Word: holocaustal
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Later, as Israel's policies became more controversial, the Holocaust was left as "virtually the only common denominator of American Jewish identity in the late 20th century." It was dragooned in support of such Jewish preoccupations as the (bogus, claims Novick) "new anti-Semitism" of the 1970s and the real (but bloodless) threat of intermarriage. Its appeal to Americans at large grew as the nation's post-Vietnam mood turned dystopian and identity politics put a premium on victimhood. The best example of the resulting crossover appeal was the influential nbc mini-series Holocaust in 1978, intensively promoted by Jewish...
Novick criticizes the bloating and misuse of the Holocaust in the 1980s and is scathing on what he calls "deeply offensive" claims of Holocaust uniqueness. He agrees with author Leon Wieseltier that survivors have become "the Jewish equivalent of saints and relics," and suspects that the growing cadre of "Holocaust professionals" assures that such trends will not reverse anytime soon...
Attending Schindler's List, Novick writes that he wept along with everyone else, but wondered "why the eliciting of these responses from Americans is seen as so urgently important a task." The remark betrays a certain tone-deafness. The Holocaust's memory, in this country far from the death camps, may be inflated and abused. But it seems perverse to argue on that basis that it is unworthy of American tears. This book should be read as a corrective to dutiful hype and dubious comparisons, not as an injunction against feeling...
...Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay showed where people can go on the planet if they have the wit and endurance. Their journeys were inward too, as all heroic endeavors are, but few in the century were more so than those undertaken by Anne Frank in her diary of the Holocaust, or Bill Wilson, who pioneered the 12-step approach to self-help that has transformed millions of lives...
...Muhammad Ali, heavyweight boxing champion --The American G.I., a soldier for freedom --Diana, Princess of Wales --Anne Frank, diarist and Holocaust victim --Billy Graham, evangelist --Che Guevara, guerrilla leader --Edmund Hillary & Tenzing Norgay, conquerors of Mount Everest --Helen Keller, champion of the disabled --The Kennedys, dynasty --Bruce Lee, actor and martial-arts star --Charles Lindbergh, transatlantic aviator --Harvey Milk, gay-rights leader --Marilyn Monroe, actress --Emmeline Pankhurst, suffragist --Rosa Parks, civil rights torchbearer --Pele, soccer star --Jackie Robinson, baseball player --Andrei Sakharov, Soviet dissident --Mother Teresa, missionary nun --Bill Wilson, founder of Alcoholics Anonymous