Posted by SLS on January 24, 2013, at 13:45:32
In reply to Re: Funny, but civil? How are you? I'm okay., posted by Meatwood_Flack on January 24, 2013, at 11:36:47
> I agree that it's difficult to fault someone for the teachings (whether conscious or not) of their parents. I began distancing myself from some of the less savory aspects of what I was learning about beliefs and behaviors from my parents as a teenager (the psychological developmental term is individuation, which is a fancy word for rebellion, where the child begins to seek their own identity), but I know there are still tendencies that I still carry that I learned from them. I'm not sure that expecting someone to move past the more destructive lessons is unreasonable. After all, we now have a black President, roughly 148 years years after the end of the Civil War so, clearly, negative attitudes passed through generations have slowly changed. As for Mel, I know he has a strong background and continuing attachment with Catholicism. What's interesting about Christianity's relationship to Judaism is believers seem to fall into one of two distinctly different camps. Either Jews are the chosen people of God, or Jews are responsible for the death of Jesus. Because I am agnostic (and more importantly, human), Jews are just people to me. Yes, 6 million of them died in concentration camps under the direction of Hitler. Yes, they have been a target of persecution for ages. But many have also managed to achieve great success, as well. By the same token, 20 million Russians died under Stalin in World War II. Untold millions of indigenous peoples died under the onslaught of our conquest of America and there's no official tally of innocent dead in the Middle East, either as a direct result of our military involement or, simply, as a result of our policies there. These are all tragedies. Another interesting point about Catholicism: The Vatican assisted a number of ranking members of the Nazi Party in escaping Germany (and capture) at the end of World War II. Human history is littered with ugliness, so I guess the part of me that groaned when I heard about Mel's drunken anti-Semitic remarks during his arrest a few years back is the idealistic part, that wishes we could all get along. But, as you say, nurture can be tough to overcome, and Mel doesn't strike me as the introspective, enlightened type. He's just an entertainer. And, yes, the sarcasm shone through.
As far as Mel Gibson is concerned, he learned his antisemitic tendencies from his father, Hutton Gibson, who is an avowed antisemite who has authored material claiming that the Holocaust never happened, etc. Alcohol sometimes makes for a good "truth-serum" as it relaxes one's inhibitions (disinhibition). Old messages are hard to extinguish.
- Scott
Some see things as they are and ask why.
I dream of things that never were and ask why not.- George Bernard Shaw
poster:SLS
thread:1036366
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/poli/20120327/msgs/1036366.html