Another writing bit...
Apr. 20th, 2003 11:19 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
misscamI interviewed an Aussie member of the Church of the World Creator last year and this is what I wrote.
White God
By Camilla Sandman
David is a religious racist.
David believes in God. He goes to church because he wants to, not because he feels obligated. David loves his God and is convinced his God is the right God.
David believes in race. He goes to meeting declaring Jews the menace of the white race because he wants to, not because he feels obligated. David loves his race and is convinced his race is the right race.
“My religion is my race,” he says calmly, as we sit under the open sky in a Brisbane café, watching people walk to and from.
David is white. Under the bright sun he looks almost brown, tanned and the poster child for Australian surfers. He likes to surf, he has told me earlier. He did well in school. He really admires Adolf Hitler.
Adolf Hitler killed millions of Jews and ethnic minorities in his concentration camps, an act condemned by most of the world. David doesn’t. In fact, he doesn’t even believe it happened. He sees himself as a ‘Revisionist’, a small group of people whose one purpose is to ‘revision history’. History is not about facts, David tells me. History is about who writes it.
I don’t tell him I have been to Auschwitz and have seen all the history I could take before I had to run outside, pale and shaking. I don’t tell him that green grass grows in Auschwitz, and that I cried when I saw it. I don’t tell him I’ve met a Holocaust survivor and that I believe no one could fake that dread and horror.
David thinks Holocaust is a big hoax. He met infamous self-proclaimed British historian David Irving when he was in Brisbane in 1986. David and David even got to talk. Irving went on to write more books of how he saw history. David went on with his education.
I ask David how his namesake had fared even though I knew. Irving had sued an American author for calling him a Holocaust-denier and a falsifier of history. Irving had lost on all points, a damning verdict declaring him for all times the worst kind of liar. A set-up, according to David. He doesn’t explain how. It is not the first how he has failed to give me – how holocaust can be a hoax has not been explained to me either. David believes in whys.
He tells me in great length why the Jews would construct such a hoax, why the Allies would go along with such an elaborate conspiracy, why Hitler invaded Norway and Denmark to protect them from England, why God is white.
I don’t tell him I find it strange that the Christian God would be racist when there is no mention of it in any version of the Bible I have seen. I don’t tell him the very notion makes me sick and that my coffee tastes bitterly now.
He tells me more of his White God even though I have not asked. It seems a strange combination of faiths – Christianity and racism. One proclaims love, the other hatred.
“We need hatred,” David says. “Hatred makes us strong.”
I don’t tell him the many victims of hate-crimes might disagree. I don’t tell him hatred torched a mosque here in Brisbane, causing more hatred to erupt. I don’t tell him I believe hatred spawns hatred and that hatred kills.
David tells me he wants to visit Norway, but that he would likely freeze to death there. His laugh is charming, his smile bright. I could have passed him in the street and thought him normal. In a sense, he is. We’ve talked of cricket and he very patiently explained the game to me. He paid for the coffee. And then he told me he hoped Australia would close its borders and not let any more non-Whites in, as it was soiling the purity of the race. Australia should be white, as it once was. He speaks of the strength of the white race, and how it has diminished.
I don’t tell him Australia was never white, that the whites were not even the first here. I don’t tell him I think opening ourselves up to other cultures is good and that we can learn much. I don’t tell him I would like to throw the coffee on him and walk out.
It is David who makes his excuses. He has a meeting he can’t miss, but he enjoyed meeting me and that he hopes I’ve seen his viewpoint.
I don’t tell him I could never see his viewpoint. I don’t tell him his vision makes me cold with anger. I don’t tell him if we ever meet again, I will be on the other side of the fence, protesting against his opinions. I can’t tell him, because I’m a journalist. I tell the stories, I do not pass judgement.
“Do you believe you are right?” I ask as we are about to part.
“Yeah.”
“Why?”
He looks strangely at me.
“I just know. History will deem us right.”
He smiles as he leaves. David, the Revisionist. David the Religious. David the Racist. David the Human.
I could tell his story without my opinions. But if he is right, and history is about who writes it, this story is also about me. And I will not let his vision come to pass.
As I walk home, the skies open, pouring down on black and white alike. And I realise one thing revisions cannot change.
In the rain all humans look grey.
White God
By Camilla Sandman
David is a religious racist.
David believes in God. He goes to church because he wants to, not because he feels obligated. David loves his God and is convinced his God is the right God.
David believes in race. He goes to meeting declaring Jews the menace of the white race because he wants to, not because he feels obligated. David loves his race and is convinced his race is the right race.
“My religion is my race,” he says calmly, as we sit under the open sky in a Brisbane café, watching people walk to and from.
David is white. Under the bright sun he looks almost brown, tanned and the poster child for Australian surfers. He likes to surf, he has told me earlier. He did well in school. He really admires Adolf Hitler.
Adolf Hitler killed millions of Jews and ethnic minorities in his concentration camps, an act condemned by most of the world. David doesn’t. In fact, he doesn’t even believe it happened. He sees himself as a ‘Revisionist’, a small group of people whose one purpose is to ‘revision history’. History is not about facts, David tells me. History is about who writes it.
I don’t tell him I have been to Auschwitz and have seen all the history I could take before I had to run outside, pale and shaking. I don’t tell him that green grass grows in Auschwitz, and that I cried when I saw it. I don’t tell him I’ve met a Holocaust survivor and that I believe no one could fake that dread and horror.
David thinks Holocaust is a big hoax. He met infamous self-proclaimed British historian David Irving when he was in Brisbane in 1986. David and David even got to talk. Irving went on to write more books of how he saw history. David went on with his education.
I ask David how his namesake had fared even though I knew. Irving had sued an American author for calling him a Holocaust-denier and a falsifier of history. Irving had lost on all points, a damning verdict declaring him for all times the worst kind of liar. A set-up, according to David. He doesn’t explain how. It is not the first how he has failed to give me – how holocaust can be a hoax has not been explained to me either. David believes in whys.
He tells me in great length why the Jews would construct such a hoax, why the Allies would go along with such an elaborate conspiracy, why Hitler invaded Norway and Denmark to protect them from England, why God is white.
I don’t tell him I find it strange that the Christian God would be racist when there is no mention of it in any version of the Bible I have seen. I don’t tell him the very notion makes me sick and that my coffee tastes bitterly now.
He tells me more of his White God even though I have not asked. It seems a strange combination of faiths – Christianity and racism. One proclaims love, the other hatred.
“We need hatred,” David says. “Hatred makes us strong.”
I don’t tell him the many victims of hate-crimes might disagree. I don’t tell him hatred torched a mosque here in Brisbane, causing more hatred to erupt. I don’t tell him I believe hatred spawns hatred and that hatred kills.
David tells me he wants to visit Norway, but that he would likely freeze to death there. His laugh is charming, his smile bright. I could have passed him in the street and thought him normal. In a sense, he is. We’ve talked of cricket and he very patiently explained the game to me. He paid for the coffee. And then he told me he hoped Australia would close its borders and not let any more non-Whites in, as it was soiling the purity of the race. Australia should be white, as it once was. He speaks of the strength of the white race, and how it has diminished.
I don’t tell him Australia was never white, that the whites were not even the first here. I don’t tell him I think opening ourselves up to other cultures is good and that we can learn much. I don’t tell him I would like to throw the coffee on him and walk out.
It is David who makes his excuses. He has a meeting he can’t miss, but he enjoyed meeting me and that he hopes I’ve seen his viewpoint.
I don’t tell him I could never see his viewpoint. I don’t tell him his vision makes me cold with anger. I don’t tell him if we ever meet again, I will be on the other side of the fence, protesting against his opinions. I can’t tell him, because I’m a journalist. I tell the stories, I do not pass judgement.
“Do you believe you are right?” I ask as we are about to part.
“Yeah.”
“Why?”
He looks strangely at me.
“I just know. History will deem us right.”
He smiles as he leaves. David, the Revisionist. David the Religious. David the Racist. David the Human.
I could tell his story without my opinions. But if he is right, and history is about who writes it, this story is also about me. And I will not let his vision come to pass.
As I walk home, the skies open, pouring down on black and white alike. And I realise one thing revisions cannot change.
In the rain all humans look grey.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
Re: Wow . . .
Date: 2003-04-20 11:26 pm (UTC)Shades of grey. Just some shades of grey are so dark they look black.
Re: Wow . . .
Date: 2003-04-21 08:20 pm (UTC)Or in the words of Granny Weatherwax: "There's no grays, only white that's got grubby."