Re: Germans and Klezmer

[Ari Davidow <ari...>]

At 09:08 AM 2/28/00 -0500, you wrote:
>Steven,
>You are entitled to your opinion,
>but I think that it is too easy for those a bit 
>removed from the pain to absolve those 
>who inflicted it and say "get over it" 
>to those of us a bit closer to it. 

Leopold, there is no answer to the point you make. There is no 
way to undo what was done, nor is there any way to erase its
memory (fortunately).

But many of us would argue that neither can we give the Nazis
victory by remaking the world in the memory of their image.
There is, I hope, some room to acknowledge Germans who are not
Nazis. If we cannot find reconciliation, what hope is there for
us, what hope is there for the survivors of Deir Yassin =or= Kfar
Etzion, what hope is there for survivors in the former Yugoslavia,
or Cambodia, or Rwanda.... 

>Why don't the Germans perform the music of the long-resident, 
>but non-citizen Turkish "guest workers" in their midst?
>It might produce some empathy where it could now be useful.

I can't speak specifically to the music, but I do know that there has
been significant protest and organization against the anti-Turkish
racists in Germany, and that it lies behind, in part, the move to 
change Germany's citizenship laws to make it easier for immigrants
to become German citizens.

I would hope that there is room to acknowledge some space between
the Nazi past and perfect redemption where there are many Germans
speaking out against racism, and being heard, as was not the case
two generations ago.

The past is a large part of who we are, or who we might have been, but,
to paraphrase Mordechai Kaplan, there has to be a way to prevent it 
from having a veto on our future.

I'll go one step further and say that to the extent that there are
some Germans genuinely interested in Jewish culture, along with their
own, we are that much less "the other" in Germany. There would be no
hope for a less racist future without such interchange. And, as you 
note, clearly we also need to generalize that and ensure that this
exploration does not stop with Jewish culture of the past, but includes
cultures of other minorities, Turks, for instance, in Germany today.

ari


Ari Davidow
ari (at) ivritype(dot)com
list owner, jewish-music (at) shamash(dot)org
the klezmer shack: http://www.klezmershack.com/

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