NETHERLANDS: Jehovah's Witnesses are not allowed on the Holocaust Memorial
TLDR; The 'crowd-funded' major Holocaust Namen Monumnent in Amsterdam is promoted as being an inclusive public memorial that will "list the names of all Dutch victims of the Holocaust" - but is apparently choosing to just memorialise those targeted because of their ethnicity rather than those targetted due to their religion, political beliefs, or sexual orientation.
Sensitive subject, that proves that history isn't always 'easy' - a series of articles from the NRC Handelsblad newspaper from the last week (via Google Translate)
What was the Holocaust, and who where the victims? - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocaust_victims
Holocaust Namen Monumnent in Amsterdam - https://www.holocaustnamenmonument.nl/en/home
NRC Handelsblad, Wednesday 22 February 2017, page 5
Jehovah's Witnesses are not allowed on the Holocaust Memorial
World War II only names of Jews, Roma and Sinti are the new Holocaust Memorial. Why do not Jehovah's Witnesses?
Who exactly is it and who is not a victim of the Holocaust in the Netherlands? The monument is put down to the Weesperstraat in Amsterdam, will according to the website holocaustnamenmonument.nl "all names of Dutch Holocaust victims who have no grave" come to be. All names?
Richard van de Velde - history teacher and member of the historical society in Culemborg - wanted to "adopt" a name. To this end, the site invites the public, at the rate of 50 per name. Van de Velde opted for adoption the name of a Jehovah's Witness from Maurik who perished in Auschwitz. Dutch Jehovah's Witnesses were sought by the German secret police during the occupation, put in prison and, in some cases deported to a concentration camp.
...
The name proposed by Van de Velde did not appear to occur in the file of the organizing committee. The secretary wrote: "Unfortunately we have to disappoint you, on our website describes our goal and there, only the Jewish victims and among the Roma and Sinti. I can imagine that you're disappointed, but if we put it this name, we have others that are not within our target also set up and that's not the intention. "
...
"It sounds harsh," said Grishaver, "but a Jehovah's Witness could renounce his faith, and he was free to go. That possibility had Jews, Roma and Sinti do not. "
READ MORE: https://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2017/02/21/jehovas-mogen-niet-op-het-monument-6874133-a1547088
This was followed a couple of days later in the newspaper's Editorial / Opinion Page
NRC Handelsblad, Friday 24 February 2017, page 17
Opinion: Holocaust Namen Monumnent Auschwitz Committee missed an opportunity by excluding murdered Jehovah's Witnesses
Remembering the millions who were murdered by the Nazis, has increased rather than decreased since the end of World War II. Rightly stopped regularly to the horrors of the Nazi regime. Rightly respect is shown for the victims and their families. Rightly reminded periodically to what happened. How this could happen. With the added message that this must never happen again.
In Amsterdam there early next year by the Dutch Auschwitz Committee, a Holocaust Monument Name 'with the names of the Dutch victims: 102 000 Jews and 220 Sinti and Roma.
To fund is largely used crowd-funding. People can names of murdered compatriots 'adopt' a good way to connect now living generations with the victims of that time.
There is objection to the proportions of the vast monument. But the magnitude of the crime can indeed be expressed through the mold. In addition, everyone is free, for example through the establishment of so-called Stolpersteine (stumbling stones) by the German artist Gunter Demnig to continue to draw attention to individual victims.
The hermetic character of the Holocaust Memorial Name this week criticized by a historian from Culemborg who murdered wanted to adopt Jehovah's Witness, the name of Auschwitz. This was rejected by the organizing committee because only the names of murdered Jews, Roma and Sinti can be adopted. The organization wants according to Jacques Grishaver, the Chairman of the Committee, not build a monument for all victims of war, but specifically for victims of the Holocaust. Jehovah's were not, according to him, for they could save themselves by renouncing their faith.
The organizing committee obviously has the right to decide for itself which group is referred to the monument. At the same time the sole selection criterion one uses regrettable. A monument commemorating the Holocaust is a memorial to the exclusion of groups in society. Close outside, then drain and set aside. A monument in the public area of the capital, aimed at involving everyone there and to warn of the risk of repetition, it would not itself have to exclude a group. There is an opportunity missed.
READ MORE: https://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2017/02/24/holocaust-namenmonument-auschwitz-comite-mist-een-kans-door-vermoorde-jehovas-uit-te-sluiten-6954229-a1547461
SEE ALSO: http://www.stolpersteine.eu/en/
And then a few days later on the letters page
NRC Handelsblad, Monday 27 February 2017, page 17
Jehovah's Witnesses: Mention them just that
The fact that the names of Jehovah's not allowed on the new Holocaust Memorial in Amsterdam because instead of being prosecuted could renounce their faith, is nonsense (NRC 21/2). Jews, Gypsies, communists, resisters, gay and Jehovah's Witnesses were all persecuted and destroyed by the Nazis. After seventy years suddenly come up with additional criteria that someone still has to pay for a victim to be seen, is a slap in the face of the murdered victims, survivors and people like the man in the article who wants to do something to keep memories alive. The organization should be ashamed and should cease to distribute Holocaust victims classes.
Laurens v. der Flier vwo-4, Vleuten
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