The Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur, and my observance of the dignified, reflective nature of the observance, inspired the writing of this diary. Since I went to services last night, this is a diary in the true sense of the word; designed to record thoughts as they occur.
The temple I went to had approximately 1000 people worshiping, in first shift services, and another thousand were due for second shift. The people came and went peacefully, in a civil and orderly manner. The Rabbi gave a cerebral "sermon" on the hazards of atheism as popularized in recent best-sellers. I am sure that not everyone agreed with the sermon, but the discussion about it was civilized and respectful.
When one opens the news, it is rife with displays of "playing the victim card", where the "victims" are more or less helpless before greater forces. More often than not, their response involves varying degrees of dysfunctionality and even violence.
A short list of recent "victim card" events are:
1)Katrina;
- The "fate" of "First Nations" in Canada (link); and
3)The "fate" of the "Palestinians".
The list,and the beat, goes on. The common thread in all of this is that the "victims" are doing little to alleviate their own fate. In New Orleans, the people are sitting by waiting for a bailout that likely will not come (for reasons involving the fact that most of the money would be dissipated in municipal corruption). The schools remain violent places. Why it is that the parents of these students make little effort to foster values at home conducive to study or achievement is beyond me.
In Canada, the First Nations largely inhabit fetid "reserves" which are rife with alchoholism, drug abuse, teen pregnancy, etc. Well intentioned people who have gone to provide educational service on the reserves have left in tears after being subjected to violent attacks. Now, the "First Nations" are dredging up ancient "land claims" in order to make development in parts of Ontario impossible. They are threatening in the process to upend settled property rights and all further development.
The "Palestinians" could be absolrbed by other Arabs the same way Israel, at the time a new and destitute country, absorbed hundreds of thousands of Jews expelled from Arab cities arfter centuries of inhabitation. Instead, they are left to fester in refugee camps and in Gaza, listening to perorations of "jihad" by demagogues who stay safe and sound behind, while hormone-fueled 17 year olds are urged to blow themselves up in order to kill Israelis.
This is morally bankruptcy and disgusting.
Which brings us back to the Jewish congregation and Yom Kippur worship. The Jews would make the perfect victims. Not only the Holocaust, but centuries of legal discrimination and pogroms have been waged against them. Even during the "golden" Moorish era the Jews faced grinding discrimination under dhimmitude. In Christian Europe, they faced death at worst and discrimination at best. Only the opening of the New World provided relief. If they were stuck in Europe, they'd be dead, and I wouldn't be composing this diary.
Why don't the Jews play the victim card? Where are the UN resolutions, and the hectoring press that calls Bush to task for Katrina and the Palestinians?