Top Police Officer Requests Official List of All Jews in Ukrainian City, Sparking Fury

[Jason]

https://www.haaretz.com/world-news/europe/police-officer-requests-official-list-of-all-jews-in-ukrainian-city-sparking-fury-1.8837491

[Kal-El814]

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

Make no mistake about it: Eastern Europe is still very much an epicenter of anti-Semitism.

[skillzdadirecta]

Damn I thought this was 2020, not 1920...

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

Just now, skillzdadirecta said:

Damn I thought this was 2020, not 1920...

Not in large swathes of Central and Eastern Europe.

[skillzdadirecta]

Just now, Emperor Diocletian II said:

Not in large swathes of Central and Eastern Europe.

I remember when I was in Germany for a film festival and a local German of Black descent (I didn't even know they existed until then) warned me that there were certain parts of Germany I couldn't go to because they would "slit my thoat" for being black and also for being an American. That always stuck with me. We got into the habit of telling people we were from Canada 🇨🇦 

 

[CayceG]

Reading the headline, I decided to play a little game with myself and try to guess the city. My top guess was L'viv, with it being a strong center of Ukrainian Nationalism. And with Ukrainian Nationalism comes anti-Semitism. 

 

Now, I was not surprised to learn it was Kolomyya. Not because I know the place, but because of where it is. This is true heartland of the Ukrainian Nationalist movement territory. So I figured it'd be in the west. 

I didn't go for anywhere in the central or east of Ukraine because... well... They really haven't given thought to Jews since around 1941...

[Zaku3]

2 minutes ago, skillzdadirecta said:

I remember when I was in Germany for a film festival and a local German of Black descent (I didn't even know they existed until then) warned me that there were certain parts of Germany I couldn't go to because they would "slit my thoat" for being black and also for being an American. That always stuck with me. We got into the habit of telling people we were from Canada 🇨🇦 

 

You never saw the backlash against the black German soldiers in BF1? They existed but probably not in the European theater. There was also backlash about the black/Indian troops in 1917. 

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

5 minutes ago, skillzdadirecta said:

I remember when I was in Germany for a film festival and a local German of Black descent (I didn't even know they existed until then) warned me that there were certain parts of Germany I couldn't go to because they would "slit my thoat" for being black and also for being an American. That always stuck with me. We got into the habit of telling people we were from Canada 🇨🇦 

 

Those parts of Germany are all probably in what was formerly the German Democratic Republic (East Germany).

 

Those are areas where the neo-fascist Alternative for Deutschland party has its strongest support.

[skillzdadirecta]

8 minutes ago, Emperor Diocletian II said:

Those parts of Germany are all probably in what was formerly the German Democratic Republic (East Germany).

 

Those are areas where the neo-fascist Alternative for Deutschland party has its strongest support.

Yeah it was the "other side of the wall" I believe. 

[Jason]

29 minutes ago, skillzdadirecta said:

I remember when I was in Germany for a film festival and a local German of Black descent (I didn't even know they existed until then) warned me that there were certain parts of Germany I couldn't go to because they would "slit my thoat" for being black and also for being an American. That always stuck with me. We got into the habit of telling people we were from Canada 🇨🇦 

 

 

I can believe the racism but I'm a little dubious about the American bit. I was there at the tail end of the W administration and it seemed like people would give you the benefit of the doubt on being an American until you gave them a reason not to. 

[skillzdadirecta]

18 minutes ago, Jason said:

 

I can believe the racism but I'm a little dubious about the American bit. I was there at the tail end of the W administration and it seemed like people would give you the benefit of the doubt on being an American until you gave them a reason not to. 

YMMV? We were told at the time there was anti american sentiment by one of my classmate's sister who was actually living there to tell everyone who asked that we were from Canada and not the U.S. and this was BEFORE the Iraq war. The sentiment was confirmed when we befriended the local that I mentioned and those were his EXACT words to me over beers. Maybe your experience was different... I don't doubt that it was, but mine was what it was 

[Jason]

2 minutes ago, skillzdadirecta said:

YMMV? We were told at the time there was anti american sentiment by one of my classmate's sister who was actually living there to tell everyone who asked that we were from Canada and not the U.S. and this was BEFORE the Iraq war. The sentiment was confirmed when we befriended the local that I mentioned and those were his EXACT words to me over beers. Maybe your experience was different... I don't doubt that it was, but mine was what it was 

 

Where in Germany were you/what parts were you being warned about?

[skillzdadirecta]

Just now, Jason said:

 

Where in Germany were you/what parts were you being warned about?

I was in Saarbrucken for the festival and he warned me about East Germany which is what he was specifically talking about.  The whole Canadian thing was more of a general statement and we were told to say we were from Canada in order to avoid a bunch of debates. 

[Jason]

1 minute ago, skillzdadirecta said:

I was in Saarbrucken for the festival and he warned me about East Germany which is what he was specifically talking about.  The whole Canadian thing was more of a general statement and we were told to say we were from Canada in order to avoid a bunch of debates. 

 

I guess East Germany makes more sense. And I was primarily in Heidelberg, and unlike in Japan I think having the big US military base there actually makes them like Americans more than average for the country. But I've had similar experiences not hiding that I'm an American in other places in Europe too.

 

As for debates, that makes more sense, the last time I was in Europe was in summer of  2017 and it was definitely a nonstop stream of people wanting to ask me what the fuck was wrong with us for electing Trump. But I never felt judged personally for being an American on account of Trump, and felt like I was always being given the benefit of the doubt that I wasn't one of the lunatics who voted for him.

[thewhyteboar]

3 minutes ago, Jason said:

 

I guess East Germany makes more sense. And I was primarily in Heidelberg, and unlike in Japan I think having the big US military base there actually makes them like Americans more than average for the country. But I've had similar experiences not hiding that I'm an American in other places in Europe too.

 

As for debates, that makes more sense, the last time I was in Europe was in summer of  2017 and it was definitely a nonstop stream of people wanting to ask me what the fuck was wrong with us for electing Trump. But I never felt judged personally for being an American on account of Trump, and felt like I was always being given the benefit of the doubt that I wasn't one of the lunatics who voted for him.

Leavenworth, Washington is a little tourist town designed to look Bavarian. There's a good burger restaurant there called Heidelburger. That's the extent of my knowledge of Germany. 

[CayceG]

I will say, AT LEAST it "sparked fury."

[Commissar SFLUFAN]

26 minutes ago, CayceG said:

I will say, AT LEAST it "sparked fury."

 

It "sparked fury" among Ukrainian JEWISH groups, not among the Ukrainian gentile population.

[CayceG]

Oh...

 

 

 

 

[Jason]

3 minutes ago, Emperor Diocletian II said:

It "sparked fury" among Ukrainian JEWISH groups, not among the Ukrainian gentile population.

 

Clearly it was just a masterful ruse to get Ukrainian Jews to put themselves on the list.

[Nokra]

For what it's worth (probably not much), I lived in Germany for the last almost 9 years (early 2011 to late 2019), plus a semester back in college (2007) and never experienced any anti-American sentiment from Germans at all. If anything, after 2016 they were by and large very sympathetic to our plight.   To be fair though, I was in a college town in the southwest (Freiburg) which is known as a pretty liberal place in an already liberal country. I also never really went to eastern Germany except for Berlin (big liberal city), Munich (the most Americanized place in Germany), and Nuremberg (just passing through on my way further east).  

 

The only time I've really gotten flak for being an American in the roughly 30 countries I've been in was from a Pakistani diplomat who was in my German course in Berlin in 2011, and he wasn't really being unfair; he was pushing back on my ignorant views at the time. I don't even remember what he criticized me about, but I think I was probably defending some Republican policy because I was an ignorant kid away from home for basically the first time; I deserved it.  

[ThreePi]

6 hours ago, skillzdadirecta said:

I remember when I was in Germany for a film festival and a local German of Black descent (I didn't even know they existed until then) warned me that there were certain parts of Germany I couldn't go to because they would "slit my thoat" for being black and also for being an American. That always stuck with me. We got into the habit of telling people we were from Canada 🇨🇦 

 

My brother went to Germany/Poland/Amsterdam for his honeymoon a couple years ago and he was surprised at how much casual racism was prevalent, especially at soccer games. 

[Jason]

9 hours ago, ThreePi said:

My brother went to Germany/Poland/Amsterdam for his honeymoon a couple years ago and he was surprised at how much casual racism was prevalent, especially at soccer games. 

 

I stayed with a host family the first time I went to Germany. It was kind of uncomfortable when the host father made a big deal about how his family hid Jews doing the war and what-not. It was even more uncomfortable later on when I very lightly suggested to the host mother that Turkey is more European than not (this was back in 2008) and she got REALLY pissed off at the suggestion.

 

Spoiler

Also, I was home alone one time and looking at their bookshelves and they had Dianetik on the shelf. I decided not to ask.

 

[Commodore D]

21 hours ago, skillzdadirecta said:

I remember when I was in Germany for a film festival and a local German of Black descent (I didn't even know they existed until then) warned me that there were certain parts of Germany I couldn't go to because they would "slit my thoat" for being black and also for being an American. That always stuck with me. We got into the habit of telling people we were from Canada 🇨🇦 

 

First time I was ever turned away from an establishment outwardly because of my race was in Düsseldorf. Happened twice in the same night. Funniest part is a black girl working the door told me why at the second place.

 

Based on the conversation on the plane ride over with a black service man, I can’t say I blame them. 
 

The red light district was welcoming though.