That word again
The family of Sir Nicholas Winton, who organised the rescue of more than 600 children from the Nazis, say he refused to think of himself as a hero. The philanthropist is now the subject of a film which tells the story of him bringing them from German-occupied Czechoslovakia to the UK in 1939.
His grandson Laurence, who lives in Herefordshire, said the making of the film had been an emotional process. It also had a pertinent message about refugees today, he added.
Sir Nicholas, known as Nicky to his friends and family, saved 669 young children in the nine months leading up to the outbreak of World War Two.
Missing: the word “Jewish.” It seems it’s become an obscenity to the BBC.
The piece is headlined ‘Sir Nicholas Winton: Holocaust saviour “did not think he was a hero”‘. The reference to the Holocaust is specifically a reference to the Nazi mass-murder of European Jews and will be read as such, certainly in Britain and I imagine elsewhere.
There is a link to a series of other recent pieces on the Holocaust directly below the headline. Several of them refer explicitly to the Jewish victims, eg this one from 29 December: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-67796417:
And this one from 22 December: Sir Anthony Hopkins on telling story of ‘hero’ Sir Nicholas Winton in One Life:
In Britain schools are legally required to teach children about the Holocaust as part of the history curriculum, and have been for many years: see https://www.het.org.uk/about/holocaust-education-uk. So for most readers in the UK, any reference to the Holocaust is going to evoke the historical details and context .
guest – that’s not a reason to omit all mention of them, especially in the wake of October 7.
Also that’s the opposite of normal journalistic practice. One doesn’t omit key facts on the assumption that everyone will know those key facts; one spells out everything, because that’s the job.
NightCrow (sorry I missed your comment at first – it was held because of the links) – no doubt all that is true but so what? Anyway (see above) newspapers don’t do that – they spell everything out at the beginning, because they’re addressing a wide audience and it’s a mistake to assume knowledge. There’s no reason not to say “Jews” or “Jewish” even once, so why the complete avoidance?
While this is true, there is a tendency in certain quarters to use the word “Holocaust” to refer to all Nazi murders, perhaps for lack of an equally succinct term, perhaps as a result of a deliberate attempt to minimize atrocities against Jews.
Could be, I think there’s a sense in which the non-Jewish victims have previously been mostly ignored in any discussion of the Holocaust. “Inclusivity” if you will.
I think there’s just a general cynicism and paranoia about…