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From: mmt@dciem.UUCP (Martin Taylor)
Newsgroups: net.politics
Subject: Re: Dave Holt Good and Bad
Message-ID: <348@dciem.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 2-Sep-83 11:41:06 EDT
Article-I.D.: dciem.348
Posted: Fri Sep  2 11:41:06 1983
Date-Received: Fri, 2-Sep-83 14:25:24 EDT
References: <1996@tekecs.UUCP>
Organization: D.C.I.E.M, Toronto, Canada
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Someone on the net responded to David by saying that perhaps the 
hardship his friend had faced in the Soviet Union was because he 
was a Jew, and perceived to be an "enemy of the State" as he put it.   
I ask what the hell difference does that make ??? Would that justify 
the actions of the Soviet govenment?  To justify the actions of the '
Soviet Government in this way validates racism, forced labor camps,
and murder as legitimate government policy. 
=======================

Of course there is no justification for such instruments of state policy,
but please don't exempt "our side" from criticism. In North America alone,
just remember the concentration camps for patriotic US and Canadian
citizens who happened to be of Japanese descent in WWII, or think of
the murder camps arranged for Amerindians less than 100 years ago.
The Russians don't run the worlds's most humane society, but blasting
them out of the water on the issue is, to mix a metaphor, the pot
calling the kettle black. I know, now "we" are good guys :-), but give them
a hundred years to emerge from the despotism of centuries and maybe
they will be as well. Doesn't the Bible say something about taking
the beam out of one's own eye...?

Martin Taylor