Among other folks as well [0]. Of note, the US was not the only country to turn away refugees during WWII. Also of note, from what I've read, refugee immigration has been temporarily halted from certain countries with the exemption being refugees from minority religions in those countries.
I also read the same regarding minority religions. Although the price I saw was only citing a draft of the executive order. I wonder when, they haven't already, publish the final version.
The countries to which the bans apply are all majority Muslim, so the exemption would apply to non-Muslims.
This specific exception would obviously not have made any sense back then, considering the vast majority of refugees belonged to the minority religion.
I actually just tried to find out what the attitude towards jewish refugees was in the US and happened upon this eerily pertinent passage:
Out of fear that the Nazis could smuggle spies and
saboteurs in with refugees, immigration officials
tightened visa policies for immigrants and non-
immigrants. The State Department urged its diplomatic
consuls in Europe to screen potential immigrants
carefully, including those fleeing persecution,
"Trump's Refugee Plan Will Prioritize Christians Suffering Religious Persecution"
The precise wording of the order/legislation may not mention any specific religion, but the intent is clear. Specific countries will be targeted, and exceptions within those countries will be granted, to ensure that Muslims aren't able to get in but Christians can sail right through.
Not really, initially in the inquisition they let them to choose - convert or be expelled, later convert or die, then they just gave up on the conversion all together.
All in all there isn't much need to do a bacon test for either Muslims or Jews, at least for men, just make them strip if they are circumcised you know exactly who they are.
You already have that, it's not uncommon for those who immigrate to Europe to throw away their passports claim they are Christian and under age in order to not fear deportation and pretty much be immediately accepted.
There's various ideologies of that, and some of that are aggressive (repressive) towards the others, which is exactly what is leading to refugee problems in Europe. Is the law going to paper over that difference?
And I thought all the innocent Americans (or as I'm not from America "people") killed by criminals sucks. As far as I'm informed being a criminal, an asshole or a despicable human being is completely separated from religion, immigration, color, gender, (feel free to extend this list) - people can be multiple things. Or none.
Islam is a religion, not a race. Being an illegal immigrant is a form of legal status, not a race. Calling someone a racist every single time we disagree with them is part of the problem.
It's an extremely slimy debating tactic. Someone says they don't like a religion, you accuse them of not liking a race, the person correctly claims the that a religion is not a race, and then the other person fires back with "Well, you don't really mean that."
Since when is that an acceptable way to debate? Part of any decent discussion is that you actually have to let the person state their own position, and accept it. You can't just tell them they're lying about their own beliefs. You're then putting your own words into their mouth, and using that as a straw man.
A religion is a set of beliefs. A race is a set of physical characteristics. They are completely different things, and I have no idea why (or how) you could possibly confuse them.
If it's that simple, answer this: Jews -- religion or race?
Racist doctrines are about discrimination towards those deemed inherently "other" and therefore irredeemably unworthy of something (for example the consideration of entry into a country). It's not just about physical characteristics, even though 19th and 20th century racists did create a lot of pseudoscience around that to justify discrimination.
You would probably agree that Nazi Germany was a racist regime, right? If you look at the categories of Untermensch [1], they are a hodgepodge mix of ethnicity, religion and subjective personal defects.
Although I enjoyed this article and don't mind seeing it on hacker news, I can understand the question tho, and actually have found myself wonder about it.
of course we are human, but it's called "hacker news" and I guess people expect computer related news here. Just like when I visit soccer.com, I'm not expecting news about AI or Anne Frank :)
So it's not about being people too, it's about the subject focused (or at least implied) by this website.
I can also see the fact that HN is now more a community that an actual news site and people like to talk about more and more various subjects.
Hackers/technocrats armed the Wehrmacht, built The Bomb, developed chemical and biological weapons, and have an awful tendency to go "me, I just make the widget. What they use it for is their problem."
Therefore it's important that we talk about these things.
So are all the other people on earth. There are other outlets for general interest news. The appeal of HN to me is that it's limited specifically to tech-related news.
You're probably right that this article is off-topic and should be flagged, but this...
> The appeal of HN to me is that it's limited specifically to tech-related news.
...is wrong. The guidelines have said for years that on-topic is:
> Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity.
I just don't get these types of complaints (on dying ./ they are doing the same thing over and over). There are hundreds of tech-related stories every day and it's not as if somebody forces you to click on the Anne Frank link so you can complain about it.
For me, the hope that somewhere underneath our interest in growth hacks, new programming languages, and this week's hottest JS framework exists basic human decency.
edit: Allow me to rephrase a bit. Our actions as technologists have real effects upon real people. It is incumbent upon us to consider how the tools we make may harm or help our fellow human beings.
In Canada, newly graduated engineers are given iron rings to remind them of the ethical obligations incumbent in their jobs. We should all be so fortunate as to have a physical token reminding us of this on a daily basis.
If you mean that "elected president is literally Hitler" and related themes have been mainstreamed so thoroughly and quickly as to be the new normal already... I think you should be afraid of the power of the press more than of any merely elected president.
A multi-car pile-up isn't one 5 minutes before it happens either.
I agree that one shouldn't cry wolf and exaggerate too often, but it's equally ignorant to not take things seriously, whether it be a fact-opposing president, mass surveillence legislation or anti consumer net unneutrality, that are all just steps that are hard to reverse once in place, and are building towards something much worse.
Darn, I guess the 190 or so nations that issue passports and check them at the border are all Nazi's... man I didn't realize that the TMITHC on Amazon was reality TV.
I make all my political and ideological choices based on analogies using Hitler or Nazis. Then I post about them on sites related to technology and downvote anyone who doesn't tow the line. It's called being a decent human being!!!
Under the British Mandate of The League of Nations Britain was obligated to allow Jewish immigration to what is now Israel. In fact originally Hitler wanted European Jews to go there.
But the British broke their mandate with "The White Paper" in 1939 which severely limited Jewish immigration to their land.
If America had run the mandate instead of the British there probably would not have been The Holocaust and many millions more Jews would be alive today in Israel including presumably Anne Frank.
and this counterfactual America would have responded how to the partly anti-mass-immigration revolt that caused the paper to be be written? History (and hypothetical history) are rarely that simple.
Saudi men committed the terrorist act of 9/11 and the Orlando shooter was of Afghani origin. But Trump banned people from Iraq, Iran, Libya, Yemen & Sudan. What kind of logic is that?
I disagree wholeheartedly with the idea that the United States of America should ban people based on their country of origin. That is UnAmerican. But I do find the above illogical and very fishy.
They know a thing or two about basic security and cultural hygiene, unlike most of Europe. I suppose Europe will only learn that after hundreds of rapes and dozens of trucks running over innocent people.
Cultural hygiene? _really_? What exactly do you mean by that sentence? Do you mean that if I am culturally abnormal then I should be purged from my homeland much like they should not enter?
While I'd concede the point; its pertinent to national security that not many neighbouring countries are very fond of them. So I can imagine why the level of immense paranoia being applied here.
Tragically allowing refugees in is the sort of action that might convey the goodwill necessary for Israel to find a diplomatic home in the Middle East but alas; short-termism wins out.
There are about 5 million refugees outside Syria and more than 5 million internally displaced in Syria. 100 is nothing.
Sweden and Israel both have populations of about 10 million. Sweden has taken in 200-300 THOUSAND. Israel promises to take in 100 and pats itself on the back.
It has not come without a price though. Note the rabbid anti-semitism and general domestic issues including a considerable increase in rapes.
All factors considered, Israel does more than its share to help the situation. Or perhaps they should take out Assad and bring this misery to an end. Or would that even end it?Perhaps you've heard of the many many Syrians who have sought and received medical assistance in Israel. Plenty of print on that.
Israel should share the burden, especially as they are next door. 100 refugees is pathetic. 5 million refugees should be admitted right now.
Isn't it strange that 1000 American rabbis can call on the US to accept Syrian refugees? Are there 1000 Israeli rabbis doing the same? Don't they remember Anne Frank?
Yeah but 100? we can talk nice all day and dance around it, but the most simple fact is, Israel ain't helping. what you describe can be said by any country.
Shame on Israel (and all other not-my-issue countries).
Israel has been treating wounded Syrians since the conflict started.
The number of Syrian refugees fleeing to Israel is also nearly zero, 70 years of propaganda would do it for it as well as Israel not being a welfare state.
Overall you can say the same thing about most Gulf nations, only with one exception they have more cash than both Israel and Sweden and they are both culturally and ethnically more similar.
Considering that many of the Muslim refugees are Sunni, a better question would be why didn't Saudi Arabia and rest of the Oil club didn't take most if not all of them.
Which country is geographically closer Turkey or Sweden?
Greece or Sweden? Italy or Sweden? Bulgaria or Sweden?
They run to Sweden for a lot of reasons geography isn't one of them, and it's not because all of the other countries are hell holes.
They don't go to Israel because 70 years of government propaganda makes them think they'll eat their babies.
It didn't stop Israel from treating 1000's of wounded and many of them are not reported because crossing to Israel is a death sentence to anyone who wants to return to Syria or their families.
The way the US and other countries abandoned Jews to genocide was shameful.
And I do think that Western countries (such as the US and my own country of Australia) should take more refugees, including Syrian refugees.
However, I'd question the parallel the article tries to draw between between victims and survivors of the Holocaust and contemporary Syrian refugees – every Jew fleeing the Nazi regime was under a very serious risk of falling victim to genocide, whether or not they realised it at the time. By contrast, I don't think the vast majority of Syrian refugees are fleeing genocide. While genocide has been occurring in Syria (e.g. ISIS' genocide of Yazidis), the actual or potential victims of those genocides are a small minority of the total Syrian refugee population.
Everyone in the west always forgets thats Jews were not the only ones that were victimized by the Nazis, and I feel that this is too often misrepresented from the general knowledge pool of most people in society.
More soviets died there than Jews, and in fact more Non-Jews died there than Jews. Why does everyone ignore that?
Number of Deaths
Jews: up to 6 million
Soviet civilians: around 7 million
Soviet prisoners of war: around 3 million
Non-Jewish Polish civilians: around 1.8 million
Serb civilians: 312,000
People with disabilities: up to 250,000
Roma (Gypsies): 196,000–220,000
Jehovah's Witnesses: Around 1,900
Repeat criminal offenders: at least 70,000
All true, but that's standard warfare stuff. Only certain populations were targeted for extermination. Jews were not the only ones but Russians certainly were not.
86 comments
[ 6.2 ms ] story [ 184 ms ] thread[0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/MS_St._Louis
The countries to which the bans apply are all majority Muslim, so the exemption would apply to non-Muslims.
I actually just tried to find out what the attitude towards jewish refugees was in the US and happened upon this eerily pertinent passage:
(from https://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10007094)"Trump's Refugee Plan Will Prioritize Christians Suffering Religious Persecution"
The precise wording of the order/legislation may not mention any specific religion, but the intent is clear. Specific countries will be targeted, and exceptions within those countries will be granted, to ensure that Muslims aren't able to get in but Christians can sail right through.
These were common during the inquisition to test convert Jews.
Looks like it works, but you simply force people to lie - be that via false confessions or going against halal/kosher practice.
Anusim are Jews who were coerced to convert: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anusim
All in all there isn't much need to do a bacon test for either Muslims or Jews, at least for men, just make them strip if they are circumcised you know exactly who they are.
Sadly this leads to some surreal events such as this: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3422000/Just-old-thi...
There's various ideologies of that, and some of that are aggressive (repressive) towards the others, which is exactly what is leading to refugee problems in Europe. Is the law going to paper over that difference?
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tu_quoque
(I'm talking about the account age - obvious troll is obvious)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correlation_does_not_imply_cau...
Statement: "Since Islam is a religion and not a race, Islamophobia is not racism" That sounds logically true, but in your heart you know it's false.
> Calling someone a racist every single time we disagree
"every single time we disagree" is more misdirection in this context.
Can you see into peoples hearts?
Are you using alternate logic?
Since when is that an acceptable way to debate? Part of any decent discussion is that you actually have to let the person state their own position, and accept it. You can't just tell them they're lying about their own beliefs. You're then putting your own words into their mouth, and using that as a straw man.
Racist doctrines are about discrimination towards those deemed inherently "other" and therefore irredeemably unworthy of something (for example the consideration of entry into a country). It's not just about physical characteristics, even though 19th and 20th century racists did create a lot of pseudoscience around that to justify discrimination.
You would probably agree that Nazi Germany was a racist regime, right? If you look at the categories of Untermensch [1], they are a hodgepodge mix of ethnicity, religion and subjective personal defects.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Untermensch
of course we are human, but it's called "hacker news" and I guess people expect computer related news here. Just like when I visit soccer.com, I'm not expecting news about AI or Anne Frank :)
So it's not about being people too, it's about the subject focused (or at least implied) by this website.
I can also see the fact that HN is now more a community that an actual news site and people like to talk about more and more various subjects.
Therefore it's important that we talk about these things.
> The appeal of HN to me is that it's limited specifically to tech-related news.
...is wrong. The guidelines have said for years that on-topic is:
> Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity.
edit: Allow me to rephrase a bit. Our actions as technologists have real effects upon real people. It is incumbent upon us to consider how the tools we make may harm or help our fellow human beings.
In Canada, newly graduated engineers are given iron rings to remind them of the ethical obligations incumbent in their jobs. We should all be so fortunate as to have a physical token reminding us of this on a daily basis.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13489156
Something like: we are banning people again, history repeats itself... but I didn't actually read the article (comments first) so I might be wrong.
A multi-car pile-up isn't one 5 minutes before it happens either.
I agree that one shouldn't cry wolf and exaggerate too often, but it's equally ignorant to not take things seriously, whether it be a fact-opposing president, mass surveillence legislation or anti consumer net unneutrality, that are all just steps that are hard to reverse once in place, and are building towards something much worse.
But the British broke their mandate with "The White Paper" in 1939 which severely limited Jewish immigration to their land.
If America had run the mandate instead of the British there probably would not have been The Holocaust and many millions more Jews would be alive today in Israel including presumably Anne Frank.
See: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Paper_of_1939
We can go on in this silly vein all day...
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1936%E2%80%9339_Arab_revolt_...
> "...their land"
The sentence is unclear if you're referring to it as British land or Jewish land, but either way it's contentious to say the least!
I disagree wholeheartedly with the idea that the United States of America should ban people based on their country of origin. That is UnAmerican. But I do find the above illogical and very fishy.
And it's right next door.
Talk about self-destructive behaviour...
Cultural hygiene? _really_? What exactly do you mean by that sentence? Do you mean that if I am culturally abnormal then I should be purged from my homeland much like they should not enter?
Tragically allowing refugees in is the sort of action that might convey the goodwill necessary for Israel to find a diplomatic home in the Middle East but alas; short-termism wins out.
[0] http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-38755946
Sweden and Israel both have populations of about 10 million. Sweden has taken in 200-300 THOUSAND. Israel promises to take in 100 and pats itself on the back.
All factors considered, Israel does more than its share to help the situation. Or perhaps they should take out Assad and bring this misery to an end. Or would that even end it?Perhaps you've heard of the many many Syrians who have sought and received medical assistance in Israel. Plenty of print on that.
Isn't it strange that 1000 American rabbis can call on the US to accept Syrian refugees? Are there 1000 Israeli rabbis doing the same? Don't they remember Anne Frank?
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/israel/...
http://time.com/4135445/american-rabbis-syrian-refugee-lette...
Shame on Israel (and all other not-my-issue countries).
The number of Syrian refugees fleeing to Israel is also nearly zero, 70 years of propaganda would do it for it as well as Israel not being a welfare state.
Overall you can say the same thing about most Gulf nations, only with one exception they have more cash than both Israel and Sweden and they are both culturally and ethnically more similar.
Considering that many of the Muslim refugees are Sunni, a better question would be why didn't Saudi Arabia and rest of the Oil club didn't take most if not all of them.
They run to Sweden for a lot of reasons geography isn't one of them, and it's not because all of the other countries are hell holes.
They don't go to Israel because 70 years of government propaganda makes them think they'll eat their babies.
It didn't stop Israel from treating 1000's of wounded and many of them are not reported because crossing to Israel is a death sentence to anyone who wants to return to Syria or their families.
And I do think that Western countries (such as the US and my own country of Australia) should take more refugees, including Syrian refugees.
However, I'd question the parallel the article tries to draw between between victims and survivors of the Holocaust and contemporary Syrian refugees – every Jew fleeing the Nazi regime was under a very serious risk of falling victim to genocide, whether or not they realised it at the time. By contrast, I don't think the vast majority of Syrian refugees are fleeing genocide. While genocide has been occurring in Syria (e.g. ISIS' genocide of Yazidis), the actual or potential victims of those genocides are a small minority of the total Syrian refugee population.
More soviets died there than Jews, and in fact more Non-Jews died there than Jews. Why does everyone ignore that?
Number of Deaths Jews: up to 6 million Soviet civilians: around 7 million Soviet prisoners of war: around 3 million Non-Jewish Polish civilians: around 1.8 million Serb civilians: 312,000 People with disabilities: up to 250,000 Roma (Gypsies): 196,000–220,000 Jehovah's Witnesses: Around 1,900 Repeat criminal offenders: at least 70,000
https://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10008193