#it's about the Religious Imperialism

[onomatopiya]

anotha one. this time for lamplight! 

Show Summary: A runaway, an experiment, a prophet. Divine soldiers chosen by cruel, hungry gods find themselves at odds while serving in a world-splitting war.

Episode 1 - Behemoth: Arthur attends his going-away party, and Halcyon cuts through a ritual. Meanwhile, away from Celeons, Valiance signs her papers.

Episode 2- Open Wounds: Valiance goes under, but someone else wakes up on the table. Arthur adjusts to his circumstances and sends a message to his father.

Episode 3 - Birds: Haunted by prophetic visions, Halcyon seeks his mother's advice, and Astor makes a terrible mistake. Teresa keeps an eye on things.

Episode 4 - Well-Fed Beasts: Arthur's secret is bled out of him as his city watches, and Astor learns the truth about Halcyon's life before the church.

Episode 5 - Serpent Tongue: Valiance and Dove slip up before their research team, and Arthur's god offers him an escape. Halcyon is sent on a holy mission.

Playing Episode Transcript: You’ve got blood on your face, little bird.

[thorough-witness-enjoyer]

anon because im on the wrong blog rn but i wanted to say i really enjoyed your witness analysis post. i havent really seen many comparisons about the colonisation aspect of what the witness does (though to be fair, im not really in touch with fandom). so it was nice to these themes touched on especially so eloquently !

Greetings anon!!!

Thank you so much for the kind message!! I deeply appreciate your words as the Witness is a character that is extremely close to me, quite literally being one of my favorite characters in media ever and someone who revolves in my head like a rotisserie chicken 24/7!!!

I truly believe that if you don’t see the content you desire in the world, you should go out and make it, so when I didn’t see mountains of the most bitter vitriol towards the Witness, I knew I had a job to do!

I’ve been left to pick up the pieces of the Witness’ long legacy of reducing my people and culture to what is “palatable and profitable”, my family has a prophecy (a destiny if you will) that I will form my own Witness in this life to enact an ideology and force that idea on me, I was once a precursor who raged against a silent god by abandoning my self, I’ve met many disciples of the Witness in my life and many more victims of it. This character has been so firmly tied to my life that I just had to share my perspective with the world in an attempt to make people understand just how important the lessons we can learn from it are!! I could talk about the Witness for eons!!!

There has been a lot of Witness works ( fanfiction, memes, art work, etc.) produced and a lot of it has been absolutely phenomenal work!! They are all clearly created by people who have a deep affection for the character that clearly shows in their fantastic pieces and I truly love that, but a lot of what I saw left me feeling restless because none of it (from what I’ve seen) truly tapped into the absolute nightmarish nature of what this entity has brought down on civilizations. I really wanted to bring in another voice on this character because I couldn’t be moved so deeply by its defeat and sit still on it!!

Again, if no one is making the content you would like to see, make it! That’s actually the biggest reason why I started making posts for this blog, I wanted to help others see that there is much more to talk about when it comes to the Witness than its philosophical views on reality and it’s big eyes (as well as not keeping my trillions of thoughts in my head).

To me, characters as awful as it should always have their victims struggles voiced first and foremost and the Witness is much bigger than itself for it has forced its necrotizing fingers into the lives of everyone in the Destiny universe.

The story and focus will never be on the Witness for me, it will always be on its victims and their recovery.

I think about how I struggle to find traditional names for my heritage because everyone has a name from the beliefs of our imperialists instead of the victims they forced to be remembered as necessary casualties on a path to “civilization and salvation” and I am putting the Witness through a million glass tables.

I think about how all I know of my relatives who were born not that long ago was that they were only allowed to be “field workers and strong believers “ and here comes a massive anvil over its head.

Speaking on this matter, I am still working on a small thought dump on how Rhulk is a prime example of someone who sheds their cultural and personal ties to go from victim to perpetrator and it’s been hard!!

In all honesty, it has really taken an emotional and mental toll on me for how deep it cuts and how much of it reminds me of all that could of have been in the lives of so many if they weren’t groomed into believing that the only way to get justice for their lives (lives affected by the conditions the ideological groomers use to be opportunistic) is to take on a position where they are a subjugator, not the subjugated.

It’s very painful to write about and Rhulk as a character makes the very core of my being ache as every time I read Shattered Suns, I have to sit back and clench my fists at the invasive, predatory behavior the Witness displays towards Lubraens. Those same words it coerces Rhulk with are the same ones that resulted in hollow people in my life who were prideful in turning their backs on their cultural ways and community if it meant gaining the security and sense of righteousness the oppressors offered. The Witness preyed on Rhulk and turned him into something truly awful, something I see so often that I cannot stand by and not say anything on it.

I wish to see Rhulk content that does not focus on him just being a devoted disciple of the Witness or some super strong villain who’s cool, I really want to see more content touching on what happened to make him fall so far into the Witness’ clutches and views him as the victim he is! I want to make content that shows how REPUGNANT their relationship is and how Rhulk is an example of the need to provide preventative community and understanding to those vulnerable to ideological grooming, especially in our modern era where harmful beliefs are ever present and looking to find people to sustain them!

This is getting very long, but in essence, thank you! Thank you so much anon for your words!!

I truly believe in the importance of POC voices, especially black voices, in fandom spaces as we have been left out of a lot of discussions that have heavy implicit (and explicit) ties to race and culture when it comes to sci-fi and fantasy settings! We get strength from community and understanding, it is how we can better make fandom spaces comfortable for all!! By giving my views on the Witness and its ills, I wish to help the Destiny fandom understand some of the ties it has to real life issues and hope that it helps people be more conscious of the teachings in media they invest in!

It was so nice to see people contribute to my Witness post with their own connections or point out connections other people have made like with evangelicalism and Polish fascism. I’m very glad many people can unite on the fact that the Witness is abominable and that we can face irl Witnesses by defeating ignorance hand in hand!! My understanding and beliefs are always evolving with new information and I’m always happy to grow alongside others!

Just remember guys, make the content you want to see in life and if you are a POC, voicing your discomfort or offering your perspective on matters discussed in sci-fi and fantasy settings is essential to getting proper representation in media that is done with nuance and respect as well as help both audiences and writers craft better narratives!!!

And trust me, the Witness (especially the behaviors it displays towards Rhulk and it’s other victims) makes me deeply, deeply,

deeply

deeply

Uncomfortable.

I will never forgive the Witness for all it has done and I never want to see it pleased with its work EVER. The only redeeming I want to hear about the Witness is how it can redeem this coupon for my fist in its face, free of charge, guaranteed by me, filled with the force of all my relatives who did not live long enough to see that they could have always mattered in this world.

[randomnameless]

Genuine question, not trying to start a fight, why do you get so upset about gods and churches being presented in a negative light in fictional works?

No pbs!

I guess it's a mix of being too common, too forced and having, in general, the cast use common tropish arguments to fight /defeat them.

I rant a lot about this game, but take TS where we have three sort of factions opposing each other, and each are supposed to suck. Who is the faction who never receives any "positive traits" or "pet the dog" moment?

The game force fed us a scene where an Aesfroti soldier - when Aesfrost is depicted as a highly militarised nation with a cult of personality towards their current ruler, that invaded the protag's home and slaughtered several civilians and NPCs in the process - say goodbye to his wife and kids before going to "war" to defend his land against, well, the protags who are invading it to kill their warmongering leader.

As force-fed as this scene was, it, I believe at least, tried to tell us that even the Aesfrosti who pillaged villages and killed their inhabitants are humans, and care about their loved ones, sure it's corny, but it's all about not deshumanising any party.

When we attack Hyzante? Niet, zilch, nothing. No similar scene where random soldiers, or NPCs, worry about what is going on and if they're going to die when their wall has been breached. They just, don't exist in this context.

I think the cherry on the cake is the Golden Route scene, where, apparently, nationalists Aesfrosti decide to turn back against their ultra charismatic leader because, uh, he "lied" when he declared the war and used a false pretense, so the soldiers and people who were butchering babies and invading a city where people were preparing a marriage apparently now have morals and rebel.

There's no similar scene for Hyzante when the cast reveals that the teachings of their Goddess were made up and salt wasn't exclusively given to them by divine intervention, because rock salt exists everywhere. Sure it would be a bit weird and forced that people thinking they're chosen ones and looking down on everyone else suddenly, hm, don't break down when their entire system of belief is shattered, but hey, if the Aesfrostian Gregor can have morals after washing his hands of all this Glenbrookian blood, why shouldn't religious npc #55 not make the same heel face turn?

And then, we have the slavery/human experimentation plot - in general, when TS tries to give nuance, they more or less explain/justify why something that "sucks" is done, it's basically Silvio's character.

Aesfrost' Gustadolph manages to push his "freedom" mentality because his land is a harsh place where people are desperate to survive, salt smuggling is reprehensible, but it's the only way to give some to the ones who cannot afford it. Of course is everyone is free, no one is because, as Gustadolph puts it, they're basically free to die for his ambitions.

Hyzante? Follows a racist creed where Rozellians have to pay for some great sin, and are slaved away in a lake to recover salt until they die. It's, later, justified by Hyzante wanting to keep its salt monopoly else they don't have anything, and wanting to curb down the Rozelle people because they know about the exitence of rock salt (and I guess getting free workers to harvest salt from the lake + having state enemies make his own population docile/not willing to rebel ?).

And then, we have the human experimentations, that are just done for, uhh, Idore's lol. When Hyzante is known for its "advanced medicine" and we could have had the usual dilemna of, idk, having those humans experimentations used to develop this medicine that is reknown in the world (idk, sacrificing a Rozellian to save someone else's life?) - it's not the angle the devs picked. Rozellians are sacrificed to power up an idol, Idore wants to control the world through his idol and soft power (compared to Gustadolph's hard power) and manipulates his people (just like Gustadolph) to do so.

The two are very similar, but who is the final boss? Complete with a transformation in an eldritch monster? The war-mongering imperialist or the jaded old man who is leading de facto a religion?

Hopefully there's the entire "human experimentations for no other purpose than the lols" to settle them apart.

---

I recently watched Dune, and even if I have some issues with the adaptation, the Bene Gesserit isn't portrayed as "comically" evil-er than the Harkonen Empire, I reckon the comparison isn't adequate, because Dune is multi book series when I'm mostly talking about video games.

Symphonia's church of Martel is a font for the Big Bad (tm) to put in motion his nefarious plans, and yet, through the game, we see how random clergymen use their, uh, religious buildings to help people around. Ultimately Martel herself is reincarnated through plot device and tells the big bad to stop being an ass and the story is less about "church and gods evil" but "big bad distorts Martel/church's teachings and role for his plans because he has a tragic backstory"

(but then Symphonia ends with the biggest whitewashing from every Tales I've played for its big bad so I'll stop talking about it because otherwise I'm going to be salty).

Abyss' church is more or less the same thing - the Church is supposed to help people deal with the fact their verse has "predestination stones" where the future is already written, and in the course of the game, we see how it has several factions and one opposes the group (who has the pope as a NPC!) - but it's not a story about "gods bad church BaD".

I remember playing Suikoden Tierkreis a long time ago, and while the game seemed to go through familiar "church bad gods bad" route and we end with defeating a god-like entity... I pretty much loved the twist that, in a game that relied on alternate dimensions/universe, the god-like entity was actually the protag if he made different choices!

In those games, if you fight a religious body and someone pretending to be a God or what not - it's not because people fight against an eldritch creature who wants world domination and to erase puny insects, or is the reason why everything goes wrong, but because, at the end, the conflict/fight is ultimately caused by someone, generally a human or at least a non "god like" entity, wanting to destroy the world.

I don't remember if FE was my first JRPG series or not, but I always liked the idea that if the world is doomed in those games and the heroes must prevent said doom, it's not because a god-like being wants to destroy the world, but because people, humans/randoms are the most shitty ones out there.

---

As for the "tropes" often used to deride fictional churchs and religious people, well, I will again point to TS - which did a splendid job in the Benedict Route where you smash Hyzante after allying with Aesfrost.

There's one battle where out protags diss Hyzantese because they worship a goddess and have no free will, listening to Her teachings and Her says (the traditional "religious people have no free will and listen to their churches who tell them how to think!") - which is immediately countered by one of those Hyzantese characters asking Serenor if he's not the same, but instead of blindly listening to a Goddess, blindly follows Benedict. And it ends with the final chapter title referencing automatons/puppets : who is that title talking about ? The fake "idol" Idore created, or the fake "king" Benedict created?

Anyways, the usual "religions people have no free will because their church/religion tells them how to think" trope reeks of r/atheism and the double standard - bar in this route of TS, but I guess, in TS itself in the Roland route! - is never called out, blindly following a charismatic leader is okay, as long as charismatic leader isn't religious?

Regardless of my IRL thoughts about religion, usually those tropes are presented as a "gotcha!" when they are... not at all, but the games/books leave it at that and we're supposed to roll with it.

I'd say it's lazy writing or, as we saw in Naruto, a quick way to end a story without having to dwelve in characters and their motivations : "you're a god/alien/other being and you're bad, so let us do what we want!" - end of the story.

Hopefully some fillers and to an extent, Boruto gave her more meat bar being the 11 hour villain we had to defeat quick and who manipulated the previous sad'n'lonely antagonists - but it still felt rich from Naruto, known for his famous "talk no jutsu" and trying to understand people he's fighting against, to drop the ball with Kaguya, calling her pure malice and ending with some "let us live the way we want" to wrap up the plot so he can wrestle with his boyfriend later on.

In the end, we often end up with "religion bad bcs the big bad manipulates people through it", as if those mangas/animes/vg never have other examples of charismatic people not using religion to manipulate their randoms/people or "gods bad they should let humans do what they want" when we've read/seen/played through various, uh, really fucked-up shit humans did - but on their own! and ultimately, but it's more in fandom spaces, with have Projection 101.

TLDR : church/religion/gods are too often used in those works as the ultimate scapegoat to either wrap up a story in a rushed ending or to pretend to have "nuance" but still have a common enemy where all the "nuanced" characters can grow/be whitewashed and side together against that "common enemy".

Just like in all things I guess, I prefer when something isn't painted as purely negative and all of the positive traits are erased because there is a need for a perfect scapegoat - sure, bring out too much "nuance" and writing/designing a game/manga/anime becomes harder because there's no "clear cut" antagonist, and yet, the one who always gets fucked in this scenario is the religious/church side.

Want a generic stock villain who will destroy the world so the heroes have to fight against them? Just create a "religion" in your setting, and have the big bad either hell bent on resurrecting Chtullu to destroy the world because Chtullu BaD, or have them be the most corrupt piece of shit who manipulate everything in the shadows, so the rest of the world, even the ones who slaughter others bcs they feel like they must start a war, can be whitewashed at the end.

I mean, there's a saying about diverting attention from a fire by starting a bigger one near, or a trope of "aliens made them do it" : who cares if Madara started a continental war and targeted a village full of random civilians he swore to protect because he lost the elections? Did y'know he was manipulated by a woman, I mean, an eldritch thing created by a woman, regarded as a God, who ultimately wanted to get out of her fridge to kill everyone?

Roland must get over his hatred for Aesfrost for barging in his kindgom and killing hundred of his people while they were preparing for a wedding, because hey, Idore is evil and plans on ruling the world through his sham religion!

I'll forever be salty at TS for not giving Kamsell the occasion to rise against Idore, or not even have minor NPCs get the same treatment as Sycras suddenly going all "u lied to me gustadolph so i won't listen to u anymore + sad goodbyes to my wife'n'kids".

Extremism of all kinds can lead to wars/tragedy/fucked up shit - Sure I don't want to get my History lessons in video game medium when I play lol, but what I really don't like is how it feels like depicting "they're extremists because they're religious" feels like the default/easy answer : want a bunch of brainwashed people the heroes must fight against and can't talk no justu their way out of this fight/will fight without looking too BaD? Depict those people as "misguided" members of a corrupt church/believers of a religion, no one will givea fig. If they are instead supporters of a charismatic leader who throws them through the meatgrinder to further their goals? Well, there's no automatic loyalty so either you have to show/depict it on screen, else it can be challenged at key points to demonstrate how those people - who follow the charismatic leader - aren't completely "mindlessly listening to their leader" or how their leader "isn't that bad after all".

[wisecrackingeric-2]

My Luis blog is so fun cuz I’ll find a topic that’ll look pretty simple on paper and I’ll be like Oh Yeah this won’t take much time at all!! And then it Does in fact take A Lot of time

[oldtestleper]

big spoilers for new info as of tonight's episode but eye am soooooooo curious about the extent to which galicaea is still opposed to cassandra in some way. obviously in her high elven form she was trying to get kristen as a follower rather than have her continue to investigate the nightmare king and find cassandra, like she was NOT trying to put her thumb on the scale in that way. and from the sound of it she and sol basically respectively absorbed/dissolved the domains that once belonged to cassandra and ankarna through numerous calculated efforts of their clerics and evangelists, with sol and helio acquiring exclusive association with the sun and summer, and galicaea acquiring exclusive worship of the wood elves and becoming a goddess defined by certainty and eternity, driving away doubt. so is galicaea still playing the game even after being "restored" by wolfsong, trying to keep rage and doubt out of the world that is so well set up for her. was she ever really restored or was it doomed to be a cosmetic overhaul after the high elves got behind it again. like how christian fundamentalists dress like hipsters and open really trendy and successful coffee shops

[rebelontherocks]

i think it's a little concerning that ppl watch dune 2 and don't realize that paul is a villain

[charmixpower]

Hcs about the Winx and their respective faiths/religions? Idk why but I have this hc about Stella being Christian and again, Bloom being Jewish? I mean you might disagree but that’s just what it’s giving to me

Oooh, uh, I can't really answer that question because the underlying premise doesn't fit with the Winx world building as it's been presented

I feel really bad about this but my answer to this question would be no

Like, in general, everyone except Bloom wouldn't have a religion

In the Winx world, they know what god is. It's a big fire Dragon that brought the dimensions into existence. Faries of the dragon flame were and are quite literally running around as imperial evidence. There is concrete and visible proof of a God's existence, and people know exactly what god is. They don't know exactly what was going on in the Great Dragon's head, but they know it existed

They're would likely be different interpretations of the great Dragon, but there would be no religion. It's not a religion really, it's just beliefs about something they know exist. No faith required

Because all other religions would be provably wrong, they either integrated into the fact of the Great Dragon as god or died out

Only earth, that wouldn't know that God is a Dragon, would have a bunch of diverse and thriving religions. Everywhere else knows that God is a Dragon. Not much room for conflicting religions when you know what god is

Hell because of the water stars the existence of a different water god that's likely the Creator of the infinite ocean is assured, which destroys the concept of monotheism in the Winx world. You can't be monotheistic because you can point at the other God's creations. They're in the ocean, right off of Andros

I just remembered that Darkar is a god and that the Winx fought and had a chit chat with a god. Clearly a weak and lesser one compared to the Dragons that created two separate dimensions, but a god all the same. Imagine the existential crisis

[rotzaprachim]

mixing not just the histories but physical costumes and clothing of scotland and central asia sure was a ..... series of choices 

[duckbunny]

nothing quite as funny as ppl saying "but what if they're Jewish? then they can't drink blood!" abt vampires. love the energy, love the analysis, but did you forget about the murder? it is a rare religion that is cool with murder, whatever you do with the blood.

[chicago-geniza]

"Assimilation & its discontents," or, February 1936 was an interesting month for Bruno Schulz

Lwów Zionist paper really went "THE AUTHOR OF CINNAMON SHOPS HAS ABANDONED JEWISHNESS" like calm down his fiancee is Catholic (2nd-gen convert) & lives in Warsaw, which is governed by imperial Russian marriage law, so he resigned from the Drohobycz kehila, he didn't get baptized, give a bitch a break, his refusal to opuścić żydostwo in the perfective-verb sense by "going all the way" and taking the sacrament was part of why they broke up lol

[ikusayu-no-hana]

ame-no-habakiri as a touken danshi please god. the sword closest to the divinity that others can only dream of.

[unganseylike]

i watched warrior nun a few weeks ago and hm i dont have many thoughts on it good or bad but

1) why are the crusades presented as like. heroic. for much the series. girl what year is it

2) um. little uncomfortable how they presented like the vatican/catholicism as a constant victim of theft and pillaging. when we uh. know its kinda the opposite.

[psychotrenny]

And people keep trying to justify Israel's existence on the basis that it is somehow a safe place for the preservation of Jewish people and their culture and not only is that an awful argument for establishing a Settler Colonist Apartheid State but it's not even true. Like the state is politically and economically dominated by Ashkenazi Jews from Northern Europe and their descendants. While not as severely mistreated as Palestinians, there is still a significant disparity between the European and Non-European Jews in terms of income and education. Non-European Jews are still regularly subject to interpersonal bigotry (hell earlier this year there was a news story about a viral video where Ashkenazi girls in a Purim made a skit mocking the Mizrahi) and Israel government policies towards non-Ashkenazi migrants have done severe damage to their social structure and cultural traditions. Not to mention the fact that the whole reason why many Mizrahi migrated in the first place was to escape the violence caused by European Jews committing atrocities in their name, tearing communities apart as neighbours that had peacefully co-existed for centuries found themselves on opposite sides of this new ethno-religious conflict

There have even been attempts in Israeli history at the forceful assimilation or even biological reduction of non-European Jews; the kidnapping and adoption of Yemeni Jewish children in the 1950s is significant example of the former while the forced contraception of Beta Israeli (Ethiopean Jewish migrants) with the explicit intention of reducing their population's birth rate is an example of the latter. There's also very clear favouritism when it comes to recent converts; white Afrikaner converts are given the right of Aliyah while Nigerian Igbos are not. Like the fact of the matter is that Israel's fundamental nature is as a European Settler Colony, incredibly racist not only towards the indigenous Palestinians but the many Non-European Jews it claims to represent. It's an outpost of Western Imperialism, not a haven for the Jewish people. If it was ever meant to be the latter than it has failed miserably

[enbylvania65000]

When a ceremonial monarch who largely didn't do anything died, tumblr cheered about it because she symbolised colonialism and imperialism. Not because of anything she personally did, but because of her *symbolism*.

When someone dies who personally presided over mass executions of political dissidents, oversaw as a political leader massive repression of women, religious minorities and ethnic minorities and helped organise genocide and civil war throughout the Middle East, only Iranian and Jewish tumblrs are saying anything.

Skewed priorities much?

[determinate-negation]

Did the majority of Jewish people and institutions support Zionism pre-1948?

no, very far from it. i dont have time to give an in depth response, theres a lot of history here but ill give some bullet points

some interpretations of judaism have always opposed a jewish state in any form and many jews were religiously against zionism from when it first started becoming a political movement

(there are still a lot of religious jews who are anti zionist on religious grounds. the satmar hasidic dynasty is an example. this is separate from political groups like neturei karta)

religious opposition to a jewish state was so strong that without zionism constituting itself as a specifically nationalist movement drawing on other 19th century nationalist movements it probably would not have become successful

assimilated jews in europe, which herzl himself was, were divided on zionism. many assimilated middle class jews were liberal nationalists of their own countries and rejected zionism. many other european jews were socialists and rejected zionism as a form of nationalism and imperialism.

among european jews who were generally poorer and more religious, zionism became more popular in response to the active extermination of jews in eastern europe. still, it was not the dominant belief in eastern europe. eastern european jews were very involved in socialist and radical movements, many specifically saw socialism as the only answer to european antisemitism. the jewish labor bund in particular espoused a type of anti zionist diaspora politics.

most anti zionist and socialist jews, especially eastern european ones, especially the working class, were murdered. thats part of why its not so common anymore

post-war and in the context of the red scare, american jewish institutions basically threw left wing anti zionist jews under the bus, let people lose their jobs and get blackmailed, and started focusing on relations with israel

there has always been jewish opposition to zionism both on religious and political grounds and it was a hotly debated topic and not something people agreed on. you can read more here

i have reading guides under my tag resources

edit: this is just pertaining to european jewish history and american jewish history, and mostly of ashkenazi jews. the history of arab jews is different but to be very brief, there was not widespread support among arab jews for zionism before the nakba and founding of the state of israel, and the israeli govt and zionist organizations were very active in trying to create conditions for arab jews that would encourage them to immigrate to israel

[jewish-sideblog]

I feel like people have such a limited view of the Shoah as something that killed religious Jews living in Eastern Europe. Certainly, that’s the majority of Jewish deaths from a raw numbers perspective. But that narrow view erases so much suffering.

Imperial Japan was allied to the Nazis, so Jews in East Asia and the Pacific forced to flee or die as Japan expanded their empire. Fascist Spain was sympathetic to the Nazi cause, and it’s not like the Sephardic Jews could easily flee into France after 1940. The Axis powers had colonized Algeria, Iraq, Libya, Morocco, and Tunisia at that point, so North African Mizrahi Jews weren’t spared the horrors. While the US government didn’t directly kill Jews, they denied us refugee status during the Shoah, and they did nothing to prevent the spread of multiple US American fascist parties and white suprematist groups. The Vatican, unofficially allied with Fascist Italy, handed over the names and locations of Jews they had converted to Catholicism decades or centuries prior. Families who didn’t even know they were ethnically Jewish were dragged out of Catholic Churches during Mass and sent to slaughterhouses hundreds of miles away. There were precious few diasporic communities throughout the world where Jews were safe in the 30s and 40s.

The Holocaust spanned entire continents. The Holocaust was global.

Edit 04/02/24: This post wasn’t written about Israel, and you shouldn’t make it about Israel. In either direction. The Shoah should not serve as a justification for the unnecessary abuses of the Palestinian people by the Likud government. Simultaneously, the Shoah was not a “lesson” to be learned by Jews, you cannot make a reasonable comparison between the Shoah and Gaza. This post is not about Israel and Palestine. Do not make it about Israel and Palestine. The deaths of our ancestors are not a tool with which you can make your argument.