May 19, 2005

Film Screening: Children of Survivors Speak We watched the 2G documentary "Then and Now: Children of Holocaust Survivors Speak". (Thanks to Shoshana Romer for bringing her father's film.) In the film, 2Gs speak about their family history and the experience of growing up a child of survivors. Many of their experiences were similar, such as feeling different from their peers and their parents' pervasive silence about the Holocaust. Now, as part of a 2G community in Colorado, they have found solace and comfort in connecting with people like themselves. Afterwards, we discussed: - The film and the differences between us and the 2nd generation. We agreed that the generational gap won't seem as large with the arrival of the fourth generation, most of whom will never have known our grandparents. - Our sense of community and how we may have more in common with each other than we think, even though we're two generations removed from the Holocaust. - How we and our families view intermarriage - The role ordinary citizens, particularly Poles, played in helping to carry out the Holocaust. This topic stemmed from an astounding figure cited in the film -- the Jewish survival rate in Poland was 1.5%. There was interest in seeing the documentary "I'm Still Here", which aired on MTV earlier this month. We wrote the group's mission statement on the board and received some helpful feedback. We had a nice turnout Thursday -- 16 were there. We want to encourage even more people to come to our fifth meeting, since we'll have a very important guest.

April 18, 2005

General Meeting / Discussion Group After everyone introduced themselves and shared a little of their family history, we discussed the following: - Yom Hashoah and our past participation. There were also announcements of upcoming commemoration events. - Holocaust Denial, which included a reading of Deborah Lipstadt's letter to the Times about C-SPAN's coverage of her book "History on Trial". We talked about deniers, delegitimizers and their motivations. - What's the meaning of 3G Activism? We tried to define what activism would mean to this group. Is it enough to meet once a month and talk about issues or should our goals be more broad? There was a consensus not to rush into group activism until we have a well-defined purpose and message.