IBM, Disney, Bush: Nazis?

[davemarc]

From: Terrance <lycidas2 at earthlink.net>
>
> You see, once genocide is introduced, the killing of six
> million Jews, all bets are off.

What does this mean?  I doubt that Terrance means that in the event of
genocide (as
opposed to, say, car theft or rape) survivors should not be able to seek
reparations and other form of compensation through legal channels, but I
don't see what the expression could mean besides that (or nothing at all).

> Is it so absurd to
> suggest that the blame game here, blame  Bush, IBM, Disney,
> the Oil industry, the CIA, may have more in common with the
> blame game of the Nazis than civil rights activism?

Yes, it is very absurd.  The "blame game" in terms of, say, the IBM legal
case (which is my focus in this thread) has to do with tracking down
evidence of the interrelationship of IBM's activities and the ability of
bureaucrats such as Eichmann to conduct genocide.  It is dependent on
ascertaining the degree of corporate responsibility, and conducted through a
court system that seeks firm evidence and considers all parties to have
equal legal standing.  It does not seem to be a clear-cut case at all, but
that is often the type of case that does end up in legal systems.  No lives
are in jeopardy.

In contrast, the Nazi "blame game" consisted of perpetuating Big Lies that,
for example, accused a mass Jewish conspiracy of poisoning Aryan blood,
losing World War I for Germany, and basically being unworthy of citizenship
rights, including the right to live freely.  In the Nazi "blame game," an
infant with a Jewish grandparent was just as guilty as a decorated
German-Jewish war veteran, a Jewish professor of physics, a rabbi, a Jewish
Jewish pedarest, or a Jewish traitor--and a major part of the "blame game"
was meant to ensure that none received anything resembling a fair legal
hearing involving factual evidence.  They were subject to household
invasion, confiscation of property without compensation, deportation,
slavery, and torture, and execution.  Lives were constantly in jeopardy.

If one is honestly seeking to find a historical situation that is analogous
to the IBM legal case, I am sure that a much better one can be found than
Nazi genocide.  However, I also feel that finding such an example might be
difficult, because past victims of mass persecution might have been
relatively silent and unable to use legal channels are they may do so today.
That is one reason why I think that such cases do represent legal activism
on behalf of victims that is akin to civil rights actions.

Regarding Disney and the Bush family, I have not paid attention to those
aspects of this thread.  So I may be missing something.  I don't, however,
see how Walt Disney or his family have been oppressed by any power, and I
don't see what may boil down to a single forwarded article or email about a
Bush connection to the Nazis as being all that terrible either if it is
fact-based.  I seem to recall that it might have involved some transitive
property of family guilt, but as bad as that might be, it is hardly unique
to the Nazis.  The bottom line is that neither the Disneys nor the Bushes
have been subjected to anything that would put their treatment on a equal
footing to that doled out by the Nazis onto their victims.  Such equations
have been described here as "unpalatable"--and I agree to the extent that
they are simply in bad taste.  There are plenty of other examples that would
apply much, much better, and would be much more instructive.

d.