Simon Wiesenthal

The friendliest place on the web for anyone that follows U2.
If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.

MrsSpringsteen

Blue Crack Addict
Joined
Nov 30, 2002
Messages
29,245
Location
Edge's beanie closet
LOS ANGELES (CNN) -- Simon Wiesenthal, the Holocaust survivor who helped track down Nazi war criminals following World War II and spent the later decades of his life fighting anti-Semitism and prejudice, has died aged 96.

http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/09/20/obit.wiesenthal/index.html

In his book "Justice, Not Vengeance," Wiesenthal wrote: "Survival is a privilege which entails obligations. I am forever asking myself what I can do for those who have not survived.

"The answer I have found for myself (and which need not necessarily be the answer for every survivor) is: I want to be their mouthpiece, I want to keep their memory alive, to make sure the dead live on in that memory."

www.wiesenthal.com
 
Things like that always make me wonder

Okay, put another tally on my ''cold an insensitive'' mark.


But really...... what gives anyone the right to speak for a large group of other people like that? I always wonder. I understand, though, that such a life change event as the Holocaust will impact someone.

But it was his choice, and not anyone else's, to make it his life's work, what defined him. Now, don't get me wrong, I do respect him. Anyone who dedicates their life to a cause is someone I can at least respect.


I do not think it is a shame that he died though.

He was 96, and certainly seems to have lived a full life.



I don't believe there is anything you can do for those that did not survive.

But plenty you can do for all the people of the world in the modern day. The Holocaust isn't really about the Jews, in the core level. It's not about Nazi's, either. It's about the horrible depths of the dark side of the Human Heart/Mind.

I hope that we can prevent things like that in the future....
 
thanks for posting this, MrsS. :up:

he was an amazing, amazing man. one of the first people i remember being truly inspired by.

if my memory serves correctly, he was the person who tracked down the officers responsible for arresting anne frank, her family, and the other people in hiding with them.

much respect.
 
For Honor said:
I don't believe there is anything you can do for those that did not survive.

But plenty you can do for all the people of the world in the modern day. The Holocaust isn't really about the Jews, in the core level. It's not about Nazi's, either. It's about the horrible depths of the dark side of the Human Heart/Mind.

I hope that we can prevent things like that in the future....


perhaps if you had clicked on the link to the wiesenthal centre, you'd see that the bulk of his recent work was dedicated to fighting racism and anti-Semitism throughout the world.
 
Simon Wiesenthal was truly superhero!

His work made sure people were held accountable for their actions.

What he did for those that didn't survive the Holocaust was to make sure the rest of the world remembered and realised how easy it could have happened to anyone anywhere.

I hope he rests in peace.



:(
 
dandy said:


um, he is a holocaust survivor himself, perhaps?

:|

I'm choosing not to say anything in response to that, but I was going to...................................................


:|
 
dandy said:



perhaps if you had clicked on the link to the wiesenthal centre, you'd see that the bulk of his recent work was dedicated to fighting racism and anti-Semitism throughout the world.


Again, I won't say anything in response.........
 
Yes, we have the Simon Wiesenthal Centre. He was a great person. A thing not so many might know is he was openly battling against the right-wing party of Haider in Austria.

Rest in Peace.
 
Last edited:
Tania said:
Simon Wiesenthal was truly superhero!

His work made sure people were held accountable for their actions.

What he did for those that didn't survive the Holocaust was to make sure the rest of the world remembered and realised how easy it could have happened to anyone anywhere.

I hope he rests in peace.



:(

Yes, he was a remarkable man indeed though I hope, for his own sake, he didn't live his life consumed by hatred. I've often wondered that about him. :(
 
People consumed by hatred aren't generally capable of achievements on a par with Wiesenthal's.

As a child of Holocaust survivors, I understand the consternation many feel towards those who devote so much time to preserving the past, when there is such suffering in the present. (This is why bleak jokes like "Remember the Holocaust and keep it holy" are common among Jews of my generation.) I agree absolutely that the most important lesson of suffering is to try to prevent it from happening to others. But that work only begins (and endures) by remembering how and why you arrived at this conviction--what it is in you that makes you feel connected to whichever cause, and where the sense of purpose driving your efforts comes from. And no matter who you are, the answer to that lies in experiences you had and the way they made you think and feel...NOT in abstract platitudes about good and evil, hearts and minds, or whatever. Those may be powerful words, but only as shorthands. Your life has to supply the meaning, or else there won't be any.

Also, there is a paradox to suffering where the more extreme and extraordinary in nature it is, the harder it becomes to adequately and accurately express it through words. This is where voices like Wiesenthal's, Elie Wiesel, Toni Morrison, Richard Wright or whoever else comes to mind for you are so important...they are able to elucidate particular sufferings in a way that is healing for those who have experienced it, and illuminating for those who have not. Once you can name those feelings, it is easier to recognize kindred ones in others and to feel connected to their fate.
 
He lived his life with passion and conviction, and for that, I salute him. Wonderful work was done by his centre. :up:
 
A true hero of social justice in the 20th century has just passed from our midst -

we should reverence his presence amongst us and live up to the challenge he leaves us.

That one person can MAKE A DIFFERENCE FOR GOOD in our world.

Thank you, Mr. Wiesenthal. I won't soon forget you. :wink:
 
A_Wanderer said:
Seeking justice over revenge is certainly virtuous.

Yes, and that is what he did.

I also give him big, big props for staying in Vienna.

The city and the people here did NOT always treat him good. This is the Viennese mentality you will not hear of in the multicoloured Mozart-brochures we are printing for tourism.

In the 60s, life in Austria was different. We saw ourselves like victims of the Nazis, when there were many people who had thought that Hitler was fantastic. Some who worked in concentration camps. Who sent the trains away. Sure, there was resistance too. When we got our freedom in the year 1955, ten years after the war had ended, there were ex-Nazis hiding in South America.

So, one could say up until the 80s, the "official" Austria had a lot of run-ins with Wiesenthal. This even led to a juridicial quarrel with our (70s) chancellor Kreisky, who had appointed a politician called Peter for his cabinet, who was an ex-Nazi.

Just in the late 80s, Austria was mature enough to recognize that in our own rows there were not only victims, but also people who helped the Nazi regime.

Without Wiesenthal, there wouldn´t have been some of the Nuremberg trials, like the one against Eichmann.

Wiesenthal´s wife, however, always wanted to return to Israel. But he always wanted to stay, saying that he couldn´t continue with his work if he moved there. In a way, he was right. I liked to have him right here. To be our conscience.

That´s not to say he was a perfect saint. There have been articles about the finances of "his" NGO etc.

However, he played such an important role. There are those "little" things people will not mention in their newspaper articles.. like when he pressed and pressed and pressed the Viennese politicians to put a statue on Judenplatz (Jew´s Place) in our central business district. It was designed by Josef Hrdlicka (another guy who conservative Austrians don´t like, because he is critical of politics and can be very provocative).

I think the art scene here admired him a lot. We have some good people here, who don´t give a fuck. I will always remember Hubsi Kramer, one of our actors: when the conservatives here made a coaltion with Haider (the right-wing politician who said that sending people to concentration camps was a "proper employment policy"), Hubsi came up to the yearly "Opera Ball" in Vienna (where all the rich elite, national, international, meets once a year to dance waltz and make business deals) - in a limousine, dressed in a Hitler uniform, complete with Svastika and all, and walked right in (it took the police half an hour to realize what was going on and get him out).
 
Last edited:
yolland said:
People consumed by hatred aren't generally capable of achievements on a par with Wiesenthal's.

As a child of Holocaust survivors, I understand the consternation many feel towards those who devote so much time to preserving the past, when there is such suffering in the present. (This is why bleak jokes like "Remember the Holocaust and keep it holy" are common among Jews of my generation.) I agree absolutely that the most important lesson of suffering is to try to prevent it from happening to others. But that work only begins (and endures) by remembering how and why you arrived at this conviction--what it is in you that makes you feel connected to whichever cause, and where the sense of purpose driving your efforts comes from. And no matter who you are, the answer to that lies in experiences you had and the way they made you think and feel...NOT in abstract platitudes about good and evil, hearts and minds, or whatever. Those may be powerful words, but only as shorthands. Your life has to supply the meaning, or else there won't be any.

Also, there is a paradox to suffering where the more extreme and extraordinary in nature it is, the harder it becomes to adequately and accurately express it through words. This is where voices like Wiesenthal's, Elie Wiesel, Toni Morrison, Richard Wright or whoever else comes to mind for you are so important...they are able to elucidate particular sufferings in a way that is healing for those who have experienced it, and illuminating for those who have not. Once you can name those feelings, it is easier to recognize kindred ones in others and to feel connected to their fate.

That is an amazing post, thank you. I'd say you must have a definite understanding of this and of a man like him. What else can I say.. your parents must be incredible people.
 
He found a meaning in life that I could never hope to equal. Amazing he kept a sense of humor after surviving a concentration camp.

"Pride" is now ringing in my head...
 
Back
Top Bottom