Violence is Gibson's message

New York Daily News ^ | 3/02/04 | Richard Cohen

[kattracks]

I saw Mel Gibson's "The Passion of the Christ" the morning it opened. I thought it was tawdry, cartoonish, badly acted and anti-Semitic, maybe not purposely so, but in the way portions of the New Testament are - an assignment of blame that culminated in the Holocaust. But I wrote none of that because something else about the movie disturbed me, and it took days to figure it out. It is fascistic.

I don't know if I use the word right, but in Richard Evans' brilliant "The Coming of the Third Reich," it becomes clear how violence was so much a part of fascism. It was not merely that Hitler and, to a lesser extent, Mussolini used force to get their way, but also that violence almost became part of the ethic - "the cult of violence." After a while, Germans became inured. That, both precisely and surprisingly, is how I felt watching Gibson's disturbingly nondisturbing movie. I was bored stiff.

I abhor violence in movies and avoid films that have more than I think I can tolerate, so I approached the Gibson movie with some dread. I wished that the Anti-Defamation League and other critics had simply ignored it. I even joked with friends that the ADL's Abraham Foxman must be taking a cut (of the gross) for all the publicity. But my joking mood changed when I entered the theater. I became uneasy.

I need not have worried. The movie was inexcusably gory, but I found myself intrigued: Why wasn't I horrified? Instead, I was more like the Roman soldiers who tortured Christ. I did not laugh with glee as they did, but I did find myself at an emotional remove. There was so much horror that almost immediately I became inured to it all. I felt as a surgeon must in the operating theater. More work.

[BkBinder]

I had the same immediate thought, so I looked it up here:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/style/longterm/movies/review97/cohen.htm

To quote him, "But his recreation of the roundup of the Jews in the Cracow ghetto is a frank accounting of what happened there. It's not some sanitary, neat dragnet of people, a chalkboard exercise that ends with the gassing of the naive and the incineration of their bodies -- "processed," in Nazi-talk or, in the boast of the Treblinka death camp, "from door to door in 45 minutes." It is, instead, an unmitigated horror -- an indictment not just of Germans or of Nazis but of human beings. I have read of these events, walked their sites and tried to imagine them, but it was not until Spielberg showed them that I felt their immeasurable horror. Even then the reality was so much worse."

Apparently he didn't think the Speilberg was over the top. Gibson obviously is because he's Christian. Or as they call us over on DU, a fundie.

Now for a pet rant....maybe I'm dense, but behind ever single hateful, sinful act in the movie, wasn't there the same character? I have yet to hear anybody bring out the fact that Satan tempted Christ and corrupter the Jews. Gibson made that perfectly clear, even going to the point of showing that Christ's sacrificial death on the cross was Satan's defeat. Why is this so ignored?

[Aquinasfan]

something else about the movie disturbed me, and it took days to figure it out. It is fascistic.

Just when I thought we were running out of insane movie reviewers writing insane reviews which generate interest in and free publicity for "The Passion," another one comes along. Thanks dude! Just spell the name right.

[Aquinasfan]

It's interesting that the media has finally found a movie in which they can criticize the violence.

Don't forget the "pornography" too, which is also bad. I think. Or was it supposed to be good? It's so confusing.

[Aquinasfan]

I expect this movie to result in a huge SURGE in interest in Christianity in Japan. Churches will be overwhelmed with visitors.

Let us pray. I had thought of it as a tool for evangelizing closed Muslim societies, but this may also finally crack Japanese society.

[TaxRelief]

Fascistic is a very difficult word to use. Cohen blew it.

Fascistic is the adjectival form of the noun fascist (A fascist is a dictatorial person or an advocate of fascism.)
Fascistic can be used to describe the behavior of a person, not a movie. Movies don't have behavior.
The adjectival form of Fascism is fascist.

He should have said "It was fascist."

[Aquinasfan]

IMO non-Christians cannot relate to this film.

Many, but not all. I just talked to a family friend who is the lukewarmest of Christians. He said the movie was the best he had ever seen, and now his atheist mother wants to see it with him! Pray for her.

[kaylar]

...anti-Semitic, maybe not purposely so, but in the way portions of the New Testament are - an assignment of blame that culminated in the Holocaust.

What an ignorant putz. He obviously thinks that Hitler and the nazi leaders were Christian. Hitler was an atheist, and at least some of his followers attempted to foist a revived pagan worship of Odin, Thor, Freya, etc on 20th century Germany. Cohen believes that the Holocaust was simply a late version of the antijewish riots of previous centuries. I thought all educated people knew that Hitler's beliefs were based squarely on "science" : That misguided attempt to link outward appearances-height, hair color,etc-to character traits and intelligence level. In a word, eugenics. Before the discovery of DNA, eugenicists thought every possible trait-truthfulness, a love of the sea, chastity, everything, was passed down in a mendelian manner, like the color of peas. None of Hitler's ideas about women, Jews, Aryans, slavs, et al were original-they were cribbed from dozens of philosophers, scientists, eugenicists , writing from the 1880s on. I rather think that the fact that so many others besides Jews-millions of other peoples, Gypsies, homosexuals, Slavs, epileptics, the retarded. anyone considered biologically inferior-were deemed fit for extermination would in itself prove that it wasn't religious hatred that drove Hitler on.

[ArrogantBustard]

Some people think "anti-Semitic" means "expressing irrational hatred of Jews" ...

It probably did mean that, once.

But no longer.

It now means "anything that Jewish professional victims (such as Mr. Cohen) dislike".

"Racist", and "sexist" have similarly been stripped of their original, literal, meaning through misuse by professional victims.

These words have become meaningless tarballs, thrown by mindless and unimaginative speakers at things they dislike, in order to damage their reputation. The use of these terms tells us more about the user than about the object of his wrath.

[AmishDude]

Not only that, Foxman had to come out denouncing a magazine called . . . I kid you not, Heeb . . . which mocked the film (and Christianity). Here's the thread. An unkind person could even accuse Foxman of inciting such a treatment. But that person would have a wide, ironic smile.

[FITZ]

Has Cohen ever complained about the porn --- or violent porn?

[TaxRelief]

Excellent point, "antisemitic" didn't quite catch on, so he switched gears and tried our the newly-popular "fascist". The libs use to love to call Christians "rascists", and "intolerant homophobes". But they know that we have become inured to the use of those names. So, like good playground bullies, they are breaking out the next batch of "clever" insults.

We can probably look forward to five years of being called "fascists", "Nazi's" and "xenophobes".

"Antisemitic" doesn't ring true to too many in the Jewish community, because no group supports Israel the way the Christians do.

---

On an aside, if anyone has trouble understanding the divergence of views within the Jewish population, I suggest reading The Chosen by Chaim Potok. It is a High School level, short novel about an injuring ball pitch, in a game between two Jewish boys' schools, that leads at first to hostility between the Hasidic boy and the culturally-Jewish youth, then later to an understanding of the real differences between a believer and a non-believer. (A real eye-opener if you managed to skip this one in HS.)

[Toespi]

Yet they'll never admit that those blacklisted were dedicated communists who supported history's greatest mass murderers,

The operative word here is "communist," and I believe their very support of those blacklisted is their admission. The communists made no bones about how they would overtake our free society, they would infiltrate our media, government and morality. They did then and still are operating successfully.

[BSunday]

"Shut Up is BSunday's Message" (to Cohen)

[Sloth]

anti-Semitic, maybe not purposely so, but in the way portions of the New Testament are

That what virtually all of the Passion-bashing boils down to. "This movie is just as bad as the Bible!"

[BSunday]

I thought it was tawdry, cartoonish, badly acted

I don't know. That part of it describes most of what comes out of Commiewood.

[LiteKeeper]

INTREP - THE PASSION OF THE CHRIST

[Aquinasfan]

Has Cohen ever complained about the porn --- or violent porn?

I don't know, but that's been the mantra of the Left regarding this film. "Anti-Semitic, pornographic violence, father's a nut, he's in it for the money," yada, yada, yada.

[Ben Chad]

Excerpt from Washington Post, 1993

Schindler's Lesson
By Richard Cohen
The Washington Post
December 14, 1993

....

Spielberg, too, had to control his anger. For all the horror he puts on the screen, he nevertheless had to omit much. But his recreation of the roundup of the Jews in the Cracow ghetto is a frank accounting of what happened there. It's not some sanitary, neat dragnet of people, a chalkboard exercise that ends with the gassing of the naive and the incineration of their bodies -- "processed," in Nazi-talk or, in the boast of the Treblinka death camp, "from door to door in 45 minutes." It is, instead, an unmitigated horror -- an indictment not just of Germans or of Nazis but of human beings. I have read of these events, walked their sites and tried to imagine them, but it was not until Spielberg showed them that I felt their immeasurable horror. Even then the reality was so much worse.

Schindler's Jews survived the war. He spent his fortune bribing the authorities in their behalf. His exploitation turned to benevolence and then to an audacity that only the heroic could attempt and only the corrupt could bring off. He brazenly entered Auschwitz itself, coolly treating a Nazi official there like a head waiter with his palm out. He became passionate in the protection of his Jews, the Schindlerjuden, moving them -- and his factory -- out of harm's way, ultimately relocating to Czechoslovakia, where they were liberated at the end of the war.

Schindler's wife once said that he had done nothing before the war, little afterward but the period in between was exceptional. So is the movie that tells his story.

[Liz]

Abe Foxman better be careful about hurling charges around.

Awhile back, a judge fined ol' Abe $10.5 million for falsely calling a Colorado couple anti-Semites.

Heaven knows what he'd be fined for calling Heeb anti-Christian (/sarcasm).

[biblewonk]

I've read the book 50 times, I'm not going to see the movie.