Criticism of actress Whoopi Goldberg for declaring that the Holocaust was not ‘about race’

BBC News Brazil

Actress Whoopi Goldberg, 66, sparked outrage on Monday after claiming on a US talk show that the Holocaust “wasn’t about race”. On ABC’s The View, she said that the Nazi genocide of Jews involved “two groups of whites.”

Critics pointed out that Hitler himself expressed his hatred of Jews in racial terms. And later, she apologized for the statement. The Nazis, who saw themselves as an Aryan “master race”, murdered six million Jews in the Holocaust.

Monday’s row was sparked by the banning of a comic strip about Nazi death camps during World War II by a Tennessee school board.

Maus, which portrays Jews as mice and Nazis as cats, has won several literary awards. The school board said it banned the book because its foul language, nudity and depiction of suicide were inappropriate for 13-year-olds.

Goldberg, who has been on The View since 2007, told the show’s co-hosts, “I’m surprised it made you uncomfortable, the fact that there was some nudity.”

“I mean, it’s about the Holocaust, the murder of six million people, but didn’t that bother you?” “If you’re going to do that, then let’s be honest. Because the Holocaust is not about race. No, it’s not about race.”

Co-host Joy Behar noted that the Nazis said Jews were a different race. And Goldberg replied, “But it’s not about race. It’s not. It’s about man’s inhumanity to another man.”

“But it’s about white supremacy,” retorted co-host Ana Navarro. “It’s about going after Jews, Gypsies.” “But they are two groups of white people,” Goldberg countered. Co-host Sara Haines argued that the Nazis “didn’t see them as white.”

And Goldberg continued, “But you don’t understand! The minute you turn it into a race, you’re on this path. Let’s talk about what it is. It’s about how people treat each other. It’s a problem.”

She then waves to someone behind the camera as the show’s theme song plays to indicate the commercial break. Critics condemned the show for airing dangerous disinformation.

Jonathan Greenblatt, leader of the Anti-Defamation League, which fights anti-Semitism, tweeted: “No @WhoopiGoldberg, the #Holocaust was about the Nazis’ systematic annihilation of the Jewish people — who they considered an inferior race.”

“They dehumanized them and used this racist propaganda to justify the massacre of six million Jews. The distortion of the Holocaust is dangerous.”

Meghan McCain, former co-host of The View, tweeted: “Anti-Semitism is a cancer and a poison that is increasingly condoned in our culture and television — and pervades spaces that should shock us all.”

Conservative commentator Ben Shapiro tweeted a quote from Nazi leader Adolf Hitler, who wrote in Mein Kampf (“My Struggle”): “Their very existence is not based on a big lie, namely that they are a community. religious, while in reality they are a race?”

The US Holocaust Museum, in what was interpreted as a tweet in response to Goldberg, wrote: “Racism was central to Nazi ideology. Jews were not defined by religion, but by race. Nazi racist beliefs fueled genocide. and mass murder”.

Amid the criticism, Goldberg later apologized: “On today’s show, I said that the Holocaust ‘wasn’t about race, but about man’s inhumanity to man.’ I should have said it was about both.” wrote Goldberg in a Twitter post.

“Jewish people around the world have always had my support and it will never go away. I’m sorry for the pain I caused,” he added.