How to Be an Upstander Not a Bystander

Yesterday, Jan 27, was Holocaust Memorial Day. It's an opportunity for all of us to stand against hate and remember the millions who were murdered. It's also an opportunity to raise awareness and check in with ourselves about our assumptions and biases.

Inappropriate and inaccurate comments about the Holocaust trivialize genocide and cause real harm to Jewish people. A few days ago I was talking to a lovely person who used the expression “grammar Nazis." I experience microaggressions like this often and it hurts every time.

Here's how to be more inclusive and respectful of your Jewish coworkers or students when discussing the Holocaust:

✅ 1. Don’t trivialize. Don’t make inappropriate comparisons to Hitler or the Nazis. (No, gun control isn’t equivalent to the policies of Nazi Germany.)

✅ 2. Educate yourself about genocides past and present. Don’t conflate genocide with discrimination or other forms of prejudice. The crime of genocide is the act or intent to deliberately and systematically annihilate an entire people.

✅ 3. Challenge Holocaust myths and misconceptions. Don’t repeat the myth that “ordinary Germans” were passive bystanders who looked the other way as their Jewish neighbors were targeted, persecuted, and eventually murdered. The Holocaust never would have happened without millions of German citizens and citizens of other nations *actively* collaborating with the Nazi regime.

✅ 4. Center Jewish people. We must remember the millions of non-Jewish victims of Nazi persecution and murder; their suffering must not be denied or diminished. And yet, only Jews were singled out for complete annhilation because Nazis considered them to be the "priority" enemy to Germany. During the Holocaust, two out of every three European Jews were murdered through brutal mistreatment, mass shootings and gassings, and specially designed killing centers. Discussing this history of state-sponsored mass murder without centering Jewish lives perpetuates antisemitism.

✅ 5. Learn about Holocaust history. In 2020, an alarming 63% of millennial and Gen Z survey respondents were not aware that 6 million Jews were systematically murdered in the Holocaust. The US Holocaust Memorial Museum has great resources.

✅ 6. Be an upstander. If the Holocaust question you’re most interested in is “what would I have done?” it’s time to rethink your assumptions. In the face of the alarming rise of contemporary antisemitism, the question is “what will I do?”

May the memories of the 6 million Jews who were murdered, as well as those who endured and survived, always be a blessing. 🙏🏽🕯️✡️

Are you interested in bringing these timely conversations to your team, organization, or classroom? Contact me and let’s work together to mitigate anti-Jewish bias.

Image description: Visitors gather near the gate rail entrance, of Auschwitz Birkenau, a Nazi concentration and extermination camp in Poland. Image credit: shutterstock.