holocaust memorial day 2018

i'm fascinated by some of the stuff in my feed from holocaust memorial day - posts claiming that the holocaust wasn't a unique historical event, and posts claiming that we should focus on the other victims as well.

1. never in history has a people been so brutally destroyed on such a massive scale, under such inhumane conditions and with such inhumane efficiency. to claim anything else is to claim ignorance of what actually happened, and i warmly recommend locating a holocaust museum close to you and paying it a visit.

2. yes, there were most certainly other victims of the holocaust. absolutely. but there were six million of us, and as the prime target of the holocaust we're allowed to take one day of the year to remind ourselves and others just how far antisemitism goes - yesterday, today, and tomorrow. that's not to say that the other groups of people who suffered shouldn't be remembered, or aren't welcome to join us in remembering, but i think it's fair to say that they were swept up in something that was created exclusively with us in mind.

---one "friend" actually blocked me for responding to his post about how the holocaust wasn't special, when my response was an explanation about what made the holocaust unique, how an act of genocide demands the complete dehumanization of the enemy and is not the same as violent subjugation. slavery is awful, yes, and lots of people have suffered and died tragically as slaves, but slaves are still seen as having some value to their owners. jews were seen as vermin, not "less than human" but utterly devoid of humanity.

NEVER FORGET.
it was ordinary humans who built and ran the death camps. people like you and me.