Whoopi Goldberg may not have articulated very well what she was trying to say, but what she was trying to say is felt by many of us within the Black community and who are descendants of people held in captivity and subjected to the persistently long and evil nightmare called slavery. When Black people hear about the Jewish Holocaust, though satanically evil, we cannot help but think about the holocaust of enslavement in the Americas, introduced to the British colony in 1619, but existing in the so-called New World prior to that date. Genocide was carried out against Indigenous populations in the Americas, and the Caribbean, and millions, if not billions of lives were lost, worked to death, hung, burnt, raped, whipped, lynched, shot, uprooted, and destroyed for more than 400 years. That means that there were 400 years of death camps in the Americas that continued with impunity.
The historical effects of enslavement continue today in terms of gaps in wealth, income, education, health disparities, and mass incarceration. Whenever there is any attempt to respond to the historical carnage and damage inflicted onto families being ripped apart, children being sold off as sex slaves, and women, men, and children being sold into lives of hell, the response from many has been to “get over it,” “stop complaining,” “It wasn’t that bad,” or “that was in the past.” The reality of the criminal and horrific brutality, and lasting inhumanity of the legacy of enslavement is hardly met by the larger society with the same kind of zealous and punitive response as comments about the Jewish Holocaust.
Whoopi Goldberg saw the racism of the Jewish Holocaust through the lens of the holocaust in the Americas. These are two very separate realities that she was trying to articulate. The holocaust of the Americas was based entirely on skin color, as opposed to the “master race” ideology of the Nazi regime that excluded everyone from intellectuals, to gays, to the disabled, to the Roma people, and yes also Jews.
In the Americas there was the one drop of Black blood rule, where one drop of Black blood made someone Black and not white. Categories were created to define Blacks according to the amount of white blood in their veins. Terms such as negro, mulatto, griffe, quadroon, and octoroon, among many other terms were coined to create classifications for the percentage of Black/white blood. This clearly illustrates how whites in the Americas were consumed with skin color and the creation of caste based on skin color and blood. So, the non-white person, no matter the percentage of white blood, was always met with suspicion, hate, violence, and even death. And that is still the case today.
Furthermore, Blacks have witnessed European immigrants coming to the US being name-called and discriminated against upon arrival, but in a generation they have ceased to be “the other”. Immigrants of European blood were able, and usually do assimilate into whiteness with all its privilege and benefits. This means that they join the ranks of white America protected by the political, economic, and social layers of white supremacy, while denying that the fruits, benefits, and wealth of American whiteness stems from stolen Black labor. Restitution has never been offered for all the privileges and power amassed through the labors of enslaved Black people. Centuries of robbed labor and lives have enriched the US, and yet whites bristle whenever the discussion of reparations emerge.
The Jewish Holocaust lasted from 1941-1945, and of course there were other pogroms carried out against the Jews historically in Europe, but the racism of Europe, and the genocide of Jews on that continent must be put into perspective alongside all of the other groups and peoples who have experienced holocausts. This is not to measure whose pain is worse, but it is to recognize that there are some things that remain, like the history of African enslavement and the genocide of Indigenous peoples that the world has never come to grips with, and only a few really decry when this horrible history is minimized or denied.
Within the Black psyche there remains the muted outrage of why the European atrocity against Jews is recognized, made to be regarded and respected, and made sacrosanct, while African enslavement in the Americas are treated as a footnote, if that. Hence, when it comes to talking about genocide against people of African descent there is the boogeyman of Critical Race Theory, and demands to sanitize history in schools because it might make white people and white children feel guilty.
Jews have been allies of Blacks from time to time, but not always. Jews in America have been discriminated against, name-called, and killed for being Jews. But also Jews have benefited from America’s white privilege and the systems of white supremacy. A European Jew can generally flip, based upon skin color, from being a Jew one moment and perceived as white the next, and of going from oppressed one moment to becoming oppressor in the next. This is not within the realm of possibilities for Black people, unless we pass for white because of light skin color, as some have done, which means cease to exist as Black people. But for the majority of us assimilation to whiteness is not possible or desired, which means that the Americas must come to terms with the permanence of Black people, the history and presence of white supremacy, to name it for what it is, confess the bad and the ugly, and to confront the horrible truths of this period in the history of the US in order to begin to elevate Black, Indigenous, and Brown holocausts to the same levels as the Jewish one.
Also, the guilt of White America and Europe over the inaction during the Jewish Holocaust has given to the Jewish community the power of shaming those white nations. The privilege afforded the Jewish community because of white guilt regarding their oppression, and its close relationship to white privilege, has elevated the horrors of the European death camps into a political power equation. This equation has virtually made it impossible to question any Jewish political agenda, and that agenda often manifests itself as blind support and allegiance with the state of Israel. The Jewish Holocaust’s narrative has been used as a political/psychological tool in the US and among the other so-called “white nations” to such a degree that even human rights violations by Israel are ignored. There are atrocities carried out against Palestinian Christians, Muslims, and African immigrants in Israel that are met with silence, and silence equates approval. These human rights violations committed by Israel are protected because to unmask them is to bare a chorus of antisemite allegations.
However, Archbishop Desmond Tutu called what was going on in Israel apartheid. Amnesty International in a February 2022 report also labeled Israel an apartheid state. Yet, in a polarized political climate as exists in the US today the report of Amnesty International was met with a hail of criticism from both sides of the political aisle. Finally, something that politicians across party lines can agree upon, supporting Israel right or wrong.
I cannot fully get into the head of Whoopi Goldberg, but I can hear the frustration and rage that exists when the genocidal hatred and violence of more than 400 years is met with relative silence, while the European Holocaust is drilled into the consciousness and narrative of the nation and the world. Let us be fair and equal about the death and destruction inflicted upon peoples, and maybe we will remember that the horrors of Black Death camps and enslavement went on for 400 years.
It is true, and people need to at least admit this point, that wherever in the world a racial attacker comes into a room, and a Black person and a Jew of European descent are standing side by side, and there is nothing to distinguish the Jew as a Jew, the rage will be unleashed upon the Black person for no other reason than the color of the skin. The hatred and racism of the 1940s in Europe is quite different from the persistent hatred and violence against people of African descent in the Americas. Until we admit the difference, and raise the genocide of Black people and Indigenous peoples to at least the same level as the Jewish Holocaust there will remain the muted rage that won’t remain muted, and on occasion will scream out.
This is a very powerful piece by Rev. Graylan Scott Hagler. He expresses, articulately and eloquently, what Whoopi Goldberg was not allowed to express, because debate about the meaning of the Holocaust is simply not allowed. Any question about it’s meaning – or, for that matter, about its true history (i.e. numbers of Jews murdered for example, not about whether or not it actually occurred) – is met with the charge of anti-Semitism. What should have been a meaningful discussion of the Black and Jewish perspectives on the Holocaust vs anti Black racism in this country was cut short by the Zionist masters and Whoopi was cancelled.
As their power is steadily diminishing, and the truth is finding its way more and more into the mainstream, the Zionist leaders are becoming more and more desperate. Simply expressing sympathy for the Palestinians is considered anti-Semitic in their minds. It is both pathetic and dangerous, but it further portends the end of the racist ideology we know as Zionism.
Rev. Hagler’s article helps greatly in moving the discussion forward, but I’d like to address a couple of his points. First, I find the assertion that slavery was a “holocaust” to be problematic, just as I would find it problematic if someone used the world “slavery” as a synonym for genocide. Yes, the institution of slavery resulted in mass deaths and cultural genocide, and the Holocaust included forced labor. But death was the primary purpose of the Holocaust, just as forced labor was the purpose of American slavery, at least originally. Indeed, the word “holocaust” literally means “burnt offering”. According to Wikipedia, it was first used to describe the Armenian genocide, and the Nazi crematoria make it even more apt for the Nazis’ genocide. Rev. Hagler weakens his argument by using a word that vividly brings to mind the burning of flesh when referring to slavery.
Second, there’s the issue of equivalence and why it even matters. Although I lost family in the Holocaust, I’m as offended as anyone that their deaths have been used to serve a parochial rather than a universal purpose. Though the Nazis clearly were hung up on race, the result was suffering. The experience of suffering isn’t Jewish, Romani, gay, Slavic, disabled, or any other characteristic that the Nazis targeted; it’s universal. While suffering has different flavors depending on the circumstances, it always involves hurt, and it always calls for empathy. When the focus is, “Are the Jews still suffering or at risk?” instead of, “Who’s suffering now or at risk?” it’s natural that others would ask, “But what about us?” But why does, “What about us?” have to be about equivalence? Whenever I’m engaged in trying to prevent either type of experience from persisting or recurring, I want to know what each experience was like without comparison to the other, so that I can recognize the features and see the warning signs. No one needs to convince me that either is bad enough to care about.
For Whoopi Goldberg, as, probably, for most people today, race equals colour. It didn’t always. Jews were considered to be a different race. So were Italians, Greeks, etc. But not within living memory, unless you are very old indeed. American Jews, as well as Italians, Greeks, etc., have become white.
My father wrote a song called “Carrying On the Race,” in the 1950s. It was sung by a group of mothers with strollers. The race? The human race.
Some thoughts about the term ”Holocaust”. I know the term is established so the lines here can be considered pure non sense or a theoretical discussion.