Roald Dahl’s family quietly issues apology for late author’s anti-Semitism
he was a pos
https://nypost.com/2020/12/05/roald-dahls-family-issues-apology-for-authors-anti-semitism/
I read the story on that link, and just want to say that his comments are not all that uncommon for people born in the beginning of the 20th century. Much like the stereotypes of other minorities, they are often taught by elders and passed down generation to generation. They eventually will die out if there's no truth to them.
I am a black man who was raised in a middle class Italian/Jewish neighborhood, and I heard plenty of things about Jews from my relatives I can tell you. Strangely, none of those things I heard translated to the friends I made in school. Maybe some of those hateful things *were* true more in the old days. All I know is that I've never seen anything in my lifetime that remotely fit what I was "taught".
Odd that Dahl called himself an anti-Semite. Most racists in polite society generally deny they are. While I happen to think his comments about Jews are dead wrong, they were his opinion. The biggest difference with him is that he made them publicly and unapologetically.
To me, people show their true colors by actions, not words. I'd like to think that had he lived into the 21st century, Dahl might have had a different opinion. I may be wrong, but my first inclination is to give people the benefit of the doubt, particularly those who were born 50 years before me.
I think if he was born in Germany in 1916 and not England, he would have been in the SS. He really was a hateful person.
shareI think you underestimate the time in which Dahl was born and the effect it had shaping people's opinions. They didn't live in an era of instant news and information. Most of what they learned was word of mouth.
The kind of statements Dahl made were not uncommon back then, and not generally frowned upon unless of course you happened to be Jewish. You can't judge people and their words or even actions from an earlier era with the same "sensibilities" we have now. It just doesn't work. Some day, people will judge us by their new sensibilities, whatever those might be. You might be surprised how many of the things you said here on MC might someday be considered hateful and offensive.
As for if Dahl was a hateful person or not, I have no clue. Maybe he was down deep. What I do know is that there's nothing in what I read that would convince me of that or that he couldn't or perhaps didn't change toward the end of his life.
My father knew such a hateful person. He stormed out of my dad's house because my father was watching Fiddler on the Roof. True story. *That* is a hateful person.