, too, need Holocaust education.
I've written countless articles over the years on that need, and many of those articles have been about one of the most powerful tools used to educate students and the public about the Holocaust: the Holocaust Stamps Project at the Foxboro Regional Charter School.
That project proved that Holocaust education works. Undertaken at the school, the project was started by now-retired elementary school teacher Charlotte Sheer to teach her students about the Holocaust, and the effort inspired more than 11 million stamps being collected from 2009 to 2017. That number represented the total number of Holocaust victims: 6 million Jewish people and 5 million of other ethnic, religion and racial backgrounds.
The stamps have since found a permanent home at the American Philatelic Society’s center in Bellefonte, Pa.
They offer hope that there will come a day when --- 77 years after the death camps were liberated by the Allied troops in the waning days of World War II --- people living in a time when white supremacists and neo-Nazis are making a frightening comeback will understand the inhumanity of the Holocaust.
Several of my articles can be found on this blog, and I'd encourage you to read or re-read them --- especially if you're among those who think that this latest post on Anne Frank was no big deal.
To the contrary, that post showed that the need for Holocaust education is more urgent than ever.
One of the latest instances of ignorance showing up on Facebook occurred earlier in July during the recent heat wave, when the Atlantic Sports Bar and Restaurant in Tiverton, R.I., did what so many non-Jewish people seem to feel empowered to do these days: use the Holocaust for an alleged "joke" and-or political talking point.
In this case, the "joke" was not only tasteless, but was indicative of the lack of compassion by the person or persons who posted it.
It featured a photo of Anne Frank --- the same Anne Frank whose diary of her hiding from the Nazis in an Amsterdam apartment inspired millions over the years. Frank was 15 when, after being captured by the Nazis, was killed in a Nazi concentration camp --- one of 6 million Jews and 11 million-plus people in total who were massacred by the Germans at their concentration camps during World War II.
But that didn't stop this restaurant from, in its haste to complain about the heat, showing utter stupidity and callousness by using a black-and-white portrait of Frank as it posted this sentiment: "It's hotter than an oven out there ... And I should know!"
Now, not only was that item devoid of any merit, but it defied taste --- something that thanks to the Wild West nature of Facebook and Twitter, is in extremely short supply around the country and the world.
Predictably, according to an account in a July 28 story in The Boston Globe, the post went viral, with a lot of people using Yelp, the review platform, to lambaste the restaurant.
Naturally, as is the way these things usually go these days when a business or person is caught posting something that is off the charts in the offensive category, the restaurant initially shrugged off or dismissed the complaints about the post before eventually apologizing for the post, and then removing it, along with its entire Facebook account days later, according to the Globe.
This latest incident of people trivializing the Holocaust --- one of the worst examples of humankind's inhumanity to each other --- is one more reason why not only students, but adults, too, need Holocaust education.
I've written countless articles over the years on that need, and many of those articles have been about one of the most powerful tools used to educate students and the public about the Holocaust: the Holocaust Stamps Project at the Foxboro Regional Charter School.
That project proved that Holocaust education works. Undertaken at the school, the project was started by now-retired elementary school teacher Charlotte Sheer to teach her students about the Holocaust, and the effort inspired more than 11 million stamps being collected from 2009 to 2017. That number represented the total number of Holocaust victims: 6 million Jewish people and 5 million of other ethnic, religion and racial backgrounds.
The stamps have since found a permanent home at the American Philatelic Society’s center in Bellefonte, Pa.
They offer hope that there will come a day when --- 77 years after the death camps were liberated by the Allied troops in the waning days of World War II --- people living in a time when white supremacists and neo-Nazis are making a frightening comeback will understand the inhumanity of the Holocaust.
Several of my articles can be found on this blog, and I'd encourage you to read or re-read them --- especially if you're among those who think that this latest post on Anne Frank was no big deal.
To the contrary, that post showed that the need for Holocaust education is more urgent than ever.
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